BBA #3: Bagels

Regularly, I tell my students that books and the internet are tremendous resources for gaining new knowledge. We take on nonfiction research projects we've always wanted to explore, and we read and read and read to learn all we can. We identify main ideas, we make sense of unfamiliar words, and we piece information together from different sources until we have cohesive ideas about our topics.

The first 100 pages of Peter Reinhart's The Bread Baker's Apprentice: Mastering the Art of Extraordinary Bread are my summer nonfiction research project. Tucked in those pages are terms I've never heard, ideas I've never encountered, and enough information to keep me learning about bread for the rest of my life.

When you open The Bread Baker's Apprentice: Mastering the Art of Extraordinary Bread, it's easy to imagine skipping to page 108 where the formulas for different breads actually begin. Do not. If you do, your bread will not turn out as well.

Case in point: I've made Peter Reinhart's bagel recipe several times over the past year from a post on Smitten Kitchen. Deb broke down the bagel recipe and really explained each step. But my dough never rose quite the way I wanted. I never got the bubbly, doubled rise I desired from my starter. My finished bagels were always tasty, but I knew they could be better.

Little did I know that there is a MAJOR difference between instant yeast and active dry yeast. You only need 33 percent instant yeast in a recipe, whereas you need 50 percent active dry yeast to achieve the same rise. That little difference in yeast yielded the foamy and bubbly sponge I had previously failed to recreate.

I didn't know what a windowpane test was. Yes, I'm sure I could have googled it, but I just never got around to it. Reinhart explains the windowpane test clearly (part of Stage Two of his TWELVE stages of Bread). It's when you hold a small piece of dough up to the window and stretch it to make a paper-thin membrane. If it falls apart or tears before the membrane is formed, not enough gluten has developed in the dough, and it requires more kneading. If you can see through it like a windowpane, it's ready.

Reinhart even broke down how to shape the bagels into individual rolls for proofing. Before, I had a hard time forming even rolls, and my finished bagels had some inconsistencies in appearance. Reinhart suggested putting a ball of dough on the counter, cupping it inside your hand, and rotating the dough in a circular motion until it popped up into a perfect ball in your hand. He says it can be done with both hands at once, but I will save that for later recipes.

The end result were bagels so tasty they didn't need to be toasted. They had shiny, thick, caramelized crusts (from the water bath in alkalized water), and they were dense inside. They had just the right amount of chew. I gave the bagels a quick dip in an egg wash (Deb's idea) after they came out of the water bath. This helped the toppings to stay firmly on the bagels. I had sesame seeds, poppy seeds, salt and minced onions on hand to top the bagels.

These bagels were delicious with lox and cream cheese for a dinner party just a few hours after they came out of the oven. However, the apartment was hot, hot, hot from the 500 degree oven!

As part of the BBA Challenge, we're not posting recipes from the book. If you enjoy the recipes from The Bread Baker's Apprentice: Mastering the Art of Extraordinary Bread, buy the book and bake along with us!

BBA #2: Greek Celebration Bread

Bread number two in the Bread Baker's Apprentice challenge is the Greek Celebration Bread. While it certainly won't become my everyday bread, the combination of spices and sweeteners really grew on me.

The dough includes cinnamon, nutmeg, allspice, cloves, orange extract, almond extract, eggs, honey and olive oil, all of which contribute something slightly different to the bread. Once it's removed from the oven, it's glazed with sugar, honey, orange extract and sesame seeds. The glaze is thin, but it adds just the right amount of sweetness to the bread. 

I added the spices to the flour in different locations so I could make sure I had them all before mixing. 

This bread required me to make a poolish, a simple to make and delightful to say wet sponge that serves as the starter for several of the breads in the book. 

Reinhart says that every 17 degree change in temperature effectively doubles or halves the proofing time. For example, if a bread doubles in size in 90 minutes at 70 degrees, then it will only take 45 minutes if the temperature is 87 degrees. So when it's in the 90s, as it was while I was baking this bread, the proofing time is even quicker. I think it proofed a bit too much because I didn't realize this would happen until after!

This dough was a joy to work with, soft and supple and with so many added ingredients that the dough stayed moist. I had to add almost 1/4 cup more flour so that it didn't stick to the counter! 

Cook's Illustrated this month had a tip about bread kneading. They suggested just adding a teaspoon of vegetable oil to the counter instead of flouring the surface. That way the bread doesn't absorb any unneeded flour. Has anyone tried this? I'm curious as to how it would work!

The finished bread was great toasted or just served warm with butter. 

As part of the BBA Challenge, we're not posting recipes from The Bread Baker's Apprentice: Mastering the Art of Extraordinary Bread. If you are interested, get the book and bake along with us!


I'm also having a little trouble getting Blogger to cooperate. It keeps inserting these extra empty lines into my posts, often between paragraphs. Does anyone know why they are there or how I can remove them? Thanks!

BBA #1: Anadama Bread

As a child, I fancied myself quite the bread baker. At 14, I signed up for the Advanced Yeast Breads competition during our summer 4-H Fair. Even though it was my first year competing, I decided I didn't want to waste my time with the Beginner or Intermediate Yeast Bread categories.

Yes, the competition was minor. All who signed up were able to participate, and, if you successfully baked a yeast bread and filled out an eight-page booklet about your work, you received a blue ribbon and were rewarded with three dollars. Even then, that wasn't much.

But I was eager, and I decided to make potato and onion dinner rolls. They required an overnight rise (which I now know helped them ferment and helped extract those delicious flavors from the wheat). They required a light misting with water, to help simulate conditions found in professional bread ovens. They had a light egg wash to bring out some color during baking.

Did I mention that was my first time ever baking bread?

Those first potato and onion rolls did end up being somewhat successful, earning me a blue ribbon and that coveted three dollar prize. However, the baking experience only demonstrated to me that I could successfully follow a recipe and achieve a desired result. 14-year-old me just had no understanding of the beauty of bread making, how yeast can coax flavors out of the bread, how a slow fermentation can work wonders, and how the same base ingredients can be modified into countless unique breads.

Perhaps current me still isn't quite sure, but with The Bread Baker's Apprentice: Mastering the Art of Extraordinary Bread by Peter Reinhart, a delightful birthday gift from Thomas and Alyna, I'm learning.

A few years ago, Pinch My Salt challenged bakers to bake through The Bread Baker's Apprentice: Mastering the Art of Extraordinary Bread, completing each of the recipes in order. Pinch My Salt started the journey a few years ago, but the group has just taken off, and new bakers are constantly taking on the challenge.

So, with the Anadama Bread, I'm officially beginning the BBA Challenge and starting out on a journey toward true knowledge of bread. It's a delicious bread with a delightful myth behind it. According to Wikipedia, a fisherman was angry at his wife Anna for leaving him with nothing but cornmeal and molasses. After she left, he threw in flour and yeast and tossed the bread in the oven, cursing his wife the entire time shouting "Anna, damn her." Inspired neighbors are said to have adopted the recipe and changed the name slightly.

This bread incorporates a delicious mix of cornmeal, bread flour and molasses. The cornmeal soaks overnight with water, so that the natural sugars trapped in the corn are released. The soaker is followed by three rises and a long knead. I kneaded the bread by hand, which gave me a good sense of how the bread came together. These loaves rose beautifully, almost ridiculously well.

After enjoying a fresh slice with butter, I reminisced more about 14-year-old me. I thought about the first dish we learned how to make in Home Ec: egg-in-a-hole toast. I cut a circle in the bread, buttered it, put it in a hot pan, and cracked an egg in the middle. A perfect dinner after a day of bread baking.

As part of the BBA Challenge, we're agreeing not to post recipes from The Bread Baker's Apprentice: Mastering the Art of Extraordinary Bread. If you're inspired, get the book and bake along with us!