Q&A Getting Wet Dough Off the Peel!
Q: My dough seems to stick to the peel when I try to get it in the oven. How can I get it off without ruining the shape of my bread? Read More
Q&A Whole Grain Breads
Q: When I make the 100% whole wheat bread it doesn’t seem to rise as well as the other doughs, am I doing something wrong? Read More
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
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
The bucket collection (and the dough that lives within: day 5)
Several of you have had questions about the right type of bucket to be using. There are many that fit the bill beautifully, these are just a few! It 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
Sunny-Side-Up Apricot Pastry–note, pictures are missing, please reply if you’re interested
(photo by Mark Luinenburg from Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day)
In Minnesota for the past week it has been a little too gray for my taste. The one consolation to all the cold and snow we get around here, are the endless clear blue skies. They are rather remarkable and make the winters tolerable. When they refuse to show themselves through the clouds I go cold. This means I need a little something to brighten up my day. Something sweet! Something easy and quick. Sunny-Side-Up Apricot Pastry (p. 225) will do the trick. A combination of buttery brioche, luscious vanilla pastry cream and tangy sweet apricots.
If you have a batch of Brioche dough at the ready then these treats go together in a short time. Perhaps more than 5 minutes but some indulgences are worth the few extra minutes.
One other thing drives me crazy about January, the lack of fresh fruit. Not that Chile isn’t willing to produce and ship anything your heart desires, but it just isn’t the same as fresh fruit from the farmers market or the pick-it-yourself farm. But this is a craving and one that I can’t wait until summer to satisfy. So I admit I went to Lund’s and bought a can of Apricots and went on my merry way toward happiness. Read More
Perfecting your rye loaves with our recipe
Readers have asked us 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 our 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, we 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).