Journal For Bread Making Modern

Writing Down Your Bakes Actually Changes the Result

I started keeping records because my sourdough kept turning out inconsistent, and I couldn't figure out why. I tried everything from spreadsheets to custom apps, but the most reliable method I found was just writing things down in a simple, structured journal. It's called Journal For Bread Making Modern, and it's basically a dedicated system for logging every variable that goes into your bake. At its core, the journal works by having you record three things before you mix and three things after: hydration percentage, starter activity level, ambient temperature, and fermentation time, followed by dough feel, oven spring, and crumb structure rating. That's it. Nothing fancy. You're training yourself to notice patterns over months of bakes instead of guessing on each attempt. Here's how I set it up. I use a basic notebook divided into two sections per page. The left side is prep notes, the right side is post-bake evaluation. I write the date and time at the top of each entry, then fill in the metrics as I go. When I get to the post-bake section, I rate the loaf on a one through five scale for crust, crumb, and overall taste. After about ten entries, I start seeing trends I'd completely miss otherwise. Like the fact that my dough consistently overproofs when I bake after 9 PM and the kitchen hasn't cooled down yet.

The biggest mistake people make is treating the journal as a chore and filling it in vaguely. "Good bread" tells you nothing. "Crust too thick, crumb gummy, probably underproofed by 20 minutes" tells you exactly what to change next time. Be specific or the whole system breaks down. I ran into one edge case that almost made me quit entirely. My baker's percentage calculations kept being wrong because I was weighing the finished loaf instead of the pre-bake dough weight. This threw off every hydration number for subsequent entries and made the data look completely unreliable. The fix was simple but not obvious to me at first: I started photographing the scale reading right after mixing, before anything fermented or baked. Takes three seconds. Saved the entire dataset. There's a practical limitation worth mentioning. This system only works if you actually stick with it for at least two months. The first dozen bakes will feel pointless because there isn't enough data to spot patterns yet. Most people quit around bake number four and never benefit from it. If you're a casual hobbyist who bakes once a month, a simple sticky note on the fridge works just as well and requires less overhead.

Another common pitfall is recording temperature but not humidity. In my experience, ambient humidity affects fermentation speed more than most bakers account for, especially in winter when heating systems dry out indoor air. A cheap hygrometer costs about fifteen dollars and gives you a variable you can actually track over time. I wish I'd started doing this from day one. What really separates this from just scribbling notes is the retrospective review. Once a month I flip back through the previous entries and look for correlations. Did higher hydration correlate with better oven spring that month? Did certain flour brands consistently produce denser loaves? These insights don't show up in real time. They only appear when you step back and compare entries side by side. I've seen people try to replace this with phone apps, and while some apps exist, they tend to encourage shallow entries with too many dropdown menus and not enough room for actual observation. A physical notebook forces you to slow down and think about what you're writing. That reflection is where the learning happens.

If you want a starting template, here's what I use. Date, time, flour type and brand, hydration percentage, starter feed ratio and timing, bulk fermentation duration and fold schedule, shaping notes, final proof duration and method, oven temperature and steam technique, bake time, pre-bake dough weight, post-bake loaf weight, crust rating, crumb rating, taste rating, and one sentence on what to adjust next time. That's roughly twenty data points per bake. Ten minutes max to write them down. The system doesn't guarantee better bread. You still need to understand fermentation and gluten development. But it gives you a feedback loop that most bakers go their entire lives without. I've been doing this for about eighteen months now and my consistency has improved noticeably. My failure rate dropped from roughly one bad loaf in four to one in twelve. That's the value I can point to.