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A Sourdough Riff on Baguettes de Tradition

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When I’m pinched for time and want baguettes, I turn to Baguettes de Tradition that are a same-day baguette that I learned how to make a few years ago from reading Jeffrey Hamelman’s book, “Bread.” This simple baguette recipe only requires a few hours from mix to bake and is perfect for when I want baguettes for dinner. My only complaint about these is that since they’re baked on the same day, they don’t have nearly the amount of flavor as when I use the Pointage en Bac method of slow rising the dough overnight. Still, they’re perfect for dipping or using as sandwhich loaves.

This afternoon I was trying to figure out what I wanted for dinner and remembered that I had some BBQ pulled pork in the freezer, then realized that I didn’t have any sandwich loaves. Not that I needed an excuse to bake some bread, I thought I’d make some baguettes.

At first, I was going to make Baguettes de Tradition, but then I also remembered the starter in my fridge and that I had just fed it a few days ago! So, I pulled it out and it looked like it had peaked, but only recently. What luck! I was excited because I knew that the starter would add tons of flavor to the dough! And yes, I used it right out of the fridge but dissolved it in 90°F to wake it up. Here’s the formula and recipe:

Formula

Flour100.00%
Water76%
Salt2.00%
Yeast0.25%
Total %177.33%

Final Dough

Bread Flour154g
Kamut Flour205g
AP Flour564g
Water666g
Salt21g
Yeast2g
Unfed Starter (weight is 20% of the total flour)205g
Total Yield1818
6 X 300g Baguettes

It can be a little dicey using unfed starter. My experience is that it should not be so old where it smells cheesy and sour. At that point, it’s very acidic and the bacteria have essentially taken over. A telltale is that’s it’s fine to use if the level of the starter in my container is still well above the original line and hasn’t subsided all the way back and the starter itself is still bubbly. That means there’s still plenty of yeast activity.

I used a flour blend that was as follows:

Flour from the starter10.00%
Bread Flour15.00%
Kamut Flour20.00%
AP Flour55.00%
Total %100.00%

I used a tiny bit of commercial yeast to boost the yeast activity as I want to favor rising. With the amount of starter I use, there’s going to be plenty of flavor. But you can certainly skip it.

Using a sourdough starter alters my normal process for Baguette de Tradition because I follow the Tartine Basic Country Loaf process which includes a fermentolyse and a bassinage when I add the salt. Here’s the process:

Mix. Sift then thoroughly mix the flour in a large bowl and set aside. In another bowl, measure out the starter then add all but 50g of water and break up the starter till it’s completely dissolved. If you’re using starter fresh out of the fridge, make sure the water temperature is warm (85°F-90°F). Mix the flour and the liquid until everything is together and forms a shaggy mass.

Autolyse. Since we’ve included the starter, it’s colloquially called “fermentolyse.” Rest the mixture for 30 minutes to an hour.

Yeast, and Salted Bassinage. Sprinkle the yeast all over the top of the mixture. Dissolve the salt in the reserved water, then pour it over the top of the dough (make sure you use a spatula to get all the salt). Using your hands or a mixer on low spead, fold the new ingredients into the dough until they are fully incorporated.

Bulk Fermentation. You can transfer the dough to another container for bulk fermentation or just let it sit in the mixing bowl. During the first hour, fold the dough three times, every 20 minutes, then let the dough bulk ferment to about 75% expansion. With baguettes, you don’t want to go to double and in fact, you want to bake them just a little short of fully fermented. I know it sounds a little bass-ackwards, but this was a technique I learned about from the baker who won the annual Best Baguette in Paris. He claimed the slightly under-fermented dough springs better in the oven.

To letter-fold, pull sides of the piece and

Divide and Pre-Shape. Once bulk fermentation is complete, pour out the dough onto a lightly flour workspace. Pull it into a rough rectangle, then divide the dough into six even pieces. The recipe here calls for the pieces to be 300g. Letter-fold the pieces and roll them up like a jelly roll. Bench rest for 15 minutes.

Shape and Final Fermentation. Shape the pieces into long logs, then transfer to a couch or baguette pan for final fermentation. Poke test the loaves and if the indent comes up and immediately, it’s too soon. If it comes up slowly, but a small indent remains, then they’re ready to bake.

Bake. Score the baguettes then bake at 450°F. Bake with steam the first 10 minutes, then remove the steaming containers and bake until the crust is a deep golden brown. Mine took about 22 minutes to get to that point.

Cool for at least 30 minutes before cutting. Or you can do the Chad Robertson way and just cut it fresh out of the oven. 🙂

When in Doubt, Go Back to Basics

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Now that I’m back to baking on a regular basis, I realized something after my last bake of sourdough baguettes: I’m really rusty! It’s not that the baguettes turned out bad; in fact, they turned out pretty good, though I do have to say that my scoring technique needs some practice. But where I was really rusty was in dough and starter development.

First of all, I let my starter go too long without feeding it, and even though I revived it and it doubled in less than four hours, part of me knew that it wasn’t very strong but I made dough with it anyway. It took forever to ferment! We’re talking 12 hours at room temperature on a warm day where were my kitchen was 80°F for most of the day! That was concerning to me because I knew that that length of time would favor bacteria and protease enzymes and would lower the pH of my dough.

And it did. By the time the dough doubled (I shouldn’t have waited so long), it was sour. And though it still had a bit of structure, I could tell from its extreme extensibility that it was at the very edge of being ruined. From a flavor perspective, that might’ve seemed like a good thing, but I knew that I’d have some challenges in handling the dough. So, instead of giving a couple of hours to final fermentation, I only let it happen for 20 minutes. And it’s a good thing I did because the loaves were seriously slack sitting in the baguette pan.

After I finished baking them, I got the feeling that I dodged a bullet. That is never a good feeling. I didn’t have the confidence that I normally have after a good bake. I knew there were problems and though the end result turned out reasonably good, I knew I could do so much better. I needed to up my game. But instead of trying to make drastic changes in my methods and processes, I instead decided to go back to basics. And that meant going back to the Tartine Basic Country Bread.

The result of going back to the basics!

So, a couple of evenings ago, I opened up the “Tartine Bread” book, and re-read (probably for the 100th time) the section on Basic Country Bread (aka Pain de Campagne). To me, that section isn’t just a step-by-step guide. It’s a repeatable process that all of Tartine’s bread are based. Chad Robertson often refers back to the Basic Country Bread throughout the book, emphasizing that his recipes are merely riffs on the original process.

Every time I read it, it puts me in the proper mindset for baking sourdough, bringing me back to and reminding me of the fundamentals and especially the things I need to be aware of and watch for. And even though I’ve internalized that knowledge over the years, doing that review helps me re-organize my thoughts.

What I found myself doing in my previous bakes was overthinking the process and second-guessing myself. I had so many conflicting thoughts bouncing around in my head! Did I shape it properly? Was bulk fermentation long enough? Was my hydration too much? Quite frankly, it was rather unsettling. But in going back to the basics, I slowed down and focused on methodically executing the steps. And lo and behold, my loaves turned out amazing!

What better way to enjoy some sourdough than with Croque Monsieur!

And that’s the lesson I wanted to share here. In this day and age where we’re all online and practically any information we want is just a mouse click away, it’s easy to get inundated and overwhelmed by the sheer mass of information out there. And with bread, there are so many diverse types of bread recipes that it’s easy to get distracted jumping from one recipe to another. And for many home bakers I’ve met, they often get frustrated when their bread doesn’t turn out as they expect. Some have shared with me that they gave up baking entirely.

For instance, I once worked with a friend who was discouraged with her baking. She shared with me that all the bread she makes never comes out how it looks in the pictures. I told her to take a step back and master just one type of bread and to learn the ins and outs of the process for that single bread.

I shared that when I started baking seriously, I only did yeasted loaves; not because I didn’t know how to make sourdough. I wanted to learn how to work with dough and to develop a feel for it. This is because so much of working with dough is tactile by nature. I figured that no matter what type of leavening agent I used, dough is dough.

And though I shared my recent experience here, it’s not the first time I’ve gone back to basics. I’ve done this very thing several times over the years. So, as the title says, when in doubt, go back to the basics!

Happy Baking!

Pain de Campagne: More Than Just Country Bread

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Pain de Campagne or literally “country bread,” originated in France going back to medieval times. Baked in communal ovens and meant to last for several days or even weeks, it was made from a blend of different flour, usually white, wheat, and rye, and always fermented with a natural starter. It was literally the daily bread of common folk.

But with the introduction of commercial yeast, the making of the traditional country bread declined in favor of the convenience commercial yeast brought with it. Baguettes and other types of bread took precedence over the lowly country bread. But in the 1970s, naturally fermented bread saw a renaissance among home bakers, not just in France, but all over the world.

The Tartine Basic Country Loaf formula from “Tartine Bread” by Chad Robertson

Then Chad Robertson published “Tartine Bread” in 2010, and it transformed bread baking across the US, providing the inspiration for both professional and home bakers to return to their roots and rediscover the beauty of artisan bread baking. His in-depth discussion of his Basic Country Loaf (which is simpy Pain de Campagne) captured the care and passion that went into creating a finely crafted loaf of bread.

But at least for me, Tartine Bread wasn’t just a recipe book. It articulated and affirmed a belief I had formulated since I made my first loaf of bread over 40 years ago: that making bread by hand was so much more than mixing ingredients to produce a loaf. It was a lifestyle choice. Like Jeff Spicoli said in “Fast Times at Ridgemont High,” “Surfing’s not a sport, it’s a way of life, it’s no hobby.” So it goes with baking artisan bread.

Think about the time and devotion to the task that making even a single loaf requires. Think of the investment of time and resources spent on developing the skills to consistently produce bread. There’s nothing casual about it, even for someone who wants to casually make a loaf or two. I think this is where most people new to baking artisan bread get discouraged. They peruse online forums and read books like “Tartine Bread” and think, “Holy s$%t! That takes dedication. Maybe it’s more than I’m willing – or able – to commit!”

Of course, one can take a casual approach to baking and still make delicious bread. For thirty years, my only aim with baking bread was to create something delicious with little attention paid to aesthetics. My family and friends loved the taste of my bread and that was all that mattered to me. But when I started baking in earnest, I had an archetype in mind that I wanted to aspire to.

And to get to that point meant going down a lot of rabbit holes, experimenting with different techniques and ingredients, taking courses, researching the science behind yeast and bacterial metabolism, and most importantly, baking a lot of bread to hone my skills as a baker. And I realize that I’ve gone off on a tangent. But as the title of this entry says, at least for me, making Pain de Campagne is so much more than just making country bread.

Speaking of experimenting, the beauty of Pain de Campagne lies in its roots where it was produced out of necessity. As I mentioned above, different blends of flour were used, white flour for structure, wheat for taste, and rye to boost fermentation. I have no idea what the ratios were, but I imagine they varied based on what was on hand. Plus, considering that recipes and starters were handed down from generation to generation, I’d imagine that the makeup of the loaves varied considerably from bake to bake. And that variability is why country bread is such a great bread to learn to bake sourdough with. It’s easy to experiment with different things.

One thing I’m experimenting with right now is a technique I learned from a blog post called, “Don’t Be a Bread Hostage” by Martin Philip of King Arthur describing how he used unfed starter – or discard – right out of the fridge as opposed to building a levain. He learned the technique from a friend of his and in this video, says that is how he makes his sourdough at home.

I was a little incredulous about this when I first read it, but it makes a lot of sense. Even if a starter is way past its peak, it doesn’t mean that the yeast has died. It’s just dormant until it’s introduced to a new source of food. Normally we wake up the yeast in a culture by creating a levain, then using the levain at the peak of the yeast’s activity. All we’re doing with a levain is introducing a food source.

When we use a starter right out of the fridge, and mix it into a dough, all we’re doing is introducing the yeast to a new food source. So, instead of waiting for the yeast to wake up and get to peak activity, we just let it wake up within the final dough. What I found with this technique is that bulk fermentation is much slower than if I use a peaked levain – lasting from twelve to sixteen hours. But the advantage of this is that I just mix everything together, do three folds every fifteen minutes in the first forty-five minutes, then let the dough rise until it has doubled.1

Here are the formula and final dough:

Yield: 2 X 1 kilo loaves

Formula

Flour100.00%
Water80%
Salt2.00%

Starter will be 10% of total flour

Final Dough

Bread Flour (I recommend at least 12% protein content)824g
Whole Grain Flour (I use Kamut)220g
Water824g
Salt22g
Unfed Starter110g
Total Yield2000g
2 X 1000g loaves

You can do the calculations above by copying this Google sheet into your own account.

Mix. Mix all the dry ingredients in a separate bowl, including the salt. In a separate bowl, dissolve the starter into all the water, then add to the dry ingredients and mix until you form a shaggy mass with no large lumps. If you used a stand mixer mix your dough, transfer the dough to a suitable container.

Bulk Fermentation. Overnight. In the first 45 minutes, do three sets of stretch and folds every fifteen minutes. Don’t freak out when you’re folding the dough, especially with the first set. This is a high-hydration dough. By the third fold, the dough will have developed a lot of strength – you will feel it.2

Divide and Pre-shape. Once the dough has almost doubled (see footnote below), pour it out onto a well-floured work surface. This is a high-hydration dough, so you don’t want it to be sticking. Divide into two equal pieces about a kilogram each and pre-shape into boules. Place the boules seam side down, sprinkle a little flour on top of each, then cover them with a tea towel and let them bench rest for 15-20 minutes.

Shape and Final Fermentation. Shape the boules into whatever shape you want then place them in bannetons. Cover them and put them into the fridge for 8-12 hours. My advice is to check them at six hours to see how they’re progressing. When you do the poke test, the dough shouldn’t spring back too quickly, and the indentation shouldn’t fade all the way.

Bake. Bake at 450°F for 20 minutes with steam (if using a Dutch oven, cook covered for 20 minutes), remove steaming container or uncover if using a Dutch oven, then bake for another 20-25 minutes uncovered or until the crust is a deep golden brown. Personally, I take it to brown as I like a well-caramelized crust. Cool for at least 30 minutes before cutting (though it’s better to let the bread cool for a couple of hours.

  1. In Martin Philip’s video, he mentioned letting the dough double. But if you use a very mature starter, be VERY careful to monitor the progress of your dough because a mature starter is highly acidic, and acid will break down gluten. The first time I used this technique, I let the dough get to double and it was overproofed! Also, he mentioned that he let his dough go for 12 hours. Bear in mind that that’s just a guideline. Expansion is more important. I’ve learned to check at about 8 hours, and I will divide and shape when the dough reaches about 70%-75% expansion just to be safe. ↩︎
  2. If the dough hasn’t done much by the time you wake up, don’t worry. Give it another stretch and fold to move the yeast to a new food source. You will soon see progress. ↩︎

Getting Used to a New Oven

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A couple of days ago I shared that I got a new oven and in the few days I’ve had it, it has been incredible. So much more capable than my previous oven (even when it was working), I couldn’t be happier with it. BUT it has also meant that I must figure it out it; not how to use it, but the best way(s) to bake bread with it.

For instance, what level should I place the rack? With my first bake, I placed my stone on the middle level. The loaves turned out great, but the crust looked a little dry when I took them out. Did the circulation fan turn on? Did I have enough steam?

Speaking of steam, even though this oven has a steam function, it doesn’t have a separate reservoir and steam generator. You’re supposed to put water on the bottom of the oven. I know, not much different from baking with a regular oven, but the advantage of this new oven over my old one is that this new one can handle high moisture levels; something my old oven couldn’t and the baking cavity finally cracked.

I can see that the fan at the back is going to be problematic. This is probably the culprit behind the dry crust. I will need to find a way to divert the airflow, or move the loaves to either side of the fan so they’re out of the direct path of fan. With my old oven, I draped a sheet of heavy duty foil over the fan area. It didn’t complete block the fan, but it did help to block the direct airflow. But what I think I might end up doing is using a thin metal sheet or some other heat tolerant material that can lean against the back of the oven without completely covering the vents. Since it will be at an angle, it will divert the airflow down. I think that’ll also help bring steam up from the bottom.

Another thing I must figure out is using my baking stone with this oven.

Ah! The things we do for our bread! Figuring our tools out is half the fun!

Making Bread Sour

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Yesterday afternoon, my family was enjoying subs that my kids made from the baguettes I had baked the day before. I asked them how they liked the bread and they all said it was great. But one of my daughters asked said, “Dad, we love your baguettes, but can you make a real sour loaf like you used to?” Of course I agreed because any excuse to bake some bread is fine with me.

So, last night, I worked out my formula, then fed my starter in preparation for making the dough early this morning. While I was reviewing the formula, I thought of numerous ways to make bread sourer. But I have a tried-and-true method that will ensure my bread comes out sour. Actually, it’s a combination of things. Here they are:

First, I use mature, unfed starter straight out of my fridge that has hooch formed. I mix the hooch back into the starter, measure out what I need for my recipe, then I feed the starter and put it back into the fridge. I know, it seems counterintuitive, but at the stage I use it, even though there’s still live yeast in the culture, the bacteria have taken over.

Second, the starter is made entirely from whole grain flour or at a minimum T85 flour that still has a substantial amount of germ and husk in it. That’s where the little beasties (bacteria) reside. I will sometimes use a mature rye levain – and always past its peak.

Thirdly, I make a flour blend that is at least 20% whole grain flour. Today I used unsifted 100% organic whole grain Kamut™ flour. In addition to introducing bacteria, it adds a nice nutty component to the flavor profile along with a tiny bit of sweetness. Yum!

I also use a more standard hydration of 70%. This is a little low for the flour that I use which has high protein content. But the lower hydration promotes anerobic metabolism which favors the bacteria.

Next, I use significantly less starter than I normally would for other loaves. Usually, the amount of starter I use is 20% of the total flour, but when I want sourer bread, I reduce the amount down to 12%. This lower amount of starter lengthens fermentation time forcing the yeast to compete more with the bacteria during bulk fermentation. This also promotes bacterial fermentation over yeast fermentation.

Then finally I do a long final fermentation in the fridge for a minimum of twelve hours. This slows down the yeast but lets the bacteria continue doing their thing. Importantly, I didn’t want to completely stop yeast production because it was already slow to start with. So I turned up my fridge temp to 42°F (don’t worry, I have a small dedicated fridge for cold fermentation.

With the smaller amount of starter, bulk fermentation is SLOW. I mixed my dough at 7am this morning and didn’t shape until 6pm! And it was a hot day today. That got me a little worried because with my kitchen ambient temperature at 85°F, I thought it would speed up yeast fermentation. But it looks like there was enough competition from the bacteria to attenuate the yeast activity even at that temperature.

With a lower hydration dough combined with the different ways to promote bacterial fermentation, I had to be extra gentle with shaping. Normally I don’t have a problem degassing the dough because I tend to make loaves that favor yeast production. But with such low yeast activity, I handled the dough much gentler to avoid popping as few bubbles as possible.

This may seem complicated because I explained each item, but it’s not. Here’s everything I talked about in summary:

  • Use unfed starter
  • Use a whole grain flour starter
  • Use a flour blend that includes some whole grain flour
  • Use a lower hydration (68%-70%) to promote anerobic metabolism
  • Use less starter
  • Do final fermentation in the fridge for at least twelve hours

As I said, it’s not complicated. You can even skip some of these things. But from experience, I know doing those things above will create a sour loaf of bread!

How Sour Is Sour?

All that said, my technique above favors lactic acid production rather than acetic acid production. Lactic acid is sour, but it doesn’t have a bite, like acetic acid. The loaf above is high in lactic acid. Its sourness comes off as nutty and fruity as opposed to vinegary. I prefer this kind of sourness because there’s a complexity in the flavor profile. If I want a tangier loaf, I’d use a stiff starter that favors acetic acid production, but I’d use a bit more than a liquid starter.

I’m BACK!!!

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Baguettes de Tradition. These are typically same-day loaves. They naturally don’t have the depth of flavor of ones made from a long fermentation, but they are excellent for sandwiches and for dipping! Notice the shallow ears. This is a trait of this style. Fermentation is fast with these and when they bake, they spring quickly, usually blowing through the ears.

OMFG! It has been a long time since I’ve baked anything meaningful other than a couple of Pain au Levain in my Dutch oven on my Traeger grill. And the reason for that is because my ovens have been broken for a long time. They were still usable for some basic baking, but not for bread as they wouldn’t hold temperature consistently enough for bread baking.

But yesterday, my new double wall oven unit got delivered and installed. So, this afternoon I made baguettes! I haven’t made baguettes in a couple of years, so I was a little apprehensive. I didn’t know if I remembered the shaping technique. But I needn’t have worried because muscle memory took over and they turned out great!

The thing about baguettes is that making the dougn and going through the fermentation process is a no-brainer. Where it gets extremely difficult is in the shaping. That’s the part I was worried about. And though I was slower at shaping than in the past, I still had it!

Admittedly, I’ve lost my baker’s hands. Deftly handling dough without it sticking to my hands was a little challenging. But then I was expecting that and had a bowl of water handy to keep my hands moist. As I bake more, they’ll return. It just takes repetition.

And speaking of repetition, I recently started lurking in the bread forums again. It has been as if I never stopped reading them. Anyway, the answer to most folks’ questions is simply this: Repetition. There’s simply no substitute for getting your reps in, especially with baking. And as with any craft, repetition not only builds your skill, but it also builds your intuition and feeling for handling and processing dough.

And though I haven’t seriously baked bread in a couple of years, because I made countless loaves in the past and built up my skills through repetition, while I was a bit rusty with the mechanics, I still had the feel for the dough. It was wonderful!

It’s Simple as 1:2:3

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A little overproofed and a bit mishapen due to the loaf being longer than my Dutch oven, but it still turned out great with a nice, fluffy crumb.

When you get into any hobby or craft, it so easy to dive down deep into the minutiae and explore every aspect of the craft down to the nitty-gritty. I can’t tell you how many rabbit holes I’ve gone down in my pursuit of bread baking knowledge. I’ve read countless books, blogs, and academic papers. I’ve experimented with a bunch of different techniqes and even taken classes.

All that knowledge is great and I encourage everyone to learn about different techniques and methods. Even delve into the food science part of it. All it does is help you become a better, more adaptable baker.

And speaking of techniques, I finally tried a technique that I kept forgetting to try, and that’s the 1:2:3 method. Basically, it’s measuring the amount of starter, multiplying that by two to get your water, then multiplying the starter amount by three to get your flour amount. For salt, multiply the flour amount by 1.8% (0.018).

This is what it looks like in real numbers:

Starter165g
Water (2x starter weight)330g
Flour (3x starter weight)495g
Salt9g
Total Loaf Weight999
Assuming you’re using a 100% hydration starter, the recipe above will create a 71% hydration loaf.

BTW, I have a calculator available for this. I know, it’s just 1-2-3, but the cool thing about the calculator is that you can set different starter amounts to achieve the loaf weight you want without having to work it out on paper.

As for processing, we don’t need no stinkin’ processing. Just kidding… Once you have your ingredients measured, throw them all together in a bowl and mix them. That’s right, no autolyse. You can if you want, but it’s really not necessary. I used a stand mixer and mixed until the dough started climbing my hook (about 4 minutes).

Bulk ferment until the dough has expanded about 50%-75%. For me, that took about three hours in an oven with the light on. Fold every hour until the dough has built up strength. It only took two folds for my dough to develop good strength. After that, I gently shaped the loaf (no preshape) into a batard, then put it in a banneton and let it rest overnight. Bake it like you normally would.

That’s the process I used in a nutshell. But honestly you can use whatever method you want. For me, I wanted to keep it as simple as possible.

Circling back to education, as I mentioned above, acquiring knowledge makes you better. The more you know, the better you can adapt to different conditions and situations; the better you can recognize and identify issues that may come along. Especially with baking bread, as they say, there’s more than one way to skin a cat, and it’s important to at least be aware of the different approaches available.

The reason I’m saying this is because I’ve seen so many folks who’ll latch onto a particular method or technique or belief and become so parochial and dogmatic about it that they close themselves off from learning anything else. But bear in mind that bread has been baked for thousands of years and in all sorts of conditions and environments. Don’t get so fixed on a particular method. Try different things out.

What I love about this 1:2:3 method is its simplicity. I’ve got my own recipes that I just know by heart, but a method like this makes it super-easy for anyone, especially new bakers, to execute. And think about this: You can apply this method with a poolish or biga. Those are just preferments, but prepared in a different way. The link to the calculator I made for this also allows you to specify the hydration of your starter. So, for instance, if you’re using a 75% hydration biga, it’ll calculate the correct amount of salt. You can still use the 1.8%, but the calculator, does it more accurately, considering all the flour that’s used in the recipe and not just the starter X 3.

Using a Master Dough Formula

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The pictures above depict two types of bread. One is a rustic Batard and the other shows baguettes. Here’s the thing: These were made using the same dough formula!

Here’s the formula that I used:

Flour100%
Water75%
Salt2%
Yeast0.5%
Levain/Preferment20%
This is a hybrid sourdough in that I used just a tiny bit of commercial yeast to help boost the rising action of the dough. Technically, it’s not needed, but it helps with timing.

For the batard, I used 70% White Bread Flour and 30% Kamut flour. On the other hand, the baguettes were made with 100% Azure Standard Bread Flour which is similar to a T85 flour (the “Ultra-Unifine” milling process doesn’t remove all the germ and bran like regular white bread flour).

I’ve also made these loaves using the exact same flour blend. But even with the same type of flour, these loaves taste wildly different from each other. The Batard has a soft, airy, and slightly tart, chewy crumb while the baguettes are crusty with a fluffy crumb. They may come from the same type of dough, but the techniques and processes used to create the loaves are quite different.

The Batard uses an overnight, retarded fermentation in the fridge, which promotes lactic acid bacteria activity, giving the dough a slightly acidic twang. The baguette dough, on the other hand, is made and processed the same day with a dough temperature between 78℉ and 82℉ which promotes yeast activity. Same dough formula, different results. That said, I could’ve made both types of bread from the exact same batch of dough and still achieved different results.

The reason is because oftentimes it’s merely the techniques and processes employed that will differentiate one type of loaf from another. And this is where a master dough formula comes in handy. Most home bakers start out their baking journey experimenting with different recipes they come across. But those different recipes have different ratios of ingredients. That makes it challenging to understand what effects variances in the parameters might cause.

But when you use a master formula, it helps you understand the effects of tweaking ingredients in the formula because you’re always starting from the same place. Furthermore, a master formula helps you master the processing of the dough. As a fairly high-hydration dough, it can be tricky to work with, especially for beginners. But with repetition, it gets easier and easier to work with.

I’ve made all sorts of bread from the formula above from sourdough boules and batards to baguettes and pan loaves. And I believe that using that formula over and over again helped accelerate my learning!

Tweaks

So, you’re probably wondering what kinds of tweaks you can make to the formula. I’ve already mentioned a couple above, but let’s just put them all together here. Now mind you, what we’re not going to do is alter the ingredient amounts. To help put more context, here are ingredients by weight to produce one kilo of dough:

Flour512g
Water370g
Salt11g
Yeast3g
Levain/Preferment114g
Total Yield1010g
The extra 10g in the total yield is to account for loss during processing

So, what can you do with one kilo of dough? Well, lots of things. You can make 10 buns. You can make a nice pan loaf. You can make 4 demi baguettes, or you can make a single rustic boule or batard.

But those really aren’t tweaks. I’ll list a few things you can do:

  • One thing to tweak is the flour, blending different kinds of flour to create different flavor profiles. My favorite blend is using an organic T85 type of flour I get from Azure Standard called their Ultra-Unifine Bread Flour and combine that with Kamut, or Whole Wheat, or Rye, or even Durum flour in varying ratios.
  • Another thing you can do is play with the fermentation. Do a cold, ovenight bulk fermentation (I do this with baguettes). Do a cold, overnight final fermentation (especially good for rustic loaves). Or even do a delayed fermentation.
  • Something not that obvious but will have huge effect on your bread is the dough temperature you maintain. For quick bread such as baguettes, as I mentioned above, a dough temperature between 78℉ and 82℉ promotes yeast activity. Going with a lower temperature will slow things down but favor bacterial activity.
  • You can also play with the levain or preferment. Both are technically preferments, but a levain specifically means a preferment made from a sourdough culture. But you can use either a levain or a poolish.
  • With either the levain or poolish, you could play with their maturity. Typically, you use mix in a preferment at the peak of its activity. But you could let it go past its peak as well. Don’t worry, the yeast will not be dead, they will just have run out of food. Putting them in contact with a new source of food will wake them up. But in the meantime, more organic acids will form.

That’s just a few things you can do. But even with just these things, you will be amazed at the wildly different bread you can make. And remember, the formula is the same!

There Are NO Shortcuts!

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I know, I know, more philosophy. But I’ve shared almost all my recipes on here so I want to take some time to give back to the community and share my thoughts and whatever wisdom I’ve gained, especially for those who are new to making artisan bread. In particular, I want to discuss something that every experienced baker knows: There are no shortcuts in baking. If you want to bake great-looking and great-tasting bread, there are certain steps you have to follow. There’s no getting around them.

I’m bringing this up because I’ve gotten comments or been in discussions with people who don’t get this. They’d love to bake bread, but want things to be simplified. They want the process to be easier. And it’s not their fault. We live an a world where we have instantaneous information at our fingertips and readily available things. We’ve become accustomed to – and perhaps a little complacent in – being able to get many things done in our lives quickly. But arts and crafts; those things that we make from scratch require the development of skill and, let’s face it, lots of repetition.

Think about the words: Artisan bread. The operative word in that phrase is “artisan” which implies art or artistry. To do any kind of art requires development of skill. For instance, for a painter to get the right color and hue, they must understand how to mix paint colors to achieve it. “Blue” to a painter isn’t just a single color, even if the primary is a specific shade.

Likewise, in making bread, there are certain, specific ways a baker processes and works dough to create various kinds of bread. There’s no getting around those steps. Also, there’s no getting around the time it takes to execute those steps. Experienced bakers learn the processes and inherently know that they must follow those procedures if they are going to be successful. It’s like the painter mixing colors. There’s a prescribed way of doing things. Detract from that and the desired effect, or loaf in the case of bread, won’t turn out as expected.

So, especially for folks who are new to baking artisan bread, I realize that it can be a little overwhelming at first. There are usually lots of steps in making any kind of bread. But as I said, there are no shortcuts. Slow down. Put on your patience hat and as I’ve mentioned in previous posts, trust in the process. After a while, all those steps will become second nature. You won’t even think about them. You’ll just do them.

Happy Baking!

Do You Really Need All That Fancy New Equipment?

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As I returned to baking bread in earnest after a long hiatus, and “in earnest” that meant baking every single day, not just the same kind of bread, but many diverse kinds from French to Italian bread. For instance, I learned to make ten distinct kinds of baguette. I learned to make several traditional Italian loaves. I had four active starters that were optimized for different outcomes (sourness, fast rise, etc.). But here’s the thing: Other than buying simple implements such as a Danish dough whisk or some good scrapers or getting a baking stone. I didn’t get a new mixer or other high-end equipment. I baked everything in my standard electric oven.

I mostly mixed by hand but also used a mixer for specific kinds of dough. For that I used my trusty KitchenAid Artisan 5-quart mixer; yes, even for large batches when I had to make bread for a shelter. In those cases, I had to make several small batches of dough. And since I only had two ovens to work with, I had to work out timing. And though I was tempted to get a spiral mixer (I still dream about it) and a dedicated bread oven (I will get that in the next year or so), I still got by with what I had. And I made some incredible bread. My thought was that if I learned how to use what I had on hand, there wouldn’t be much I couldn’t do.

But I think a major reason keeping me from getting higher end equipment was that I had worked out a process and got so proficient and efficient with it that I didn’t feel a pressing need to buy new gear. Honestly, I’d forget the new stuff and would only remember when I deliberately thought about how nice it would be to have a spiral mixer or dedicated bread oven. And that leads me to the reason I wrote this post in the first place.

There’s an urban legend about the famous violinist Izthak Perlman who broke a string during a concert, then proceeded to finish the concerto playing only on three strings. At the end of the piece, he spoke to the audience and said, “You know, sometimes it is the artist’s task to find out how much music you can still make with what you have left.”

No one knows whether the story is true, but the quote is inspirational, nonetheless. And I think of it when I’m evaluating buying new equipment. Granted, there are times when there is an absolute necessity to get some new gear, especially if you’re replacing broken equipment. But for other, more aspirational items, can you still perform with what you have? I will be honest with you that that quote has saved me thousands of dollars, not just in bakery equipment, but also in guitar and golf and even home appliances.

Look, I’m not saying that you must be cheap. If you have the means to get the top-of-the-line stuff, go for it. But will those aspirational things improve your process to a significant degree? At least for me, as I had my process down, I didn’t think they’d help to a large degree. Even with my micro-bakery where I was baking more bread than most home-based bakers, the higher end gear became more “nice-to-haves” rather than “must-haves.”

And to be honest, in the end it’s all about the dough. A great mixer will help in mixing the dough, but after that, there’s no other equipment you need to develop you bread dough. A dedicated bread oven will certainly provide much more consistency than a normal home oven, but if you know your oven and you’re only baking limited quantities, the benefit of a dedicated oven will be minimal at best. Besides, if you screw up your dough, no amount of high-end gear is going to help you.

An early batch of baguette from the holidays. Whew! I was little rusty!

Over holidays, I baked quite a bit of bread; mostly baguettes, but I made other types of loaves as well. But here’s the thing: All the mileage I put on my ovens completely messed them up and one oven no longer holds temperature consistently and the hinge on my other oven broke so I couldn’t use it. I tried to make baguettes on my stone, but they turned out horrible. So I had to turn to my old metal baguette pans. Those never produce great results, but they’re what I had on hand. And I trudged forward thinking about the Izthak Perlman quote.

And I was okay with the results, even though I knew they wouldn’t be as optimal as I would normally get with a stone. I was making music with what I had left!