Lean Bread

So the family is sending me a message that reads something like..."hey we think it is cool that you are making bread...now make some that doesn't suck". Maybe that is not the message they intended to send, but that is the message I received...

They gave me two books...artisan breads every day by Peter Reinhart and another one put out by a chain restaurant. I was not all that impressed with the chain book so we took it back to the store. I wasn't planning to get another bread book, but I found another one by the same author called Crust and Crumb that looked interesting and was sporting a James Beard award so I went ahead and got it. When I started this bread baking journey one of the books I looked at was The Bread Baker's Apprentice also written by Peter Reinhart. I guess this is like THE book to have if you are serious about becoming a baker, so I figure this guy Reinhart knows his stuff. The problem for me with The Bread Baker's Apprentice was information overload...it is like an encyclopedia of bread making knowledge and I just want to make a loaf of bread.

See I am not looking to become a master baker, I just want to be able to make some good bread. OK, that is understating it a bit, because I do want to master one or two recipes, but I am never going to make pumpernickel  or any other kind of rye for that matter. And I really don't care about the differences between European and North American flours. I just need to know that basics. So far it seems that artisan breads every day is exactly the kind of book I need. Crust and Crumb goes a bit deeper into stuff so for now I will just be using it as reference material. ABED will most likely be doing all of the driving for the first leg of this journey.

The concept of the book is to take classic artisan breads and make them simple for the "home chef". The key trick is cold fermentation. Mix up the dough, kneed it a bit, then throw it in the fridge overnight. The next day you can take it out of the fridge, shape it into a loaf and bake it. Parking it in the fridge slows down the fermentation allowing for the development of more complex flavor. One of the suggestions in the book is to keep a log of your baking making notes about what works and what doesn't work. This seems like a good idea considering what I am trying to do, so instead of just creating a google doc, I figured I would share my adventure with the world...

December 27, 2011 Lean Bread...flour, water, salt yeast.

Up to this point I had been making small batches of dough because I was just flying by the seat of my pants and  didn't want to waste too much, but now I am jumping in with both feat...plus I was concerned that trying to cut the recipe would introduce extra complications that would make it harder for me to troubleshoot. So I followed the recipe to the gram and loaded everything in the mixer. Actually this is where I made my first flub. The recipe calls for 2 1/4 cups of water. My measuring cup is only 2 cups so I turned on the mixer dumped in the 2 cups and went back to the sink for the 1/4. There was a big clump of dough on the paddle and a bunch of dry flour in the bottom of the bowl. Oops. After the fact I am thinking that the problem was more with the mixer than the missing water...the instruction said to use the paddle blade, but the dough hook for my mixer is designed to mix and kneed. So put all the water in at once, and use the dough hook. I think I flubbed a bit with the stretch and fold technique that is used to "kneed" the dough, but in the end I got it figured out and into the fridge.

The next day we had something planned for first thing in the morning, but figured we would be back home in a couple hours and I could bake...couple of hours turned into all day and when I finally grabbed the bowl of dough from the fridge I was already on edge. First thing I did was divide the ball in half and stuck part of it back in the fridge. I am pretty sure this was about the only thing I did right and even that was wrong. The instructions about when to divide the dough are something like "Put the dough in the fridge for 4-12 hours or up to 4 days. If you aren't baking the whole thing divide it at this point." At this point...is that the point when it goes in the fridge or at the end of 4-12 hours? Anyway I am pretty sure he means if I know a head of time that I am splitting up the batch then I should split it right away...but I digress. 

The first loaf...don't do any of those things again. No need to get into everything that went wrong lets just leave it at...there are times when you should just leave the dough in the fridge...or something. The upside of the disaster...there was some pretty good flavor lurking in the thing that came out of the oven. 

The second loaf...I made bread! Good bread even. Not quite great bread yet, but it is way past "meh".

There are a couple of issues to resolve. First I am still trying to get a handle on shaping, this one came out OK, but I really need to get a better handle on how to do it "right". The other thing that comes to mind is I need to work on the scoring. Apparently there is a special knife that bakers use to do the scoring, but there is no way I am buying a knife that only exists cut slash marks in dough...I will find a good compromise. 

Notes from the peanut gallery..."You are getting better" and "it's too chewy".

The next recipe in the book is "Classic French Bread", pretty much the same recipe with some variation in technique, so I figure I will try that next. 

Another thing that you might want to stay tuned for...the mother. I will most definitely be making a real sour dough, even if it is just so I can call home one day and yell into the phone "FEED THE BITCH!"...