Pain a' l'Ancienne Baguettes- attempt #1
Today was a good day :-) I made baguettes.
I used the Pain a' l'Ancienne formula as recorded here: http://www.thefreshloaf.com/node/8524/philippe-gosselin039s-pain-à-l039ancienne-according-peter-reinhart-interpretted-dmsnyder-m
The baguettes came out great and the instructions were really easy. It's surprising how little attention this dough needs. What I was struck most with in this baguette was the taste. It was literally "cool and creamy". I was reading in Reinhart's BBA and Reinhart describes a good bread as tasting cool and creamy on the palette. I really experienced that with this bread.
So, pretty good for my first stab at a baguette. Next time I will make a few changes in method:
-The formula here has a smaller quantity of dough than that in Reinhart's book. His formula would make 6 baguettes and this formula calls for dividing into 4 pieces. I believe dmsnyder made 2 of the larger pieces into pain rustiques and the other smaller 2 into baguettes. Instead of compensating for the two larger pieces and the two smaller, I just made 4 equal-sized baguettes and they ended up being too long for both my peel and my stone. There was a bit of arranging I had to do to accomodate the size. So next time I will make probably six small baguettes or 5 medium ones.
-Next time I will also not slash them. I tried two different slashing tools on 3 of the baguettes. Because of the nature of the dough, they both just drag and tore. I also did not slash properly or deep enough. The 4th baguette I left as "rustique" and it was the best looking of the bunch. Incidentally I gave that one away and didn't get a picture. Here are the others:
This is one formula that I will keep trying again and again. I do want to also try Anis' baguettes and Nury's light rye- but I could stop at this baguette and be satisfied. Which is great, because I would choose to eat a baguette over dessert any day.
Comments
Your baguettes look absolutely beautiful! What great success on your first attempt!
I had poor results. Did you follow the formula to the letter? Did you use steam?
BH
Sorry you had poor results. I actually was suprised that mine turned out the way they did.
I printed dmsnyder's write-up (from the link posted above) and followed the formula but not the entire method as he did. I kind of mixed both dmsnyder's method and Reinhart's from the book. For example, after the long autolyse, the next morning you add additional water between 20-50g. I ended up using 37g. I just eye-balled it. You may want to adjust the hydration on your next try.
I did use steam. I poured 1 cup warm water into a cast iron skillet on the bottom rack of my oven (electric). I left it in for 7 minutes and removed. I also squirted the side of my oven with water twice at 30 second intervals for the first minute of baking. And I also spritzed the tops of the baguettes with water just before going into the oven.
Try it again as you might be suprised. Also, the main difference in this recipe was that the cold retardation in the fridge was just the water and flour, no yeast. It was an interesting experiment scientifically. I still want to try them from the Reinhart's formula. So if you didn't try it this way, you might want to see if it makes a difference for you.
Remember, you don't have to follow the method to the "t"- differences in flour/ water/ temp in your kitchen, etc come into play and can change the timeline in any given formula. I'd try again and see what comes of it.
Happy baking.
Nice job! Lovely crumb, especially.
I'm glad you like the formula. These are the best tasting baguettes of all the methods I've tried to date.
David
Terrific Baguettes! I do love the flavor.
This dough also makes an incredible pizza crust.
Go light on the toppings and bake in a very hot oven (500˚) on a stone.
I make a couple of batches of the dough. Divide into 9 oz balls. Roll lightly in olive oil and freeze into those individual zip lock plastic containers or even in zip loc freezer bags. Then use as needed. 9 oz makes a great 12 inch crust.
When ready to use, take out of the fridge about 1 hour before baking (2 or 3 hours if frozen). Once the dough is up to room temp and pliable, pat heavily with flour. Spray lightly with oil. Pat on some more flour and stretch the dough between your hands to form a round. Careful though, the softer and warmer the dough, the more quickly it with stretch into a skin.
Tip: Place on to a cooling rack first for about 5 minutes after removing the pie from the oven. Then move to cutting board. This helps maintain a crispier crust on on the bottom.
My favorite:
Very light spread of home made pesto, followed by 100% whole milk mozzarella, feta cheese, sun dried tomatoes and kalamata olives. Yum!
I made the pain a l'ancienne today....
I have been trying to get better at shaping baguettes, but again - mine look pathetic, and keep in mind I took the best possible angle for the pictures...
I ended up not slashing two of them, slashing the third (I halved the recipe), but my slashing did not work at all.
apart from these "cosmetic problems", I think the crumb and crust were good - not as good as yours, though
I include a photo and for those interested, you can see my blog post here
http://bewitchingkitchen.wordpress.com/2009/10/10/bba21-pain-a-lancienne/
Well done
They would grace any boulangerie
Keep up the good work
Chris
Hello to Dmsnyder,
Can you give me a recipe which will combine this formula with a rye sourdough, to make baguettes (or Bâtard). I need the right proportions between the ingredients to make it work.
I'm trying to do it already 8 months after I ate one rye baguette in the South West of France. I got good results but it's not good enough for me. I want a recipe that I can use eyes closed...Most of the time I have a raising problem, and when I take them out of the oven they are too flat. Crispiness and flavour are good still.
I'm french and living in Australia: the flour T55 and T65 make no sense for me here. I use organic rye flour and Wallabies white flour for bread baking.
I learn to bake bread along those 8 months and read kms of informations, but never found the right formula.
The last one I baked is "baguette marine tigrée" by "o miam miam de soso" and the result was fantastic to my total amazement. but the formula don't use sourdough just 60 grs of rye for 550 gr for the white flour.
It's the first time I managed to send a question to you specifically and I have big hopes to get the right answer out of your vast knowledge. an old French Bee
Hi, Bee.
I've never made baguettes using a rye sourdough. So, I'm imagining what I would do.
The first decision is what kind of bread do you want to make. Do you want a more or less traditional baguette, but using a rye levain? Or do you want a pain de metail au levain made in the shape of a baguette?
If you want the former, I would convert my rye starter to a white starter by feeding it with white flour a couple times, then use any baguette de tradition formula you like. If you want a bread with more rye, I'd just use a pain de metail au levain recipe and shape the dough into baguettes.
I know this is general, but if you tell me more about what the bread you want to bake would be like, I may be able to be more specific.
David
Hi David,
sorry I was very buzy and could not find my password to login!.. Now I read your reply again but I don't know what do you mean by "pain de metail au levain" ...
What I really want to do is a traditional baguette, but not the white one ( la parisienne ) I want my baguette to be made with Rye flour and may be Whole meal flour.
Because I didn't know nothing about bread one year ago, I thought that making a rye sourdough and keeping it alive in the fridge should be the "Nec plus Ultra "of the homebaker. Janedo posts also influenced me in this direction. But I might be completely wrong and may be a rye baguette can be done with a mix of rye and normal flour with some yeast without investing all the effort with the sourdough the wet slaky dough the multi ply the night in the fridge etc... Of course I didn't think about a white starter...because I would like to use less white flour possible for better healthy purpose.
To make a loaf of Rye bread is not a problem, my partner is doing that every 2 days in his MAP with a ready mix flour. But I like a lot of crust with few crumb ! It's drive him crazy to see me working on my baguettes 2 and 1/2 days for 2 or 3 little baguettes ....which are good only when fresh baked! But a French Bee stay a French Bee, I cannot get use to the British, German, Australian loaf of bread. Iwill try until I will be really satisfied with one recipe that I will use and re-use all the time. Hope you can help. Bee
Hi David,
A small spelling mistake took me far away from the subject : you meant Pain de Meteil from Dan Lepard. ("Metail"took me to articles about Pain and Metal flavour !") I read few articles about the Meteil and no it's not what I mean.
I mean a traditional baguettes with rye sourdough. I used 2 different quantities : 300 gr rye sourdough for 600 gr White : result crust good crumb very tight savour superbe ( in my opinion ). Or 150 gr. sourdough for 600 gr. white: result crumb lighter crust good flavour good, but still they are too flat. Both cut to fit the toaster (on no.1 no more)the day after make them crusty again without being toasted.
I will try your advice to use a Rye/white sourdough, or make them without sourdough but by mixing 40 to 60 gr. Rye in a traditional recipe.
May be my mistake is to use too much sourdough ? 50gr might be enough ?
Bee
Hi, Bee.
Sorry for the spelling error! I have enough trouble with English spelling.
Usually, one uses around 20-25% starter, that is if you are using 600 gms of flour, you would mix 120-150 gms of sourdough starter in the dough. Some recipes use more. Some use less.
David
Great looking baguettes. Has anyone converted the grams to cups/tsp etc? I know it's much better to do the grams thing, but it's beyond my pay grade at the moment. And as for grams when liquid is cited: is that supposed to be weight or volume?
Thanks,
Gunnersbury