Red Star Yeast Archives - Page 4 of 4 - Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day

The Flatbread Braid, New Video: How to Braid a Flat Circle

March 25, 2014February 11, 2023 jeff 29 Comments

Braided

Zoe did a great post last month on a traditional braided loaf (made with peasant dough). I thought now might be a nice time to do a new video (it’s way at the bottom of this post), showing one of my favorite techniques, the flatbread braid. Flat or traditional tall, these techniques also work great with challah or brioche dough (but you need to bake those lower temp (350F) because of the egg and sweetener in the challah or brioche). As in the photo, you can turn around a straight braid to make a very festive ring, and I topped it with egg wash and poppy seeds. This dough is about 50/50 whole wheat and white flour, which is a wheatier version of the Light Whole Wheat (you don’t have to use the “old” dough). The 50/50 recipe appears in The New Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day. Read More

Braided Peasant Bread

February 24, 2014December 16, 2022 BreadIn5 51 Comments

Braiding doesn’t just have to be for sweets. I found myself with some 2-week-old dough (truth be told it was closer to 3 weeks) and it was a little wet to shape a nice tall boule. We always recommend using older dough for flatbreads or baking it in a loaf pan, since it can lose some of its rising power in the later stages of storing. Well, it turns out this older dough makes a wonderful braided peasant bread loaf, with lots of flavor and a really open crumb. Because the braid isn’t as domed as a boule, the older dough has all the rising power it needs.

My dough was made with all-purpose flour, a bit of rye, whole wheat and Platinum yeast by Red Star. Like I said, it was almost 3 weeks old, but this technique can also be done with fresh dough and really any of our doughs, not just the Peasant dough recipe will work great. Read More

Mushroom Garlic Thyme Stovetop Pizza

February 10, 2014May 4, 2019 jeff 42 Comments

Pizza for dinner is always a favorite around my house, and while I’ve tried it every which way: classic margherita, deep dish, hand tossed, and grilled, it had been awhile since I’ve made a stovetop version. Our Artisan Pizza and Flatbreads in Five Minutes A Day book has a great recipe for pizza made in a cast iron skillet, and after making it quite often this past week I remembered how easy and tasty this method is. It’s perfect for dinner, but especially for lunch; pizza is ready quickly without even turning on the oven.

Savory Bread Pudding – how to use up leftover bread

January 15, 2014May 4, 2019 jeff 38 Comments

Savory Bread Pudding - A great way to use up leftover bread! | Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day

When we wrote our first book we were testing dozens of loaves a week, and despite our healthy appetites, we just couldn’t consume all that we baked. Our neighbors were happy to take some of the bread, but there was more than a city block could consume, so we started making all kinds of recipes using up the leftovers. There are beautiful salads and puddings that are perfect for leftover (even stale) bread. In the New ABin5 we added this Savory Bread Pudding, which can be made with just about any loaf you bake. Well, I may have found the exception…I tried this recipe with some leftover Panettone and my very opinionated and vocal family requested that I not use that particular bread again for this. My husband described it as Thanksgiving stuffing, but richer. I liked it, but I was alone. The panettone does make exquisite sweet bread pudding however. They all agreed that peasant bread and/or challah is the way to go. The peasant and challah breads allow the flavors of the caramelized onions, spinach, spices and cheese to shine through. It is perfect for breakfast (a little bacon in the mix would be fabulous) or as a side dish with dinner.

This week I got a chance to bake with Elizabeth Ries and Chris Egert on KSTP-TV’s show Twin Cities Live. They are great sports and we had fun tossing pizzas together, one of them is a bit more skilled at the toss, but I won’t mention names.

Baking in a Cloche

December 8, 2013January 5, 2023 BreadIn5 561 Comments

There are many ways to get a crusty loaf of bread, but one of our favorites is to use the tried and true method of baking in a clay cloche, here, the Emile Henry brand cloche. It is very similar to using a Dutch Oven, but the cloche was designed to bake bread, so it is an even more intuitive method. In other words, you aren’t lowering the bread into the piping hot vessel, you just lift the lid and slide the loaf onto what is essentially a baking stone. The cloche traps the steam from the dough to create a perfectly crisp and beautifully shiny crust, without having to add steam to the oven.

This loaf was made with the Master Recipe from The New Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day: Read More

English Muffins On The Stove Top

November 1, 2013March 24, 2023 BreadIn5 97 Comments

Breakfast has been said to be the most important meal of the day, but so often it is made up of coffee and not much else. I make a point to purchase store-bought bagels and English muffins to have on hand, but they lack flavor and I find myself skipping that first meal more often than not. I remembered back to a post on baked English Muffins, and decided to try the same technique on the stove top to save some time. Sure enough, they were amazing! Soaked in butter and a little jam, or filled with eggs and cheese, these biscuits were worth making every time. They also re-toasted well; I made a large batch Sunday morning and had a delicious breakfast the rest of the week.

The New Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day Master Recipe! (Back to Basics updated)

October 22, 2013January 20, 2024 BreadIn5 839 Comments

This is one of the site’s most popular posts. Why? It answers many of the questions that you asked, with the answers incorporated The New Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day. Thank you all for making this new edition possible–readers are where the new ideas come from. If you’re having trouble getting this recipe to turn out the way you’d like, check out the troubleshooting tips on the FAQs page here.

For the Master Recipe…