Q&A Dense or Gummy Crumb
Q: The crumb of my bread is dense, with small holes, and sometimes there are dense areas in the bottom half of the slices. How do I fix this? Read More
Author: jeff
Q&A Types of White Flour, Their Weights and How Much Water to Use
Q: I want to use a white flour with higher protein, how do I adjust the recipe? Read More
Q&A Salt
Q: Bread either too salty or not salty enough! How do I adjust the recipes?
Beautiful boules with a banneton (brotform)
Keep that scorchy flour off your lens!
People have asked how to prevent free-form loaves from spreading sideways, especially if the dough is a little too wet or it’s near the end of its batch-life (two weeks). Using a banneton (or in German, brotform), is one gorgeous solution to the problem, and they work well with our method. But, you’ll have to make a few adjustments. Interested? Read More
A Vented Container
Several of you have had questions about the right type of bucket to be using, and where to get a vented container (spoiler alert, they’re hard to find, see #5 below). Much depends on the size and shape of your refrigerator and how much dough you intend to make. There are a few basic guidelines to storing your dough in a bucket: Read More
Perfecting your rye loaves with my recipe
Readers have asked why their rye breads and pumpernickels seem to have so much more “whole-grain” character than what they remember from childhood (rye and pumpernickel are pictured here in Mark Luinenburg’s beautiful shot from the book). While whole-grain character is nice, it isn’t the traditional approach to rye breads (at least for those available in the US; some European rye styles are very high in bran). The reason for our readers’ results is simple: most rye flour that’s readily sold in US supermarkets is very high in bran. You’ll get a less “whole-grain” result if you use a lower-bran (fiber) rye flour, usually labled as “medium rye.” Medium rye produces breads with a gorgeous custard crumb and noticeably less whole grain character. The hole structure is more “open” as well.
For our book, I decided to avoid this complexity and just keep the total proportion of rye low, but if you’re a rye bread fanatic, read on. Read More
Errors in the first printings of Artisan Bread in Five
Early editions of our first book, Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day (2007), contained some errors, and this first note about resting times (that we wished we’d included):
Resting times: In the book, a 1 pound loaf of non-enriched dough rests for 40 minutes. Some bakers will prefer the lighter texture you get with a longer rest– experiment with a range of 40 to 90 minutes. Why? Some kitchens are cooler than others and some people have a firmer hand while working and may compress the air out of the dough, both resulting in a denser crumb. If you allow the dough to rise until it is slightly “wobbly” it will bake up with a very nice crumb.
Page 19 (“Increase resting and baking time if any of the following apply”): Remove “wetter dough” from the list; wetter dough requires less resting time.
Page 26 (Master Recipe): “Cornmeal for the pizza peel” is left off ingredients list
Page 29 (Master Recipe): In step Step 7, it should read: “Twenty minutes before baking, preheat the oven to 450ºF, with a baking stone placed on the middle rack” (not the lowest rack).
Page 72 (Bran-Enriched White Bread): Omit “Cornstarch wash” from Ingredients list.
Page 90 (Spicy Pork Buns): In Step 9, insert a sentence after “… onto the hot stone:” “Pour 1 cup of hot tap water into the broiler tray, and quickly close the oven door.”
Page 91 (English Granary-Style Bread): In the 2nd paragraph of the introduction, the second sentence should finish with “… a multigrain loaf that includes malted wheat and barley malt powder.”
Page 100 (Oatmeal Pumpkin Bread): The ingredients list should call for: 1 pie pumpkin
Page 115 (Aunt Melissa’s Granola Bread), Step 7: The step should start with “Brush the loaf with egg wash.”
Page 123 (Bagels): In step 5 the oven should be set to 450 degrees not (400 degrees).
Page 188 (Sticky Pecan Caramel Rolls): In Step 2, it should read “… 1 1/2 pound (cantaloupe-size) piece.” (not “grapefruit-size”).
Page 191 (Brioche a Tete): It calls for 1 pound of brioche dough on (page 187) it should be (page 189).
Page 192 (Brioche a Tete): Step 8, take the brioche out of the mold to cool on a rack, so the crust won’t get soggy.
Page 199 (Chocolate or Jam-Filled Beignets): Step 2 of the instructions should call for a 1/4-inch thick rectangle, not 1/2-inch thick.
Page 209 (Cinnamon-Raisin Bread): Above Ingredients list, it should read “Makes one 1 1/2 pound loaf.”
Page 211 (Chocolate Bread): Ingredients should read 2/3 cup honey, not sugar! In step 2 use the honey in place of the sugar. It should also be 2 cups water.
Page 217 (Sunflower Seed Breakfast loaf): Step 2 should include adding the 1 cup of sunflower seeds to the dough.
Page 218 (Sunflower Seed Breakfast loaf): “… use over the next 5 days (not 9). Or store the dough for up to 4 weeks in the freezer in loaf-sized portions.”
Page 221 (Chocolate-Raisin Babka): The ingredients list should call for 7½ cups all-purpose flour (not 6 cups!). Also, there’s a missing instruction at the end: “Brush rum onto loaf when slightly cooled.”
Page 227 (Sunny-Side-Up Apricot Pastry): Step 13 should read 350 degrees, not 375 degrees.
Also note, sometime after publication, the Williams-Sonoma company stopped offering a lifetime replacement guarantee against cracking of its baking stones, so we can’t recommend their product anymore (see page 13).
I love New York: in search of great bread
New York’s a great bread town; its best bakeries are really world class. But if you start sampling restaurants not neccesarily known for their bread, it gets kind of variable. It’s a real disappointment to sit down to a week of great restaurant meals in one of the world’s great food cities, and find that only one of them is accompanied by good bread (pictured above; a Turkish pita with black and white sesame seeds at Zeytin Turkish Restaurant and Bar, on the Upper West Side). Zeytin’s pita, done by a bakery service, has been a bread high point of a nine-day stay in the Big Apple.
But at a fantastic little French-Algerian place, the baguette was comically dismal– it actually CRUMBLED when pressed in the hand (don’t ask about the mouth). This restaurant takes itself very seriously (the terrific and authentic couscous was $38 a plate). Why the gap between food and bread? We all need to complain more (like New Yorkers, which is exactly what our hosts did the next night, when faced with overtly stale Italian peasant bread at their reliable Midtown trattoria where they are well-known to the staff). Alas, there was no fresh bread in the restaurant at 10:30 on a Wednesday.
So for great restaurants with lousy bread, I’m proposing B.Y.O.Bread rules. Make your own and bring the stuff. It will raise eyebrows and consciousness. Meanwhile, here’s a pita recipe that WON’T puff, in the style of Greece or Turkey. Read More
Yeast: Can it be decreased in the recipes?
Short answer: Yes!
My method is super-fast because it’s based on stored dough, not because I use a full dose of granulated yeast in the recipes. In the 2007 edition of the first book, I used full-dose yeast (which was 1 1/2 tablespoons for four pounds of dough) because I knew that many readers would want to use the dough within a few hours of mixing it. For the 2013 update of that book, I decreased the dose of yeast to 1 tablespoon, because testing showed that the extra half-tablespoon made little difference if the water was warm (though if it wasn’t, initial rise-time stretches beyond two hours). I’d still consider that a full dose of yeast in a four-pound batch, and you can decrease to 1 tablespoon in any of the recipes, from any of my books. But if you have more time for the initial rise, you can decrease it further–by large margins. Half-doses, quarter-doses, and even less will work. When using fresh cake yeast, increase by 50% (by volume) to match the rising power of granulated yeast.
Why use less yeast? Experienced yeast bakers sometimes prefer the more delicate flavor and aroma of a dough risen with less packaged yeast. And some people found that the full dose of yeast resulted in bread that tasted and smelled of beer or ale. Traditionally, it’s felt that rising the dough very slowly, with very little added yeast, builds a better flavor. So this is an option to try when you have more time:
I’ve tried it two ways, first halving the yeast (1/2 tablespoon), and then dropping it way down, to 1/2 teaspoon. Both worked, but they work slowly. For the 1/2 teaspoon version, you need to give the dough 6 to 12 hours to rise. The 1/2 tablespoon version needs something in between (about 4-5 hours). You don’t need to increase the resting time after the loaf is shaped. Active time is still five minutes a loaf, it’s just your passive resting and rising times that really escalate when you go to the low-yeast version. If you use cool or cold water with a low-yeast preparation, you’ll need 18 to 36 hours for the initial rise.
So if you’ve hesitated to try my method because you like your loaves risen long and slow, give this approach a try.
Low yeast/slow rise with egg-enriched breads: Readers have asked about the food-safety issues in trying low yeast/slow rise at room temperature with egg-enriched doughs. Raw egg shouldn’t be left out too long at room temp. How long is too long? US Department of Agriculture (USDA) is very conservative on this question; they say 2 hours is the max (click here and scroll down for their detailed recommendations). Understand that this would make it impossible to rise a cold-started egg-enriched dough fully at room temperature (though I’ve found that two hours on the counter is enough even for a 33% yeast reduction; the problems start when you make more significant reductions, which would require 8 to 24 hours on the counter). The risk is salmonella and other food-borne illnesses. Even though eggs in baked breads are fully cooked, the USDA is clear on this: 2 hours maximum. They’re a very conservative organization– for example, you basically can’t eat hamburger with any pink in it, according to USDA. Otherwise there’s some risk.
To stay in compliance with USDA guidelines for egg-based doughs, refrigerate at 2 hours regardless of whether the batch has fully risen. Then, allow the rising to complete at refrigerator temperature (18 to 36 hours).
More in The New Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day, and my other books.
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Today’s Newsday Review of Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day
From today’s review: “From all the fuss, you’d think that… Hertzberg had invented sliced bread, or maybe bread itself …delivers what it promises, which is a great gift to home cooks who have the desire to bake but worry that they don’t have the time or skill.”
Sylvia Carter, New York Newsday
