November 24, 2009 - 5:31pm
Orange Juice in Bread?
Hello,
I recently started baking out of Reinhart's "The Bread Baker's Apprentice" and am looking for some advice. I'd like to make his Cranberry-Walnut Celebration Bread (page 154) but I do not have any orange extract or zest. The recipe calls for 1 1/2 TB orange extract.
The recipe also calls for 1/2 C buttermilk or milk, and 1/4 - 1/2 C water. I'm thinking that I can substitute some of the water with orange juice to impart the orange flavor, but I do not know how much I should substitute. I'm also not sure if the acid in the orange juice will cause problems, and if I should use some baking soda to neutralize the acid? Thanks for any help.
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Add as much orange juice as you would water. The acid shouldn't affect the bread at all, and don't bother adding baking soda to neutralize it.
Ditto.
The Cranberry-Walnut Celebration bread is a real treat and looks very nice on the table, whether you form it as a single or double layered braid. One of the most important factos when preparing bread using this formula is to make certain that all ingredients are at room temperature.
The orange juice might be too little of a statement. Concentrated orange juice maybe?
Thanks everyone for your comments. When we buy oranges I plan on zesting some for future use. I'm making this bread tomorrow, though, so I'm just going to use orange juice. I'm glad that the acid shouldn't cause a problem. Based on these comments I plan on using orange juice in the place of water. I thought about using concentrate but without knowing how much to use I didn't want to risk it. If the orange flavor doesn't come through too strongly, so be it I guess. I'm looking forward to making the bread.
I made this for today's dinner with the zest of about 1 1/2 oranges and it was great. I believe the original recepie said orange extract. Orange extract is one of those things that I would just never buy. The bread was really great. The dried cranberries I used were from a little organic supermarket here and they were really great too. The bread was a real hit with the family and the leftovers will make some great toast in the morning.