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[Bread Thread] Bake with your focused rage
firewaterword
SatchitanandaPais Vasco to San FranciscoRegistered User regular
SatchitanandaPais Vasco to San FranciscoRegistered User regular
What's up homeys? I want to bake some bread. Preferably well, and in a manner that yields some goddamn delicious bread.
Bread that looks something like this:
This is sort of inspired by a brodown weekend involving a lot of food and beer. My buddy had just got the Tartine cookbook, and jesus christ was I impressed by that dude's level of breadmanship. It's seriously scary. Man's a bread scientist. Anyway, I'm going to attempt to follow his recipe for basic (hahaha) country bread. A basic recipe that requires training a starter for days and days on a strict schedule before you even think about the whole baking bit.
But anyway, what are you guys and gals into with regards to the creation and consumption of delicious bread? My ideal creation would be a quality rustic olive loaf, because hot damn is that stuff good. But I think I'll work on the basics first or something.
Bread!
Bread that looks something like this:
But anyway, what are you guys and gals into with regards to the creation and consumption of delicious bread? My ideal creation would be a quality rustic olive loaf, because hot damn is that stuff good. But I think I'll work on the basics first or something.
Bread!
Lokah Samastah Sukhino Bhavantu
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The only thing that may be a problem is acquiring a cast iron pot. If you want to do it cheaply, pick up a cast iron dutch oven at a sporting goods store, season it, and you're golden. But if you really want to go all out, pick up a Le Creuset, which is the pot you will use for life for pretty much anything.
My question is this: anyone have any better ideas on how to improve on this recipe as a base (i.e. to make a hearty bread or a more pastry like bread)? Or hey, any general flaxseed bread recipes that start fresh or with a different perspective would also be awesome.
Hopeless Gamer
Well, seeing as you have a Le Creuset then there is no excuse for "if I end up making it." ;-) In all seriousness, the basic recipe I gave that uses flour, yeast, salt and water makes for a bread well above anything else other than fine bakery bread. If you like the basic recipe, pick up Lahey's book from Amazon, as the other recipes (olive bread, chocolate-coconut, cheese) are all fantastic.
A couple of tips:
Keep a warm house for the rising, or if you can't, try to put the dough in the warmest area possible. The bread will still turn out okay if the house is cool, but it will be denser.
Absolutely use bread flour. Regular flour doesn't cut it because it makes for a denser bread. Bread flour is cheap, and since I started using these recipes, my pantry is never without it.
For the first couple of breads, make sure you give it the full 18 hour ferment time, the flavor alone will be worth it.
When you do the rising step, make sure the towel you use to cover the dough is cotton, and not a blend/polyester. The bread will need to breathe.
When you bake the bread, make sure to warm up the pot in the oven, so it's good and hot when you put the dough in. Contrary to the directions, in my experience, there is really no need to continue baking after 30 minutes with the lid off to brown the bread, as it always looks fine to me. Make sure to check for your own preferences.
I have learned a lot from there. I have switched to using exclusively SAF instant yeast with King Arthur Flour.
So far I have putzed around multiple times with this recipe as a good baseline to everything else. In the past couple of weeks I have moved on to this honey whole wheat bread.
One of the biggest things that I learned for the making of bread was the french fold method, folding the bread once an hour for several hours really lets the dough form up and become usable. I can't find the video that taught me how to do it but there is a bunch of stuff out there that can help.
I KISS YOU!
Well, I guess a bread maker would be easier.
But, fuck, that's cheating!
For a while I was making fresh challah every week, but then i lost my countertop and then moved and then moved again and now, I don't quite know how well kneading the dough will make out on a stainless steel counter.
plus all the weird measurements and having to convert things to metric.
It'll be some time before I make bread again, but it is so worth the effort. who knows, maybe I'll try next week, look up some recipes and venture forth.
man I miss making bread.
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Way to disappoint, guy.
That's not a bad idea, actually. Pastry lightning round!
Anyway, I made the no-kneed dough last night, and let it rise overnight. Turned it out to rise again in the towels, and boy howdy is that motherfucker sticky! I'm not sure if I over-measured the water or something, but we'll see. Managed to form it using a bunch of flour, and its doing its second rise right now. I'll post a picture or something, assuming it doesn't turn out looking like some breaded abomination.
Also thanks for those links folks. Will check them out.
Definitely going to keep at it - lots of room for improvement. I need to figure out how to get a less wetty-sticky dough, since that was a royal pain to handle. The dutch oven is bloody brilliant for it though - perfectly steamy with the lid on. Anyway, I'm going to go eat some bread and jam like a boss.
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Forgive me.
It had to be done.
Shitty Tumblr:lighthouse1138.tumblr.com
Yeah, didn't take. I used what I thought was a pretty sharp paring, but the dough was fairly goopy and I don't think I went deep enough. Definitely going to use a razor blade next time, since that seems to be the way to go.
I've always wanted to make some of the absolutely insane breads on this show. FYI the ganja donut he ends up making is so delicious it changes history.
Edit: Plus, it has an actual bread ninja.
I'm not really sure what to do with challah, honestly. My sandwich, bagel, and french bread recipes suit me for 99% of my bread needs. Eating it with olive oil and tomato is working so far ^^
Next time, I think I'll roll cinnamon and raisins into the strands before I weave it.
You are a fellow who knows what's up
Well, if it survives the night.
When I used to make it, I would make 2 loaves, one plain and 1 with cinnamon and raisins. I made a challah for thanksgiving that had craisins instead of the raisins and that went over quite well.
man, now I want to make bread.
oh, and challah bread pudding, or Kugel. Challah stuffing.
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Now this thread.
:evil:
Bread ninja thread for life.
edit: I meant saves you money. Money.
Doesn't mean it's not a good time though.
Unless you buy wonderbread maybe?
Feel free to correct me though!
For example, I made recently two loaves of cumin bread with an approximate cost per loaf of something like 70 cents. The materials really are dirt cheap, even in fairly small quantities. Even if you buy a decent amount of the ingredients, it's not like you need to use them in one go, so even if the initial cost may seem high(20-30 bucks, or whatever), you need to remember that you'll be making a shitload of bread with them. The cost per loaf tends to be much smaller than store-bought.
Using the no-knead bread recipe, and say you get your bread flour in a smaller bag, not bulk (a la Costco), each bag runs about 3 bucks, and you will get 3 & 1/2 loaves out of it, so it's about a dollar per loaf for a regular loaf. Consider the recipe produces "artisan" bread, you would be lucky to find a good one at a store for cheaper than five bucks. If you buy bread flour in bulk, you are looking at approximately 50 cents or less per loaf.
Just like all smart shopping, buy in bulk if you can.
RE: Cheese. I do speak from experience when I say that it is cheaper (time wise and economics wise) to buy cheese as compared to making it yourself, but making it yourself is a very fun crafting experience, and nothing compares to biting into your first loaf of cheddar. That said, no-knead bread is so quick, easy, and cheap that it occupies a very prominent niche in my home life. It doesn't replace regular sandwich bread (for that I get Dave's Killer Bread) but it makes the best snacking/dinner bread possible.
Sorry.
Point taken about the cost, though. I'll take a closer look into it; I love cooking and making food like this when I can.
Gonna buy a quarry stone in lieu of buying an expensive pizza stone, but it's gonna be real cheap and is useful for ovens in general.
edit: that challah I made probably runs for $5 here in Portland. Cost me a few cups of flour and some eggs.
This is the recipe my buddy used - they were amazing. You'd probably be fine using whole wheat flour. Oh man they were so good.