Dr. Uglybread or: How I Learned Not to Mess With Bread That's Already Started Proofing

This week I learned a valuable lesson. Several, actually. First: beauty is only crust deep. Second: never wake a sleeping baby. Third: curiosity killed the fermentation.

Lesson one. I had intended to put a cinnamon swirl in the middle of this week's bread, cinnamon raisin walnut bread, . For reasons that will become clear, one loaf did not end up with any sort of swirl, and the other loaf's swirl was incredibly faint. That's alright, though, as this bread was full of a wonderful cinnamon burst and loaded with raisins and walnuts. One of my main pet peeves with buying cinnamon raisin bread from the store is that the cinnamon and raisins always seem like an afterthought.

Lesson two. After setting the loaves out to proof, I realized that I had forgotten to create my cinnamon swirl. Due to the fact that the loaves had already begun to rise, I had to attempt to degas them and quickly create a cinnamon swirl before letting them rise again. I ended up with too much dough to roll out effectively, leading one loaf to squish all the cinnamon sugar out, and leading me to accidentally roll that loaf all around in the resulting cinnamon sugar lake. The loaf itself looked pretty tasty, as it was covered in cinnamon and sugar, but it was not very appealing. The second loaf went better, as I rolled it in the other direction and didn't drown it in the cinnamon sugar.

Lesson three. After putting the loaves back to ferment, the 'ugly' loaf didn't rise out and the 'pretty' loaf didn't stretch out. This wasn't too bad, as the taste really wasn't affected, and it created a pretty interesting look for the stumpy loaf. Next time, I won't be so quick to try to go back a few steps when I should know that it's too late.

When the bread was originally done baking, I was pretty disappointed with the outcome, but by now I've realized the learning opportunity it has provided. Also, since the taste was not affected one bit, I've also realized not to sweat the small stuff.

Without further ado, on to the bread!

This week, after reading the first few chapters of the book, describing cooking procedures, I decided that it would be best for me to start measuring my ingredients out by weight. I surprised myself a bit at how off my volume measurements were, so it turned out to be quite an asset.

This first step was a bit more involved than the previous breads. The first step was the dry ingredients. Flour, sugar, salt, yeast and freshly ground cinnamon from Findlay Market were all whisked together. To that, I added an egg, buttermilk and some shortening.

I didn't take many pictures, because adding the raisins and walnuts was quite a feat. I ended up rolling out the dough, throwing a ton of raisins and walnuts in, then sealing it up in a giant pouch. I repeated this a few times, trying to get the ingredients evenly mixed throughout. I ended up throwing the mess back into the mixer a few times, but this mixture sure doesn't handle like cookie dough, as much as the picture may look like chocolate chip cookie dough. Eventually I figured the raisins just wouldn't end up evenly spaced, and that was okay.

After letting the dough rise, it ended up very airy and of a much different consistency than the previous breads. The dough was very soft and light, so it was fun to handle a different dough. After dividing the dough in half, the aforementioned swirl disaster occurred. I also stopped taking pictures at this point, so we'll skip on to...

If you look closely, you can see the shortness of the loaf on the left and the stumpiness of the loaf on the right. Oh, well...

The loaves still looked quite appealing, regardless of their growth issues. I coated the tops of the loaves with butter and rolled them in cinnamon sugar. You can't see it too well, but it gave the crust a delicious and sweet burst of flavor.

As I said, this bread was positively loaded with raisins. They provided an extra burst of flavor in virtually every bite. The cinnamon flavor was also pervasive, giving every bit of the bread a wonderful scent and flavor, no doubt enhanced by the freshness of the spice. I will definitely be making this again when I need to appease a sweet tooth, but next time, I'll be taking my lessons to heart and treating the dough with a little more respect.

Next weekend, I'll be at home, so it will be my first time making anything vaguely bread-like out of another kitchen. I've decided to make something with an extremely short prep time, so as not to clog up what will doubtlessly be a very busy house.

Cinnamon raisin walnut bread? Check.

Next up? Cinnamon rolls!

As the Bread Bakes

The curtain rises. Our surly hero, an unnamed fisherman, is returning home from a hard day's work. All he can think of is his desire for dinner. Anything would be fine, really. Anything, that is, except for more cornmeal and molasses. You see, our hero's wife, Anna, was a lousy homemaker. It's not that she didn't try, it's just that all she knew how to serve was cornmeal sweetened with molasses.

Arriving home and seeing a big pot of cornmeal on the table with some molasses, our hero flies into a rage, grabbing flour and yeast, throwing it all into the pot with the molasses, and baking the resulting mass. After throwing the future bread into the oven, he mutters under his breath, "Anna... damn her!" The lights fade. The curtain falls.

This local legend develops the framework of my second bread of this past weekend, anadama bread. Although the tale cannot be confirmed either true or false, it provides a reasonable framework for the development of a bread that I have taken quite a shine to. Naturally, an early twentieth century Martha Stewart wannabe determined that such a foul name would besmirch the reputation of the genteel folks in New England, so the name was refined and a local delicacy was born.

The bread starts simply enough, with some cornmeal and water.

These are combined in a bowl to create a 'soaker'. This is a term for something that is left to sit overnight that does not contain yeast. As a result there is little to no fermentation occurring, but, instead, the grains are softened to better facilitate the remaining baking process. I left my soaker by the knife rack in case anyone got any smart ideas.

The next step didn't contain any major surprises, either. The soaker was combined with water, flour and yeast to form a nice goopy mess.

The sponge was then left to sit for about an hour until it began to bubble. This was slightly creepy, but interesting to watch.

If you look carefully, you can see the bubbles on the surface of the sponge. Adding more flour, salt, molasses and butter provided quite interesting, as a majority of the additional volume of the sponge was comprise of air, causing the mixer to turn the bowl into a minefield of exploding flour as the air escaped.

Due to the cornmeal, the resulting mixture really felt and looked a bit like oatmeal cookie dough. Reinhart seems kinda picky, as he had me knead the dough until it hit a certain temperature, but as soon as the dough seemed done, it turned out to be at the requisite temperature.

At this point, I covered the dough and left it to rise. It turned out to be a little cold for a timely raising, so I moved it into the over with the loaves of brioche and the hot water.

Shortly thereafter, I had a giant blob of dough, just waiting to become whatever I could dream of! Since our loaf pans were currently full of brioche, I decided to be a little more creative with this dough.

I ended up making five kaiser rolls, two batards, and two split rolls. Unfortunately, I didn't put enough flour in the crack on the split rolls or did something else wrong, because the split ended up baking out. I then let the dough proof until the brioche was out of the oven and immediately baked it.

And, voila! Beautiful rolls and other bun-like objects. I really have enjoyed this bread so far. It has a nice flavor like a very flavorful wheat bread and is just heavy enough to have a substantial presence. I know I'll enjoy it when I have it as a sandwich, but I've been too busy eating away at the buns so far to put anything on them!

I'm not sure what the next bread will be yet. I'm taking the book to work and having a co-worker pick one for me. Going from the first recipe to the last seems a little bizarre, as a number of the recipes in the book are specifically celebration breads that would be a little out of place at the moment. So don't hold your breaths in suspense, as it will be a long wait until next Sunday to find out what I choose!

Anadama bread? Check.

Let them eat brioche.

Let them eat cake. This phrase has wrecked the reputation of a daft but otherwise genuine and generous individual. Rendered in the original French (Qu'ils mangent de la brioche), the phrase sheds light on my first bread and the way that food and baking can reflect the social and economic conditions behind how and why certain foods are developed. Based on how rich you like the bread (and how rich you were, back in the 18th century), the amount of butter could be adjusted, creating a loaf with a nearly 1:1 butter to flour ratio for the richest of bread eaten by nobility, and closer to a 1:4 butter to flour ratio in the poor, tired, overworked peasants. Brioche made right is truly the kind of bread that Paula Deen could get behind.

The bread is light and flaky, very similar to a puff pastry. There are several ways to prepare the bread: in loaves or, for smaller rolls, as brioche a tete, prepared in special fluted tins with a glob of dough on top, creating the 'head' of the roll. I opted to make two loaves, not owning any brioche molds and knowing that I would be taking one loaf in to work. Due to the large quantity of butter and eggs in the dough, it handles more like cookie dough than your average bread dough, so I also used this opportunity to create my first real braided loaves (my previous braided bread experience being a bread wreath in middle school that completely enveloped the pan it was baked in and promptly turned coal black).

The recipe starts out simply enough with flour, yeast and milk. The ingredients are mixed together to form a sponge and left sitting for about 30 minutes until it begins to form bubbles (carbon dioxide).

I left mine by our knife rack, just in case anyone gets the wrong idea about coming in and stealing my sponge. The second bowl is a soaker of water and cornmeal for the other bread I made this weekend, anadama bread.

As you can see, this sponge looks like a very rough start to what a princess would consider her everyday sweets.

The next round of ingredients to be added were more flour, sugar, salt, eggs and a cup of butter (as I was only making the middle-class brioche recipe, not wanting to completely clog everyone's arteries).

After adding the eggs, the mixture was starting to look slightly more appealing. Next up: flour!

By now the mixture was starting to behave more like an oatmeal cookie dough than anything. Let's see what butter does to it...

That's more like it. After slowly working in the two sticks of butter, the dough started to behave much more like bread dough, but was still very pliable and reactive. At this point, the dough sat in the fridge overnight in order to develop its flavor.

The next day, the dough came out of the fridge and I immediately worked the into two braided loaves. The dough had started to behave much more like bread dough at this point, scrunching back up whenever I tried to roll out the strands, but in the end, I prevailed. The ends were a little sloppy where I connected them, but those baked out in the end, so no worries there.

After letting them rise in the oven with a measuring cup of nearly boiling water, as the apartment was a little too cold for proofing without assistance that day, the loaves were ready for the final step before baking: an egg wash.

And there you have it. Beautiful golden loaves, full of buttery goodness. As my first real loaves to make on my own (other than asking Bill to see whether each stage looked fine), I must say that this wasn't a bad place to start. I don't think the other breads will be anything like this, due do the way the dough handled with the butter and eggs, but it was nice to start with a dough that seemed similar to making cookies.

The bread itself is very light and the crust is flaky like a good croissant. So far its proven very nice with both jam and honey, providing the buttery flavor all on its own. Reinhart suggests using the dough for cinnamon rolls or other sweet treats, and I can see that being a very good thing. I may end up using part of the bread for french toast at some point.

So my first bread was a triumph! (My second bread was a triumph as well, but I didn't want to spoil the surprise too early. I'll blog about the anadama bread tomorrow, probably.) This will be a long journey, as I have two other Reinhart books that I'll tackle after The Bread Baker's Apprentice. I learned quite a bit from just my first loaf, including terminology such as a 'soaker', and tips and tricks, such as proofing bread in the oven with a measuring cup of hot water. This venture may just prove successful!

Brioche? Check.

Next up? Anadama bread.

What and why

Having recently bought a KitchenAid stand mixer for the home and setting out on a quest to never buy tasteless loaves of bread from the racks of Kroger again, I have convinced Bill (convinced in my own mind, at least) to set out on "The BBA Challenge" with me. BBA stands for "The Bread Baker's Apprentice: Mastering the Art of Extraordinary Bread", an excellent book written by Peter Reinhart that explains not just how to make bread, but why bread making... makes bread.

"The BBA Challenge" is similar to the concept behind "Julie & Julia": bake your way from cover to cover. I hope to bake a new bread every weekend, from "Anadama Bread" to "Roasted Onion and Asiago Miche". Until now, Bill has been in charge of a majority of the baking we've done, mostly involving focaccia and wheat bread, while I've only done a loaf or two. With "The BBA Challenge", I will attempt to perform at least 50% of the work on each loaf, roll, baguette, round and whatever other form in which this bread will be made. From this, I hope to gain a better insight into the magic behind the food and flavors I enjoy and to develop a passion for a skill that I have great respect for.

I will attempt to provide pictures of the bread I make from beginning to end, along with my own analysis of the flavors and processes involved in the baking process. I do not really expect anyone to follow this too closely, but if you see something you like, feel free to ask for a piece. This will be a lot of bread, as we will most likely be preparing plain loaves each week as well for sandwiches and other uses that call for a more mundane slice. I would love feedback from others on not only the look of my bread, but also the taste. If you see something I made that you think you would love, let me know, and I may just make you a loaf of your very own.

To wrap things up, I will tell you about the name of this blog. Fornax was the deity worshipped by the ancient Romans for the purpose of both ripening corn and baking bread ('fornax' itself meaning oven). A festival, the Fornacalia, was held every year to honor Fornax, that, by toasting spelt to her, the Roman ovens would not burn their bread in the upcoming year. In the same way, I hope Fornax bless my own oven, that I may learn, grow, and produce wonderful bread from beginning to end.