The Fresh Loaf

A Community of Amateur Bakers and Artisan Bread Enthusiasts.

King Arthur Rustic Country Bread

holds99's picture
holds99

King Arthur Rustic Country Bread

K.A. Rustic Country Boule-1K.A. Rustic Country Boule-1

 InteriorK.A. Rustic Country Boule-2: Interior

 Rustic Roll + InteriorK.A. Rustic Country Rolls-4: Rustic Roll + Interior

I recently purchased a King Arthur DVD; The Bakers Forum - Artisan Breads, from the K.A. website.  Inside the DVD case there was a recipe for K.A Rustic Country Bread, so I decided to give it try.  The recipe uses a poolish and is fairly easy to make.  I doubled the batch size and made 2 boules and 11 - 3.5 oz. rolls using the shaping technique shown in Mark's video.  I had previously had some problems with shaping and maintaining a nice shape especially with rolls.  This was probably due to applying too much pressure and not having a flour free, dry counter to get good traction, as he recommends, for the shaping.  my old way may have caused deflating some of the gas from the dough during shaping which inhibited the rise and oven spring.  This time I followed the technique in Mark's video and the results were far better than I had been able to previously achieve.  Anyway, I was pleased with the results, just need to do the drill more often.  This dough was made using K.A. bread flour, which gave me less holes than I would have liked, but the crust, interior and taste is good.  I used generously floured, unlined willow bannetons for the boules and baked both boules and rolls on parchment lined baking pans on top of a preheated stone with steam.  Next time I will make the recipe useing K.A. French style flour.  I have 3 bags in the freezer which I ordered from K.A. and have been experimenting with for baguettes/batards.  I'm hoping the French style flour, which contains less protein (I think it's 9% vs. 11-11.5 for A.P and bread flour) than all-purpose and bread flours, will, with more folding during the bulk fermentation stage, give me slightly larger holes in the interior.  I would welcome input from anyone who has any thoughts and/or experience using the French style flour or other similar flour for that matter.  For anyone new to bread baking I would really recommend trying the K.A. Rustic Country Bread as it is fairly simple and uses a poolish and its pretty easy to make if you follow the instructions carefully.  I would suggest scaling (weighing) the flour (I use 125 g. per cup) so that the dough is the right consistancy, fairly slack.  I personally want to thank Mark (and his wife, who is his videographer) again for so generously sharing his knowledge and expertise through their videos and Mark's postings on this site.  Much appreciated, Mark.

Howard

Comments

colinwhipple's picture
colinwhipple

There are a lot of recipes on the King Arthur Flour web site which may be freely downloaded and printed.  I probably have printed about as many recipes from there as I have from TFL.

Colin

 

proth5's picture
proth5

KA French flour has an advertised protien content of 11.5%, however it has a somewhat higher ash content than standard all purpose flour.

I may have mentioned before that if you go to Vermont and bake baguettes, you will used Sir Galahad Flour, which is a rough equivalent of the King Arthur All Purpose flour available to home bakers.  This might influence your thinking.

What I have found on my quest for "big holey bread" is that % of flour that is prefermented, hydration, gluten development, thoroughness of the fermentation , temperature, and handling make bigger differences than a switch from AP to French style flour - although the French style flour is a lovely flour.

Happy Baking

holds99's picture
holds99

Proth5,

I was incorrect when I said K.A. French style flour has 9% protein.  According to the label on the bag of K.A.French Style flour it has 3 g. protein per 30 g. flour (10%) and, as you pointed out, it has a higher ash content.  We can't get the Sir Galahad down here (St. Augustine, FL) without ordering it from K.A. on-line.  I appreciate your suggestions re: preferment, hydration, gruten development, etc.  I have been using both the K.A. AP and Bread flours for quite some time.  Just thought I would give the French style flour a try.  Thanks again for your suggestions.

Howard

 

proth5's picture
proth5

I have been assured that the KA All Purpose Flour that is available in many supermarkets is the equivalent of Sir Galahad.

Good luck and happy baking.

holds99's picture
holds99

Thanks again.

Howard

mcs's picture
mcs

Thanks for the above compliments. Of course you know that without your previous baking experience you would have had a hell of a time making those rolls with that technique. It took me about 1 month at the bakery I worked at (making a couple hundred rolls each night) before they looked acceptable.

After I had worked there for about a year, my mom visited on my night shift for the purpose of 'learning rolls'. We all got a kick out of it. She saw the video the other day and said, "Remember that night I made rolls with you at Baba A Louis?" My response was, "You made them, I fixed them."

Personally, I like the crumb you got there. Good job.

-Mark

http://thebackhomebakery.com

holds99's picture
holds99

Mark,

Thanks so much for your kind words.  That's a great story about your mom and you (at Baba A Louis) with you doing "roll repair".  I'm not just stroking you but I think what you're doing (videos) is really important (and extremely helpful), particularly  for people who are new to artisan baking".  This "art form" is very challenging and sometimes unforgiving.  As you know, unless someone shows you how to do it correctly it gets very discouraging... trying to make it come out the way it's supposed to.  This site (The Fresh Loaf) is a tremendous source of information and shared knowledge and one of the true jewels of cyberspace.  As anyone who has tried it knows, artisan baking is a complicated process for novices (and even accomplished bakers) and the videos that you have posted take some of the larger pot holes out of the road, so to speak.  When you first start out it's difficult working your way through this complex process (scaling-baking) with no one or nothing except a book to turn to for help and advice in order to understand what you're doing wrong--- and how to correct it.  In my earlier years I did some teaching (computer science) and I know in spades how valuable and effective visual aids can be to the learning process.  That's why your videos are so important.  Anyway, I know I'm preaching to the choir but just wanted you to know your and your wife's work is greatly appreciated.  My wife must be secretly part Italian because she really loves ciabatta so we're both looking forward to the ciabatta video.  Great sticky bun "technique(s)" video.  I tried Rose Levy's recipe for sticky buns from her B.B. (it's fairly complicated but they're very good tasting) and tried using dental floss but couldn't get it to cut though without flattening the roll.  Maybe my dough wasn't cool enough or something (or the dental floss wasn't thin enough).  The way you do it, with a serrated knife, looks like far and away the best solution.

Howard