BBA Challenge #14: French Bread

Ever wonder what would happen if you overproofed your dough and went ahead and baked it anyway?  Read on!

Given the above, you might wonder if I should even count this as an “entry” in the BBA Challenge.  I admit, it is questionable.  I am, however, not above posting on my mistakes, and in the name of baking, I press ahead! 

Actually, it didn’t start off all that badly.  This is the first time I had worked with a pate fermentee, though I can’t say it’s that hard (especially when you have a stand mixer).  Like many other breads in The Bread Baker’s Apprentice, it’s just that a little forethought is necessary.

I had always wondered how what is essentially a “mini-dough” is worked into newly added water, flour, and yeast.   Turns out, you cut it up into ten smaller pieces.  Leave out to take off the chill from their night in the refrigerator…

And they even start to plump up a little!

While I have fallen off taking pictures of dough in the stand mixer, now that I’m using pate fermentee I made sure to get a few shots.  Funny to see a few pieces of dough thrown in with flour, salt and yeast.  Seems to be about 50% old dough and 50% new ingredients.

Same old drill:  set the dough aside to rise.

Then shape for a second rise.  (Interestingly, if I remember correctly, Julia Child’s recipe calls for three rises.  In a way this does as well, via the use of the pate fermentee).  My loaves are rising in a french bread shaper I got at a great sale at Bridge Kitchenware (otherwise I might not have bought such a special-purpose item!)

Sadly, here’s where it all went wrong.  I suddenly had to go into work for about 8 hours (yes, just another relaxing Saturday afternoon for this lawyer–and I note this post dates back two weeks so it was early November, not Thanksgiving weekend, when this debacle occured; though I did have to work part of Thanksgiving weekend too–boo hoo).  As I rushed out the door I failed to tell my mother-in-law, who was visiting, what was going on with the French Bread (as she would have happily taken over had she only known).  This was about 2 o’clock. 

At about 8pm I called home to let everyone know I’d be another hour or so.  My husband then said, “my mom wants to know if she is supposed to do something with the bread.”  “What do you mean?”  “Like, should it go in the oven?”  Uh-oh.  Can we say “over-proofed dough”?  But–why not see what happens?  Remembering that the recipe had lots of instructions on preparing the oven for hearth baking, spritzing and misting, etc. etc.  I wanted to simplify things so I said “sure, just tell your mom to stick it in at whatever temperature it says in the cookbook.”  I did NOT explain that the shapers were actually just that, and that the loaves should be removed to a separate pan.  However, my mother-in-law, noting that the loaves had probably swelled out of all proportion to what is a normal looking baguette, did place the shaper with loaves on a second pan.  Frankly, considering what that bread must have looked like, I am amazed she managed to transport it anywhere without total disintegration.  (The shaper pan is fine, by the way–we weren’t talking about a straw-woven banneton here!)

We didn’t get a photo of the loaves pre-baking, but here they are afterwards.  When I was deciding whether or not I could even post about this, my mother-in-law suggested I at least show what happens if you let it rise too long.  And why not?  Especially as it’s worth noting that, while these are not your most attractive baguettes, it was generally agreed that the bread was quite delicious.  Must have been all that extra flavor generated over the long rise!

BBA Challenge #13: Foccacia

My BBA Challenge Foccacia turned out better than I expected.  My experiences with ciabatta (BBA and otherwise) had me worried;  while these aren’t the same breads (aside of both being Italian), I imagined foccacia required a rather wet dough to achieve plenty of big air pockets, much like ciabatta.  Considering, per my husband, that my ciabatta was like  a “brick”, I was expecting the same trouble with my foccacia.   (How hard it is to add more water?  Apparently for me, hard).

I added the maximum amount of water called for in the recipe (not that this helped with ciabatta, but I don’t learn).  In fact I even worried I had added too much water.  The recipe says that the dough should clear the sides of the bowl once it’s mixed.  While mine did that, it did not pull away cleanly–which is what I typically understand that instruction to mean.  Rather, a few streaks of dough still clung on the sides of my kitchenaid bowl.  But in retrospect, perhaps this is what was called for!  In addition, this dough has quite a bit of olive oil inR it, which gives it a softer texture.

Like the ciabatta, the envelope folding technique was employed several times during the rising process; i.e. pat the dough into a rectangle; stretch out each end and fold back in thirds, over itself like folding a business letter.  I don’t know what this special technique does.  At least for puff pastry and croissants, it creates layers of dough and butter which then allow for the dramatic rise (if you do real puff pastry, apparently up to 9 times in volume.   I am happy enough with the mere 4-5 times I get out of quick puff, which only takes about 1/2 hour rather than 9 or 10.  An acceptable tradeoff!).   Considering Peter Reinhart eschews that type of mattress-thick foccacia, I’m guessing this serves some other purpose.

Once the folding and rising process is through, you spread your dough into the baking pan.  You don’t actually press it out to fill the pan, the idea is that it will expand outwards as well as upwards to fill the space.  I was nervous about this–for this growth to be accomplished I reasoned a pretty slack dough would be necessary, bringing up my concerns about sufficient hydration.  On the other hand, did I mention how much olive oil was in this already?  That would certainly allow those little gluten molecules to slip all over the place and expand all over the place!

While I had to give it some help, my dough did do a pretty good job of growing properly.  The finger dimpling (to release some air without deflating, but quite possibly also to create pockets to absorb even more olive oil) helped fill in those corners where the dough had failed to reach.

And just for a “dramatic shot”–shadows and light–more foccacia just before baking:

Success!  The finished bread was a great foccacia–delicious flavor from the olive oil (and I didn’t even use a flavored oil) though I note a slightly unctuous feel to the bread.  (This is not a bad thing–this is what foccacia is supposed to be like–but quite a departure from other breads I have made recently).  As Peter Reinhart says, his version is far preferable to those foccacias that are so ubiquitous but are really just flavorless, too-thick and starchy breads.  (All volume, no substance!)  Despite copious additions olive oil, this is still light tasting, flavorful, and delicious!

BBA Challenge #12: English Muffins

Jeesh–I don’t even know how long ago I made these.  To the extent I ever have anything useful to say about a recipe or any noteworthy observations, I’m sure I’ve forgotten them by now.  On the other hand, it’s pretty cool to have made your own English muffins!

This was of course the next bread in the BBA Challenge.  I love English muffins, though often more in theory than when I actually buy them.  They are often so disappointing!  Slightly stale tasting even when just purchased, insubstantial…so how about the recipe?

In a way this is kind of like bagels–you do the first part of the baking on the stovetop, and then finish baking in the oven.  Except in this case rather than dropping the pieces of dough into a hot water bath, you bring out the pancake griddle!

The beginning is similar enough to any other bread dough we’ve seen so far:

 Then you make the muffins.  Surprisingly to me, you roll them into little balls for the second proof:

 And let them grow on a bed of cornmeal (this is starting to look familiar, isn’t it?)

 Then you put them on your hot griddle.  There’s a bit of timing according to Reinhart, you don’t want to flip to early or else they may deflate on you in the oven.  (See the little indentures?  Maybe I should have used a spatula rather than my hand to transfer these to the stove).

 I seemed to manage that OK, but apparently still have not mastered my griddle–the flame is very uneven and, just like when I make pancakes, the buns on one end burned before the other end even firmed up.  (I have since switched griddles to the lower-power flame and this works much better; however, this was in the month or two since I made these).

Burnt or otherwise, it was fun to see how they really were looking like English muffins!  More the jumbo size version than regular, certainly.

 You finish baking them in the oven, and let them cool.

And voila–nooks and crannies and butter!

BBA Challenge #11: Cranberry Walnut Celebration Bread

The good news is my camera and computer have gotten over their differences and are now talking to each other (though, I have to say, through no help of my own).  The bad news is I apparently forgot to take many pictures of Bread #11.  Too bad because it’s all gone–I made this over a month ago!

As appears to be an emerging pattern in my BBA Challenge loaves, I once again left out the nuts, so I suppose you can say I made Cranberry Celebration Bread.  It’s funny that as a result of commercial breads often being so bad, my first instinct was to think that this bread would not be very good–I must have had some memory of bad cranberry bread past, as I imagined something gummy and pasty-tasting, with some artificial cranberry taste!

It’s funny how I haven’t found this to be a problem with the extracts I’ve been using in the BBA breads–the Greek Celebration Bread, for example, had quite a few flavors and was just delicious.  I don’t know how “natural” extracts even are so it makes you wonder what’s in all those commercial breads all the more–if you can taste how artificial it is, “shudder to think!”

Now, as I mentioned I don’t have a lot of photos but the ones I do I think are rather pretty (if you find pictures of raw dough pretty, big “if”).  I managed to braid these up rather evenly as opposed to the Challah which had that big lump that only grew in the baking process.  So practice does make perfect!  And the bread was quite good–no pastiness or false notes.  I think I’d still opt for the Greek Celebration Bread over this, or if I ever make it to the latter half of the alphabet, the BBA Pannetone (I love pannetone–have I mentioned this, ha!).  Or maybe I should just add the walnuts 😉

Braided loaf, set to rise:

 

 

Alternate view:

 Egg wash on risen loaf

And that’s all folks!  I know there’s some great Cranberry Breads for your viewing pleasure elsewhere on the BBA Challenge.  Maybe next time…

BBA Challenge #10: Cornbread

Oh, this one didn’t go well at all.

First, I was hoping I’d manage to make this recipe in the BBA Challenge before our CSA stopped delivering plentiful ears of corn.  As a result of this, I noticed there are quite a few recipes in this cookbook that begin with C.

Finally, I had gotten up to cornbread.  I had already reserved the last corn for a pumpkin soup, so I just sighed and made sure I had enough frozen corn.  I had just gotten back from the grocery store and made sure I had enough yeast before I went so that I’d be able to pick some up if needed  (but of course I had enough yeast.  Silly). 

Of course this doesn’t use yeast.  But it does use buttermilk.  Which is how I ended up at the grocery store, again, Sunday morning.  Nor did I have polenta it turned out, but luckily I realized this before the second trip.  I also picked up some more quick-cooking polenta while I was at it.

I knew that I wasn’t going to manage the overnight soak, but I figured if I could get the soaker started early Sunday morning, and make it that evening, that was pretty close to “overnight.”  As I tried to get things going quickly though I realized I dumped all my “quick cook” polenta into my buttermilk.  Well, because it was 2c of buttermilk, I really felt bad about tossing it and just decided to proceed with quick cook polenta in the spirit of experimentation.  My search on google yielded no results, but maybe perhaps for the next person who wonders…

Yes, and I also skipped the bacon part.  So really, I’m not entirely sure that I could say this was a valid “entry” in the BBA Challenge.  (but like I said, could I  throw away 2c of buttermilk?  That second half of the quart I bought was reserved for pancakes, thank you very much!).  Don’t worry, there are plenty other Challenge participants who can tell you how it’s supposed to be!

It all turned out “OK.”  When it first came out of the oven, it was “fine”–it held together well (I wasn’t sure what the quick cook would do) and was a nice warm side to our corn and pumpkin soup.  However, the leftovers were not so tasty at all–it became a bit gummy, slightly cloying (perhaps for lack of the bacon) and just not all that appetizing.  Our BBA breads NEVER go uneaten. 

Finally, (in reference to my previous post on camera troubles) I was so unenthused that I don’t have any pictures.  It looked like a pretty standard cornbread though, so hopefully not too much of an omission.

BBA Challenge #9: Cinnamon Raisin Walnut Bread

I should perhaps call the latest bread in the BBA Challenge my Cinnamon Raisin Swirl Bread–not to eliminate all the suspense at the outset, but my modifications were to  leave out the nuts and include a cinnamon swirl.   I am generally happy to leave out nuts–no thank you in brownies, chocolate chip cookies, etc–but how could I not add a cinnamon swirl?

I had never read the Cinnamon Raisin Walnut Bread recipe through before but always admired the picture–I had often wondered how it achieved that lovely brown color without using whole wheat flour, assuming the whole time that the cinnamon was entirely contained in the swirl (this being how I’d made cinnamon bread in the past).  As I read through, I realized the cinnamon is added to the dough itself, with two further options to “ramp up” cinnamon flavor–the cinnamon sugar swirl, and a cinnamon crust on top.  I only opted for one of these special enhancements, the swirl, and I can’t imagine making it without in the future.  As for the walnuts, I had meant to go outside my nut-free comfort zone and make one loaf with and one without, but when I realized I would have to split up the dough in the mixer, I bagged it.

Look at all that delicious cinnamon (as before, I used my “true” cinnamon–why skimp when it’s the showcase ingredient?)

I thought I would have to knead the raisins in by hand as at first they didn’t look like they were going to incorporate themselves into to the dough.  But lo and behold, at the end of the recommended two minutes of mixing, they had worked their way in nicely.

The beautiful color is already evident, even before it bakes:

No picture of the rolling of the loaves adding the swirl, but it was similar to making the cinnamon rolls.  Here are the shaped loaves, after their the second proofing:

I got to have some fun with the lame I got online, on sale.  One more “official” breadbaking tool!  Slash to create an outlet for the buildup of steam–if you don’t, the steam will figure out a way to escape in a more unsightly manner.  Plus those slashes look very professional.  (You can also use kitchen shears, or a serrated knife).

Here’s the baked loaf, with an obligatory shot (or two!) of the swirl.  This recipe has definitely become my go-to cinnamon bread recipe:  other recipes have the yummy filling, but after trying this, I am convinced you need the background flavor of cinnamon throughout the whole loaf, AND the shot of cinnamon sugar in the swirl.