The Fresh Loaf

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What is it called? When bread crust has many laminate layers?

nutellacrepe's picture
nutellacrepe

What is it called? When bread crust has many laminate layers?

There's an Italian restaurant in my town and they serve a bread before dinner. (It used to be free but now they charge for it. And they changed it to a new kind of bread, so the photos I can find are of a different bread.)

The bread I want to replicate at home was shaped like a blunt-nose half-baguette, very tender crumb, medium small holes. Definitely not chewy. The crust was the best part: it seemed like many thin layers. The whole little loaf weighed next to nothing. If you squeezed it to tear off another piece, you might mash the inside down, with no springback, but the crust was always super-crisp. Little pieces of crust would shatter off it. 

I get the impression that it was made commercially, perhaps imported from Italy, or at least Chicago. I imagine it was made with a softer flour, and par-baked and the restaurant reheated it before serving.

Any suggestions for recipes? I would call it crusty. Ciabatta isn't at all the same -- large holes, with a crust like a thin shell, like an egg shell. The crust might be like the paler oven-spring part of a baguette, but not like the more solid layer of the bottom of a baguette crust. I also imagine it's originally made (vs, reheated) with lots and lots of steam. I'm not able to do that in my oven very well.

Thanks for any ideas!

kendalm's picture
kendalm

The very popular roll used for philly cheese steaks.  If you can get you hands on them somehow maybe that can help nail doen the type you are talking about ? 

mixakrasava's picture
mixakrasava

To be honest, I've been frustrated with Ciabatta