Help with Bread opinion please
Perfect Artisan French Baguette
Hello!
I have been at it trying to make the perfect Artisan French Baquette and need some opinions please. I really thought my baguettes were great. Then the other day my wife and I were in a grocery store and they had baquettes on sale for .99 so my wife said she wanted one. We brought it home, I cracked it in half and it has obviously been made from (very) bleached flour and (The inside) had a very "American white bread that you would buy in the 'normal' bread isle" consistency. Meaning that it was kind of doughy, soft and very fine textured with little to no air holes. So at this point I brought out one of my baguettes (which I had never revealed to my wife) and said "here is what a real baquette (LOL) should look like meaning color, texture, etc. My wife (who is very sweet and kind) tried both and said "you did an awesome job but I prefer the other one." Hmmmmmmmmmmm. And my wife is from Germany where the bread is normally very substantial. So, I don't want anyone to agree with me here for the sake of agreeing, I just want to know what everyone else thinks. BTW, I used the recipe from King Arthur Flour (KAF) Thanks for your input.
Link doesn't work. Would it be a picture? With a crumb shot?
No picture, well.... can't argue with a wife. She knows what she likes. A closet baker eh? Next time let her watch you, bake it in front of her, let her smell the bread baking and then let her taste your baguette. She might give you a different answer... then again not. You may never really know. The bread tasting was out of context, no mention of what was being eaten with the bread. That might make a difference.
Theoretically you're asking any of us to come between you and your wife. I vote for bread in both cases. The store bought can be rewarmed to crisp in the oven, the home made can be put into plastic to soften, whatever is left over can be made into crumbs cubes or pudding.
Have fun,
Mini
wasn't suppose to be a link sorry. I made a post earlier in the wrong place and I copied and pasted here, must have created a link. Any comments or suggestions on my above post are appreciated. Thanks
Most the bread in the U.S. is prepackaged and sold over the counter. Most people are used to this. I've taken my family (brothers and mother) out to dinner before where very nice artisanal rolls and bread were served with dinner. My brother would bounce the bread on the table and say, "...it's kind of hard...." He's probably familiar with commercial hamburger buns???
You should have seen his expression the first time I served some brie cheese...:-)
Which recipe did you use?
I've been using the Anis Baguette recipe that I found trawling around here on The Fresh Loaf and I love that recipe. It's so easy, although I think I'm going to have to try and tweak the recipe so that I can get 6 loafs instead of 4, so that I can share with my neighbour who gushes over my bread. :)
I use King Arthur Bread Flour for that recipe. And, well, nearly everything, except when I mix it with some home milled white whole wheat.
Sometimes store bakeries do decent bread, it depends on how old the flour is and who's baking. :) My dad (who lives with us) rarely likes my standard loaf and so he buys the Italian bread from a certain grocery store. Sometimes if I don't have time to bake bread I'll just buy their steak rolls or french rolls. Sometimes they're quite good and sometimes I regret not being able to bake something.
I have to tailor my recipes to what my family likes. They don't like big holes Ciabatta (yes I can hear you all groaning :)) but they do like the flavour. So, I make boules, cut those in half and stretch them out a bit, and make sort of half-pocket shaped sandwich buns. There's some holes in there, but not proper Ciabatta holes.
They don't care, it tastes good. I've been doing the Anis baguette recipe lately and I find the flavour comparable, but much less work involved, even though I'm somewhat patehtic at slashing.
So I commiserate with you - it sucks to put so much effort into something and be rather proud of it, only to have it dismissed. I felt the same way when I designed and hand knit a cardigan for a friend and I can't even get her to try it on for a picture. We went into a yarn shop and she fell in love with a nice looking, but boring garter stitch and *that's* what she liked. sigh.
Hi Maeve
Thanks Maeve for your post (and everyone else.) :-)
I am new to all this so I hope you are not insulted by my reply about slashing. I tried several different methods and had no luck at all until I got out the scissors. Fairly heavy duty but nothing special, just ordinary kitchen scissors, I guess you would call them. I dipped them into a coffeecup full of water and they cut through the dough like a hot knife going through warm butter, clean as a whistle and as deep as I wanted. I was amazed.
Bummer about the story about your friend and the sweater. I can "feel" that anguish all the way here ouch!
I will try the Anis baguette recipe.
Thanks again.
My wife prefers a softer crumb and crust, too, but once I get that right, she likes home-baked bread better. Or else she's being very loyal :-)
I've been baking from Bread by Richard Bertinet. It's a very different kneading technique to the one I've used for years, and gives a nice airy crumb without big holes. Seems to go over well with my wife.
People like what they like, but you can still help things along. Rose Levy Beranbaum's _Bread Bible_ has several recipes designed to recreate the soft "store bread" of her childhood but with more flavor and better texture. Why not try those recipes? From there you could progress to one of RLB's soft hearth breads, then...
sPh