Batard Blog

Nothing beats homemade bread, and it’s a lot easier to make than you might think. Master the basic white loaf, then try the easy flavoured breads. Before you know it, you’ll be giving Delia a run for her money!

Types of yeast

• There are three types of yeast: fresh, dried and fast-action (also called easy blend). Fresh and dried need activating before using – whisk with sugar and warm water, set aside in a warm place for 15 minutes until frothy, then use within 15 minutes. Fast-action yeast simply gets stirred into the flour.
• If a recipe uses fresh yeast and you can only find dried, use this as a guide for 500g flour: 15g fresh = 1 tablespoon dried = 7g fast-action.
• Fresh and dried yeast require the bread to prove twice, whereas fast-action generally can be shaped, left to prove once, then baked.
• However, for dough with heavy ingredients kneaded in, or bread that needs a lighter texture, such as focaccia, two rises are best.

Kneading and proving tips

• Knead the dough for at least 5 minutes, or up to 10 if you can! This will produce a lighter loaf.
• If the dough needs two rises, put it into an oiled bowl, cover loosely with oiled cling film and leave in a warm place until doubled in size – this takes from 30 minutes to 2 hours, depending on temperature and amount of dough. An airing cupboard speeds this up.
• Punch the risen dough to ‘knock’ out the air. Knead for a few minutes, adding any other ingredients at this stage. Shape and put onto an oiled baking sheet or in a loaf tin. Cover and leave to rise until doubled in size. Check after 30 minutes or so – over-proving may cause the bread to collapse in the oven.

Baking know-how

• Once ready to bake, you can make slashes in your loaf, or glaze the top with one of the following: milk for a soft crust, salty water for a crisp one, and honey or syrup for a sticky one – ideal for sweet doughs.
• To test your loaf is cooked, turn it upside-down and tap the base – if it sounds hollow it’s ready; if not, cook a little longer and try again. Remove bread from trays and tins while hot and transfer to a wire rack to cool.
• Fresh bread goes stale quickly as it doesn’t contain any preservatives to keep it longer. Wrap and store in an airtight container in a cool place and eat within 1-2 days. Or, freeze for up to 1 month, thaw at room temperature and warm in a moderate oven before eating.

1. Choose fresh, dried or fast-action yeast.

2. Gradually mix in the warm water.

3. Knead the dough for 5-10 minutes.

4. If the dough needs 2 rises, put in an oiled bowl to prove.

5. Punch out the air and knead a second time.

6. Put the dough on an oiled baking sheet.

Basic white rustic loaf This basic loaf is a cinch to make. It’s best eaten on the same day or used for toasting the following day.
Makes about a 750g loaf/12 slices Takes 15 minutes to make, 20-25 minutes to bake, plus proving
500g strong white bread flour, plus extra for dusting 1 tsp fine salt 7g sachet fast-action dried yeast 1 tbsp olive oil, plus extra for greasing
1. Sift the flour and salt into a large bowl. Stir in the yeast. Make a well in the centre and gradually mix in 300ml warm water and the oil until the dough comes together – add a dash more water if it seems dry. 2. Tip out onto a lightly floured surface and knead the dough for 5 minutes, until smooth. Shape like a rugby ball and put onto an oiled, large baking sheet. Set aside in a warm place for 40 minutes or until doubled in size. This is known as proving or rising. 3. Preheat oven to 220°C/fan200°C/gas 7. Make deep slashes with a sharp knife in the top of the dough and dust with flour. Bake for 20-25 minutes, until risen, golden and cooked. To test if it’s ready, tap the base of the loaf – it should sound hollow. 4. Cool on a wire rack and slice to serve.

Flavour and shape your bread

Once you’ve mastered the basic recipe, try flavouring and shaping the dough with these four easy sweet and savoury breads.

Cherry and pecan plait 1. Make the basic dough, but add 2 tsp ground cinnamon to the flour, replace the salt with sugar and oil with maple syrup. 2. Knead, put into an oiled bowl, cover and prove for 1 hour or until doubled in size. 3. Knock out the air, knead in 75g dried cherries and 100g chopped pecans. 4. Divide into 3, roll each into a long sausage, plait, then tuck the ends under. Put on an oiled baking sheet, cover and prove for 45 minutes. Brush with maple syrup and bake for 25 minutes. 5. Cool, drizzle with icing and serve.

Feta, tomato and rosemary flowerpot breads 1. Drain a 240g tub SunBlush tomatoes, reserving 1 tbsp oil and 8 tomatoes. Chop the rest. 2. Make the dough, but add 2 tbsp finely chopped fresh rosemary to the flour and mix in the reserved oil, chopped tomatoes and 250ml warm water. 3. Knead, then knead in 150g crumbled feta. Shape into 8 balls and put in 8 well-oiled and floured 7cm terracotta pots. Prove for 30 minutes. 4. Top with more feta and a reserved tomato, and push in a small, wet rosemary sprig. Bake for 25 minutes.

Olive and thyme focaccia 1. Make the dough, but stir 2 tbsp fresh thyme into the flour; add an extra 1 tbsp oil. 2. Knead, put into an oiled bowl, cover and prove for 11/2 hours. 3. Knock out the air, knead in 100g chopped pitted black olives, shape into a large circle and put on an oiled baking sheet. Prove for 45 minutes. 4. Press fingertips into the dough all over, drizzle with oil, scatter with sea salt and thyme, then bake for 25 minutes. 5. Drizzle with oil and serve warm.

Brown knot rolls with pumpkin seeds 1. Follow the master recipe, but use brown or Granary flour. 2. Divide the kneaded dough into 8 equal pieces. Roll each piece into a long sausage shape, then tie it in a knot, tucking the ends in neatly underneath. 3. Place on a large, oiled baking sheet, spaced well apart. Prove for 30 minutes or until doubled in size. 4. Brush with milk, scatter with pumpkin seeds and bake for about 15 minutes.

by Beth Scott

Don’t you just hate it when you follow a recipe to the letter and when the bread baking is finished the bread not only looks nothing like the recipe book’s picture, but tastes terrible as well?

There is no denying that bread baking as with baking anything is a delicate process.

Bread baking involves so many things that first time bakers are often discouraged after a few failed attempts to turn out professional looking and tasting loaves.

Little do they realize that if they only possessed the professional Baker’s secrets bread baking would be so easy that the bread would practically make itself!

For instance: How many amateur bakers know the secret to keeping bread from sticking to the pan every time?

None! So when they try their hand at bread baking for the first time their bread sticks to the bread pan, and ends up a crumbled mess if they try to force it out.

Then they cry and give up thinking that the problem lies with them.

The shocking truth is that it doesn’t!

The problem lies with their lack of knowledge of THE bread baking secret. The secret professional chefs and bakers won’t tell you, the secret they guard so jealously.

My father happened to learn this bread baking secret in his younger baking days and has passed it on to his children ever since.

Okay, okay, I know you’re probably screaming at me by now “Beth, get on with it! Tell us the bread baking secret already!”

The Baker’s Secret

So here it is; You will need only one tool besides for the oil and bread pan you already have, and that is quite simply cornmeal (you shouldn’t need more than 1/4 to 1/2 cup for two loaves of bread).

“Cornmeal?” you ask doubtfully. “YES, cornmeal!”

No, you do not add the cornmeal to the bread ingredients! That is not the bread baking secret.
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What you do is you oil your pan as usual, and you lightly sprinkle cornmeal on all of the sides and bottom of the bread pan.

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Now you can safely place your bread dough into the pans without fear of it sticking to them.

While your bread is baking instead of sticking to the pan, your bread will stick to the cornmeal and slide easily out of the pan when done baking.
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You may need to use a butter knife and slide it in between the panand the bread before turning the pan over and allowing your bread to pop out.

A lot of the time this will be unnecessary however and your bread will pop out just by your turning the bread pan upside down.

You will probably also want to use the butter knife to scrape the excess cornmeal off the bottom and sides of the bread as you may not care for the taste of cornmeal.

This bread baking secret will work whether you’re baking a batter bread or a rising bread (also called yeast bread). I personally use it for both.

Don’t Burn That Bread

Here is another treasured bread baking secret, this one only for batter breads:

On the last ten minutes of its baking time cover the bread pan containing the batter bread with another bread pan (a steel bread pan works best), and leave it on until the bread is finished baking.

This will keep the batter bread from burning or becoming too hard on top. You may vary the time you leave the steel bread pan on according to how your batter bread usually looks when it is finished.

If it is a very dark brown on top and difficult to slice because the top is so hard, then 20 minutes will work best. But if it is just a little too hard on top and a little too brown the 10 minutes should suffice.

Do not cover the bread at all if it usually comes out golden and soft on top after the baking is completed.

You may also glaze a batter bread on top with a tablespoon of melted butter mixed with a tablespoon of honey, and sprinkle some flaked coconut or sliced nuts on top of that.

To glaze you start by taking the bread out of the oven five minutes before the required baking time is finished, then spread the butter/honey mixture on top of the bread, sprinkle on your coconut or chopped nuts and bake for the remaining 5 minutes.

Here is another useful bread baking tip for rising breads…

Over Rising Bread?

If your bread loaves over rise (say because you were busy and forgot about them), then you can use a pair of scissors to cut off the excess sides, being careful not to cut any dough from off of the top.

You may then use this excess dough to make rolls. You simply oil a pizza or cookie sheet and form the dough into several small balls.

Rise them for another half hour and then bake on 350 degrees Fahrenheit for 15 to 20 minutes or until golden brown.

Do yourself a favor and put these tried and tested bread baking secrets immediately to use in your kitchen, and your family will rave over the results.

Beth teaches bread baking how-to’s so simply that with her new eBook ANYONE can bake their own bread.
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by Dwayne

A while back I saw a picture in a Christmas catalog of a very cool looking pastry/coffee cake and I asked here on TFL How did they do this?  I got the help that I was looking for from this great community.

I’ve been experimenting with Cinnamon Rolls now for a while.  I am using the term Cinnamon Rolls very loosely here, I guess that a better term would be “Stuff rolled up in dough”, however that just does not sound as good.
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So basically what I did was to take my Cinnamon Roll Dough recipe and made it into Nut Rolls using the Potica filling.  I used JoeV’s recipe for the filling (see link above).  You might want to follow JoeV’s Dough recipe Fatburner as well, this makes a lot so you may want to make a half batch.

I’ve now made this twice, once with Almonds and once with Walnuts (Pecans will be my next test and then maybe Hazel Nuts).

So I made my dough as I always do and rolled it out very thin.  I put the Potica filling on top.  I began rolling up the dough (stretching it even thinner as I roll).  I got a big surprise here.  The Potica filling was wet where as my Cinnamon Roll filling is dry and things were behaving a lot differently.  It was a bit harder working with the dough and rolling it up.  When I got all done it felt like I had a tube sock full of mush.

I was stuck with the challenge of trying to slice the rolls and to place them in the pan.  I made the cuts quickly and then using the knife blade as a spatula picked up the roll and placed it on the pan.  I usually like to make my rows all nice and straight but there was no way that I could do that.  I was just happy to be able to scoop them up and place them as best as I could in the pan.
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I let them raise in the pan for a while and then baked them the way I usually do for Cinnamon Rolls.  Again another surprise, they took longer to bake because of the wet filling.  (I know, I’m a slow learner)  I left them in until they looked done.

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I let them cool for 10 minutes and made a Powered Sugar/Milk frosting.  I put this in a zip lock baggie and trimmed off a corner and then just went back and forth over the rolls squeezing out the frosting.

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The last surprise was the way that they tasted.  They were a lot lighter and moister than my Cinnamon Rolls.  The nut filling gave the rolls a great flavor.  Beware: these are very rich.

What I will do differently next time: 1. Hold back the milk from the filling and make it less wet.  I want to be able shape these like I do my Cinnamon rolls. 2. Bake a bit longer. 3. Make a smaller batch or I won’t get any smaller.

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Happy Baking, Dwayne
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By hanseata

Last spring Breadsong posted about Alsatian Beer Bread, a formula developed by Chef Jacquy Pfeiffer, published in “Modern Baking”, a professional bakers’ website .I liked the looks of her buns, and was intrigued by the beer crunch crust  (if it’s crunchy AND made with beer, it must be good!) so I copied the recipe from “Modern Baking” to my ever growing to-do list.
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Alsatia is famous for its  happy marriage between French and German cuisine, as shown in Zwiebelkuchen – Onion Tarte , and Elsässer Apfeltorte – Alsatian Apple Torte.
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It’s also home of one of my favorite authors, Tomi Ungerer, known for his quirky, illustrated books for children and adults, whose heroes are no mild mannered goodie-two-shoes, but usually just the opposite – like the stubborn cat boy in: “No Kiss for Mother”. And even in his wonderful illustrations for a book of German folk songs (“Das grosse Liederbuch”) he always manages to smuggle one little nasty detail in his otherwise idyllic scenes and landscapes.

Like me, Tomi Ungerer loves cats and good food, and is no tee-totaller. And as an Alsatian, he must love this bread, too.

PAIN À LA BIÈRE – ALSATIAN BEER BREAD (3 loaves)
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PATE FERMENTEE 95 g all-purpose flour 95 g bread flour    3 g salt     1 g instant yeast (1/4 tsp.) 119 g water FINAL DOUGH 28 g potato flakes 98 g water, (to soak potato flakes) all pate fermentee 250 g bread flour 125 g rye flour     9 g salt     4 g instant yeast 220 g water BEER CRUNCH (enough for 6 breads) 50 g rye flour 90 g beer 2 g salt 1 g instant yeast rye flour , for dusting

DAY 1:

1. Mix all ingredients for pâté fermentée for 1 – 2 minutes on low speed, adjusting with more water if necessary, then 5 – 6 minutes on medium-high speed (77 – 81 F). Let sit at room temperature for about 1 hour. Cover and refrigerate overnight.

DAY 2 :

2. Let pâté fermentée come to room temperature before using.

3. In a small bowl, mix potato flakes with water.

4. Cut pâté fermentée in small pieces and combine with all dry dough ingredients. Add potato mixture. Add cautiously ca. 220 g water (not all might be needed). Mix on low speed for 6-7 minutes, then on medium-low speed for 2-3 minutes. Dough will be more sticky than tacky.
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5. Let dough rise for ca. 1 hour in a warm place, until almost doubled. It will be very soft and still slightly sticky. Transfer to a floured work surface and divide into 3 equal pieces. Shape pieces first into rounds, then fold 3 sides into center to make triangles. Place on parchment lined baking sheet, seam-side down.

6. Combine ingredients for beer crunch. Brush beer paste generously over loaves, then dust liberally with rye flour. Cover loosely with plastic wrap.

7. Preheat oven to 500 F, including baking stone and steam pan. Let breads proof for 1 hour in a warm place, or until almost doubled. (If rye flour is absorbed, dust again before baking).

7. Bake for 12 minutes at 460 F, steaming with 1 cup of boiling water. Rotate breads 180 degrees, remove steam pan and continue baking for another 15 – 17 minutes (internal temperature at least 200 F). Leave breads in switched-off oven with door slightly ajar for another 10 minutes.

8. Cool on wire rack.

Comments: The original recipe lists only an unspecified pre-ferment. I used a pâté fermentée, but I’m sure a levain would work as well.
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It also has 240 g water for the final dough, but cautions that might be too much. It was! The dough looked at first drier than it really was, and I had to adjust with more flour to keep it from being wet like Pain à l’Ancienne dough, and totally unshapable. Therefore I suggest using 220 g water.

The original formula’s baking temperature (470 F) and time (40 minutes) reflects conditions in a commercial oven, after 20 minutes baking time the breads were already getting rather dark, and after 25 minutes the internal temperature had already reached 208 F, so I took them out. Thinking of David Snyder’s San Joaquin Sourdough, I would next time bake the breads at 460 F, for about 27 – 29 minutes, plus leaving them longer in the switched-off oven to prevent the crust from softening.
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All in all, a really nice bread, with a hearty note from the rye, a great crust, and an attractive look. I will add it to my repertoire.

by txfarmer
( Linkaufbau Agentur )

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After weeks of driving, moving, and settling down, I’ve finally gotten my new kitchen more or less in order and ready to start baking/bloging again. Loving everything about Seattle so far, the active lifestyle, the urban living environment in downtown, the seafood, the “green” mentality — I even like the grey weather! It’s good for making laminated dough…

Now back to bread, this is a very Asian bread, I don’t think I have seen anything similar in a western bakery. It’s essentially the love child of Danish and Asian Style Soft Sandwich bread, inheriting the best qualities of both parties: nice and crispy on the outside, soft inside, and full of buttery goodness. While still a laminated dough, in order to rise high in the sandwich tin, it differes from croissants(tips here) and traditional danishs in following ways: 1. For croissants and danishs, we usually keep the dough fairly dry to ensure crisp and clean layers. While more kneading would make layers seperate more, resulting in a better crumb, we usually don’t knead the dough to fully developement for the ease of rolling out. However, Asian style soft sandwich breads need to be kneaded very well to pass a very thin and strong windowpane test, otherwise the bread volume would suffer, and the texture won’t be shreaddably soft (see details here). For this bread, we do knead the dough well (similar to other Asian style soft sandwich breads). In the mean time, the dough is kept pretty wet to have more extensibility, which make it possible to roll out. 2. Since the dough is fairly wet, and shaping procedure is different from traditional croissants, we don’t expect as many honeycomb-like holes in the crumb, instead, crumb just need to be fairly even and open. In the mean time, the final dough doesn’t need to be rolled out very thin (15mm instead of 4mm for croissants). For those reasons, the amount of roll-in butter is considerably less than croissants. 3. While for this particular batch in the first photo, I did one 4-fold, and two 3-folds, but this bread usually requires less folding than croissants. The most common method is one 4-fold, and one 3-fold, which I tried in another batch with good result. In summary, since the dough requires less folds, and doesn’t need to be rolled out very thin, it’s an easier laminated dough than croissants and danishes. However, it does have different challenges: the intensive kneading to full developement, the final shaping which requires concise cutting and weighing, as well as braiding.

Laminated Sandwich Loaf (Adapted from many different sources) Note: for details and tips on making croissants, please see this post Note: for tips on kneading soft sandich loaves see this post> Note: this recipe makes about 930g of dough, less or more depending on how much you trim off the edges etc.

-levain starter (100%), 44g water, 75g bread flour, 134g

1. mix and leave at room temp for 12 hours.

-final dough bread flour, 361g milk, 145g egg, 77g sugar, 60g salt, 10g instant yeast, 7g butter, 41g, softened levain, all roll-in butter, 245g

1. Mix everything other than butter, knead until gluten starts to form. Add in butter, mix until fully developed. see this post for details. 2. Round, press flat, put in fridge immediately for 2 hours. 3. Make butter block, put in fridge for at least one hour before using.  Take out the dough, roll out, and enclose butter. (see this post for details) 4. Roll out to 20X60CM, fold one 4-fold as in the following pictures. Put in fridge for one hour

5. Roll out again and do one 3-fold, put in fridge for one hour. (see this post for details) 6. Repeat 5. (optional) 7. Roll out dough to 1.5CM-2CM thickness. Length of the dough piece  would depend on the tin you use. Since we are braiding them, you will need the length to be about 2X length of the tin. 8. Cut the dough into thin pieces. This is where experience becomes important. We are braiding 3 pieces into one group, each group need to have a certain weight. Do note that if a tin requires more than one group of dough, each group should weigh the same, otherwise bread would appear uneven at the end. In another word, for each tin, select a weight for each dough group (less for flat top, more for round top),  then stick to that weight for each group of dough. a) For my bigger Chinese pullman tin (pictured on the left), I need 2 groups, each group has 3 pieces, and each group (all 3 pieces together) weigh 225-250g (225g if cover of the tin is used to make a flat top shape, more if cover is not used to make round top as in the picture). b) For my small Chinese pullman tin, I only need one group of 3 pieces, each group (all 3 pieces together) weigh 150g (if cover of the tin is used to make top flat). c) For 8X4 US loaf tin,  I suggest to use 2 groups, each group has 3 pieces, and each group (all 3 pieces together) weigh 250-270g. d) For KAF 13X4X4 pullman pan, I would suggest to use 4 groups, each group has 3 pieces, and each group (all 3 pieces together) weigh 195-215g. 9. For each group of 3 pieces of dough, braid them. Make sure the cut surface is facing up, to expose the layers. Fold ends under, put into tin. 10. Proof at around 27C until 80-90% full, about 4-5 hours in my case. Egg wash if you are not using the pullman pan cover.

11: Bake at 425F for 10min, lowered to 375F and bake until done. The bigger Chinese tin which took 450g – 500g of dough, needed about 40-45min of TOTAL baking time. The smaller tin which took 150g of dough, needed 30min in total. If colors too much, cover with foil.

If the gluten network is fully developed, the bread should be proud and tall, with clear

layers visible.

If the pan cover is used, the dough amount needs to be fairly accurate for the pan, other wise it’s each too short (not reaching the top), or bursting out (the cover can literally be blown open). This neat rectangle shape is nicknamed “golden sticks”.

The crumb soft but open with honeycomb structor.

In general, I feel it’s easier than croissants, since you can fold less and doesn’t have to roll out as thin. However, the success does depend on proper kneading and careful piecing and shaping.

By Beyondthebread

Hi, this is Daniel Rios (Beyondthebread).  Here is a photo from my latest blog entry using a pan au lait (milk bread) recipe.  I used the dough to make monkey bread, shown here, and will be posting Friday and Monday with 2 more uses for the same dough.  Here is the recipe I used . I hope to find bakers who love to talk bread and can add their expertise to my posts.  Come check out the recipes and pictures on Beyondthebread.com.  Let me know what you think and share your stories of baking.

I have been a professional baker for over 7 years now and have now started my own website to share everything that I can about my experiences and whatever experiments I decide to try out.  You will be seeing me on this site more often, now that I have found it.  I hope to meet other professional or baking enthusiasts who share my love for all things baking.

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