I titled this post Bake Home as sort of a portmanteau of back and bake, as I am back home from Alaska and this is the first chance I've had to bake! My girlfriend and I had a little tradition going, I'd head down to her house and make bread on sunday to share with her and her sister's dog. Well, she's gone up in Alaska now, but I headed down to bake (and make sure her/her sister's dog got some bread too).

Today was a triple threat from Bread Baker's Apprentice, Italian Bread 2 ways (commercial yeast and sourdough) and Portuguese Sweet Bread.

I spaced out a bit when I was making the commercial yeast Italian Bread and added an extra cup of water (the recipe calls for 3/4 cup to 3/4 + 6 tablespoons... OOOPS). I didn't realize this until much later, so I added more flour in while mixing it, but I didn't want to add too much because I'd be WAY off the recipe (oh if I only knew...). So I tried to give it a number of folds hoping that'd make it pull together, it did a bit but it was still a very wet dough. I proofed the loaves using parchment as a couche (as well as a new brotform I got for my birthday!). Turned out I didn't flour the parchment quite enough so when I turned them over onto another parchment on the peel... they stuck. Was no big deal, I was able to pull it off without too much trouble, but it was becoming really obvious the hydration on the dough was higher than it should've been.

Since I posted last week an inquiry about how to change recipes from kneading to folding, I would like to show you my results with the

Italian Bread from BBA Challenge. I liked the results much better, and of course, it is much nicer to handle the dough than use the Kitchen Aid...

Very good bread! 

http://bewitchingkitchen.wordpress.com/2009/08/30/bba15-italian-bread/

I loved the first loaf if Italian Bread I baked.  My Mom commented that she recalled my grandmother's bread being softer (less dense, having more large holes in a slice).  She also mentioned that she didn't recall grandma doing the punch down after the 1st rising.  She just let it rise once and then formed her loaves to rise before baking.  Do you think this would make more holes in the loaf and/or achieve a softer loaf?  It's not that the twice kneaded loaves I baked were hard.  But my bread thus far is uniform with small holes, so it's more chewy although moist.

My third Scali

I'm adding this to my blog. It's also in Sylvia's post for Scali bread.

 I'm very happy with this bread. Yesterday I made a double batch and made 7 rolls and one braid. I didn't take a photo of the braid but the rolls are shown below. They were delicious with that stretchy pull apart crumb that I like in Italian breads. To make yesterdays batch I made the starter as given in the KAF recipe very early in the morning, let it sit 7 hours, mixed the dough, let it rise 90 min., deflated it and put it in the fridge overnight. In the morning it was risen about half way, I divided it, let it rest for an hour then shaped, let rise and baked. The flavor was delicious in the rolls and like I said a nice stretchy holey crumb. I didn't taste the braid, it was a gift. I did not make the strips 24" long like the recipe called for. I only made them about 17". The loaf was much higher and I liked it that way.

Last night I made up another starter and today made the recipe as written but made batons instead of the braid and used poppy seeds because I had used up all my sesame seeds. It probably can't be called a Scali anymore :o)  I was surprised with the high rise of todays loaves. They were a good 3 1/2"-3 3/4". Todays bread tastes very good but not as delicious as yesterdays and I'm wondering if it's because today I used the dry milk called for instead of using the whole milk I used yesterday or because the dough for the rolls was retarded overnight. Still very good but not quite up to the other. Todays crumb is not as open either.

Anyway, thanks again for introducing us to this KAF recipe. It's become a favorite. Wish I had some of that cherry jam! A friend gave me 5 lbs of the huge dark sweet cherries. I couldn't get out to her place to get them right away so she froze them for me. Do you think I could still make cherry jam with them?

weavershouse

The rolls shown below were made with the Scali dough

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The rolls I made with the Sourdough Italian Bread  dough were so good, I made a bigger batch today. I thought about making them larger than last time, but my wife said she wanted hers smaller. So, I made half of them 4 oz and half 3 oz. I guess you could call them "His and Hers Sourdough Italian Rolls."

One of our favorite breads is the Cinnamon-Raisin-Walnut Bread from Reinhart's "The Bread Baker's Apprentice." I don't know why I don't bake it more often. Just "so many breads, so little time," I guess. Anyway, my wife has been lobbying for me to make it for a few weeks. So ...

David

When I saw Sylvia's sandwiches I immediately knew what we were having for Father's Day! I made BBA's Italian Bread. Thanks to information gleaned from David's posts I knew to increase the mixing time. I think it took about 10 minutes on medium speed in my KA to pass the window pane test.

I used a regular biga (is there really any such animal?) that I made the day before and held overnight in the refrigerator. I made one loaf and 4 hoagie-style rolls (each roll weighed about 5 ounces).

Note to self: whenever putting sesame seeds on the outside of loaves, rolls, etc., brush the target with egg white wash or most of them will be on the floor and not in your mouth. I can't tell you how many times I swept the kitchen floor yesterday! Before bagging the breads, Jim said, "Why don't we just scrape the seeds off!" I agreed whole-heartedly!

My meatball recipe is oddly (just kidding) similar to Sylvia's. It comes come foodtv's Ina Garten. You can read it here if you are interested.

I, like Sylvia, really think San Marzano tomatoes are the best and use them in all my special dishes.

The meal was a winner and the bread held up very well to the meatballs and sauce. I dressed the meatball with a semi-firm whole-milk mozzarella and popped them under the broiler for a few minutes.

I wanted my picture to look like just like Sylvia's but was out of parsley, so I had to substitute a sprig of cilantro :-) which I threw away after taking the photo.

Happy Father's Day to all,

--Pamela

I was refreshing my starter to make pain de campagne when I saw this post. Your Italian bread is beautiful inside and out. I decided to try this and was VERY happy with the results. A really delicious bread, we ate half a loaf already.

I doubled the recipe to make four batards. The only thing I did different is I used Barley Malt Syrup instead of the powder because that's what I had. Next time I'd mix it with the water first because it was hard to mix in. I don't have a mixer so I did stretch and folds and a couple of minutes kneading. My crumb is not as open as yours. The first two loaves overproofed a little because my grandkids were getting ready to go home just as the loaves were ready to go in the oven. By the time we said our goodbyes I knew the bread had gone too long. You can see which two they are. The second two had time to sit and ferment while the first two were baking and by the time I formed them they had lots of air bubbles. I formed carefully and only let them proof for a little more then 30 minutes. Absolutely delicious! After all the lean breads a litte bit of sugar and oil were very tasty. I like the lean breads for toast and this Italian will be a favorite sandwich bread. Thanks for the post. 

This bread is based on the Italian Bread formula in Peter Reinhart's “Bread Baker's Apprentice.” I substituted a biga naturale (sourdough starter) for the biga made with instant yeast in Reinhart's formula. I still added the instant yeast to the final dough to provide more predictable fermentation and proofing times.

Reinhart recommends this formula for hoagie rolls. I divided the dough to make 4 rolls scaled to 4 ounces each and shaped the remainder of the dough into one large bâtard.

I also employed the “stretch and knead in the bowl” technique during bulk fermentation, even though I used a KitchenAid mixer for mixing beforehand.

Intermediate starter (Biga naturale)

Final Dough

Mix and ferment the biga.

Mix the biga naturale the evening before baking. Dissolve the starter in the water in a medium sized bowl, then add the flour and mix thoroughly to hydrate the flour and distribute the starter. Cover the bowl tightly and allow to ferment for 3-6 hours, until it doubles in volume. Refrigerate overnight.

The next day, remove the biga from the refrigerator and allow it to warm up for an hour or so. Alternately, mix the biga late at night and ferment at room temperature overnight.

Mix the dough

Mix the flour, salt, sugar, yeast and malt powder in a large bowl or the bowl of your mixer. Add the biga in pieces, olive oil and ¾ cups of tepid water and mix thoroughly. Adjust the dough consistency by adding small amounts of water or flour as necessary. The dough should be very slack at this point.

I mixed the dough with the dough hook in the KA mixer for 10 minutes then transferred it to an 8 cup/2 liter glass pitcher that had been lightly oiled.

Fermentation

I stretched and folded the dough in the pitcher with a rubber spatula then covered it tightly. I repeated the stretch and fold again 20 and 40 minutes later. I then left the dough to ferment until it was double the original volume (45-60 minutes more).

Divide and form

Divide into 2 pieces and pre-form as logs. Allow the dough to rest 5 minutes or more, then form into bâtards. To make rolls, divide into 4 ounce pieces and pre-shape into rounds, then shape into torpedos. If desired, spray or brush the loaves with water and sprinkle with sesame seeds.

Prepare a couche – either a floured piece of baker's linen or parchment paper sprinkled with semolina.

Pre-heat the oven to 500F with a baking stone on the middle shelf. Make preparations for steaming the oven.

Place the loaves in the couche, cover with plastic or a towel and allow to proof until 1-1/2 times their original size (about 40 minutes).

Baking

Score the loaves and transfer them to the baking stone. Bake with steam, using your favorite method. After loading the loaves and steaming, turn the over down to 450F and bake until done (about 20 minutes for a bâtard, 15 mnutes for rolls.). If you want a thicker crust, use a lower temperature and bake for longer.

Cooling

Allow to cool before slicing, if you can.

Sourdough Italian Roll

Sourdough Italian Roll crumb

We had a couple of the rolls for lunch. They were very nice. The crust is chewy, not crunchy, and the crumb is also chewy. This is not your fluffy, cottony roll that seems standard in most sub shops and, unfortunately, most Italian delis.

I am pretty sure this is the roll I would choose for a meatball sandwich, oozing mozzarella and dripping marinara sauce. I don't think this roll would be the usual soggy mess after the first 20 seconds. However, in the interest of Science, I will volunteer to test this hypothesis. Of course, if additional volunteers were to pool their data with mine, we can be more confident of our conclusions.

David

Submitted to Yeast Spotting on Susan FNP's marvelous Wild Yeast blog

I went on a baking frenzy today, thanks to George Greenstein's Secrets of a Jewish Baker.  I followed one of his "Morning Baking" programs at the end of the book and made muffins, milk bread, whole wheat bread, and Italian bread.

This is what I pulled out of my oven today, a good 2kg of dough worth. First a small batch of light rye rolls made somewhat according to the instructions for making sourdough italian bread that was posted here earlier by Dmsnyder i think. The formula does only call for white flour but as I live in sweden I find that breads should contain at least a small portion of rye!

I made the dough with 20% rye flour wich gives you a dough that handles exactly like a wheat dough but with greater taste and also a somewhat drier feel, due to the high ash content of my whole grain rye flour, I also topped them with a mixture of wheat bran and rolled oats so they resemble the kind of "fake healthy" bread you can buy in stores and bakeries here in sweden.

The other breads were two sunflower ryes as per BBA, made with 30%rye starter and really coarse rye meal for the rye content in the dough. Lightly toasted sunflower seeds make for a lovely taste, can´t wait to open these babies! I have started tt get a bit better at shaping since I studied Marks videos, that technique is far superior to my prevoius attempts. Now I only have to make room for the loaves in my freezer! '