Great Crust without the Steam!

BreadIn5 191 Comments

without steam

For what ever reason some ovens just don’t trap steam very well. This is true of professional equipment, but some home ovens behave this was as well. The reason to care…if you don’t trap steam in the oven for the first 10 minutes of baking you will end up with a dull, lackluster crust, even if you use a good baking stone (which is essential for great free-form loaves).

There are a couple different ways to achieve this, including the tried and true misting bottle. You use a food grade spray bottle and mist the bread every minute for the first 10 minutes. This requires you to stick close to the oven and open the door repeatedly to spray. A bit more work than I’m generally willing to do, but it will give you a nice result. Here is a much easier way: Read More

The Easiest and Tastiest Homemade English Muffins!

jeff 182 Comments

english muffins

In case some of you have missed the memo, it is BYOB year! Bake Your Own Bread!! There are several food bloggers whose New Year’s Resolution is to bake all the bread they need and never buy a single loaf (see below for info!). This includes artisan boules, sandwich breads, sticky buns and even English muffins! These most popular breakfast muffins are a favorite in my house and yet I never make them. There are some things I perceive to be too much trouble to bake at home and shamefully never tried. The English muffin was among them. Oooops, I discovered today that they are so simple and really fast! I owe my family a big apology for not having tried this earlier. I have several of you to thank for this lovely discovery. The English muffin has been a most requested item lately and so here it is in all its simple glory: Read More

Homemade Soft Pretzels!

jeff 91 Comments

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Food writing can be very, very memorable.  In 1978, I read a marvelous essay in the New York Times by Mimi Sheraton.  They say that tastes and smells are the most memorable senses, which explains why when we re-create food we ate as children the smells bring us back in the blink of an eye.  The same’s true of great food writing, at least for me.

Mimi’s article on homemade pretzels she ate in Stuttgart, Germany is one of those great food articles that stayed with me.  I clipped the article and forgot all about it.

Testing recipes for Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day (click here to purchase), I finally made Mimi’s recipe, adapted from her Stuttgart hosts, so I adapted it for Artisan Bread (page 127 in the book). Read More

Chocolate-filled Beignets (or Soufganiyot, or whatever you’d like to call them)

jeff 33 Comments

sugar-snow-skinny.jpgIf you’ve been to Cafe Du Monde in New Orleans, you’ve had the best beignets (French-style doughnuts) around.  They’re really not very hard to make at home; check out my book, on page 197, and the chocolate-filled variation on page 199.  We make them at my house for Hannukah (tonight was the last night), and they are sublime (the same deep-fried treat is called soufganiyot in Hebrew).  The only special equipment you’ll need is a candy thermometer.

Start with a pound of dough, choosing challah (page 180), or brioche (page 189), which will make 5 or 6 beignets.  Roll out the dough into a 1/4-inch rectangle, then cut into 2-inch squares using a pizza wheel or a sharp knife.  Place a half-ounce of bittersweet chocolate into the center of each square.  Gather the edges of the dough around the filling, pinching at the center to form a seal; you may need to use a bit of water to help the edges stick together.  Read More

Rustic Whole Wheat Bread for Pappa al Pomodoro (and some Holiday gift ideas)

jeff 33 Comments

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Here’s a fantastic Italian Tomato Soup (Pappa al Pomodoro), which is actually a bread soup usually made from stale Peasant Bread (see page 46).  But we decided to use the dough from the Whole Wheat Sandwich Bread on page 78 instead, forming it into rustic round loaves.  That’s them just after being slashed, above.  Because they’re free form loaves rather than loaf pan breads as in the recipe, you can bake at 425 degrees F, right on the baking stone for about 35 minutes (use steam from a broiler pan to get a great crust).  Read More

Thanksgiving Buns and Helpful Hints for Holiday Baking!

jeff 83 Comments

thanksgiving buns

Just in case you need a little guidance on Thanksgiving day, here’s some good information about our most frequently asked questions:

Dense Crumb or Loaves Not Rising Enough?

Wet Dough Sticks to the Peel?

How to Improve Whole Grain Loaves?

High Altitude Baking?

Using a Different Type of Flour?

Too Salty or Not Salty Enough?

During the past week we’ve had several questions about making our various doughs into buns. These tiny little loaves are the traditional shape for the holidays and can be easily made from any of our doughs.  Here is how: Read More

Incorporating dried fruit, nuts, or herbs into stored dough: Thanksgiving Cranberry Corn Bread

jeff 106 Comments

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Read on for a discussion of how to roll things into stored dough.  It works the same whether you’re rolling in dried fruit, nuts, or even herbs…

Before I launch into our Thanksgiving Cranberry Corn Bread, Zoe and I want to thank everyone who posted their bread stories into our blog this past week.  Hearing other people’s stories about their bread has been the best part of doing this website. Kelly (see the post from 11/11) is the first winner of the signed book.  Kelly does not use her bread machine and loves giving bread away.  Bravo.   Beth, who posted on 11/14, is the 2nd winner– a working mom with an active blog of her own.   We’ll be in touch with both of you.

This week’s bread is a yeasted corn bread adapted for American Thanksgiving but based on the Portuguese Broa style (page 146 of The New Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day).  It’s basically our regular Master Recipe, but with 1 1/2 cups of all-purpose flour taken out and replaced with an equal amount of cornmeal.

More in The New Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day, and our other books.

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Thanks Culinary Institute of America and Seattle Post-Intelligencer!

jeff 3 Comments

The Culinary Institute of America (CIA) is a terrific institution; what can you say about a professional culinary school that:

a) … trained Artisan Bread in 5’s co-author, Zoe Francois, and,

b) …sent Rebekah Denn’s wonderful article in the Seattle Post-Intelligencer about our book!

Click on the links to read… thousands of people have come to our site because of the Seattle article and the link to it from SmartBrief.  Smartbrief is a wonderful thing to subscribe to, even if you’re not a food professional; you can do that from the 2nd link.  And if you’re curious about our book’s other reviews, click here.—Jeff