Homemade Baguettes - Easy & Awesome

After hauling myself out of bed after the most enjoyable Sunday lay in I have had in the last six days, it was time to get up and bake some bread.  I decided upon making a “lean dough”, as in one that contains no fat and settled upon a nice quick recipe for Baguettes that I found and tried a while ago.

A quick note, I am using a granite chopping board to bake my bread on. I keep it in the oven and make sure it is really hot before putting any dough on it. The idea is that it replicates a proper bakers oven and starts to cook the dough from the bottom as soon as it touches it. You can pick these up quite cheap, I got mine from Argos for £7 reduced from £15 in a clearance sale. An alternative could be an upturned heavy bottom roasting tin. You can just place the dough into the oven on a cold baking tray but you will not get a consistent crust all around the bread, it will still be good eating though, just not spectacular!

Recipe

10g fresh yeast (half for dried)

280g (approx) water

482g strong flour

10g salt

Method

Sieve flour and salt into a large bowl.

Take the fresh yeast in one hand and a small handful of the flour in another. Rub both hands together as if trying to warm them on a cold day, crumbling the mix into the bowl containing the flour and salt.

Add the lukewarm water reserving a few tablespoons in case you don't require it all. Using a knife or the handle of a wooden spoon gently combine the ingredients together. When the mix looks like its almost formed add the remaining water if there is still some flour remaining at the bottom of the bowl.

Turn out onto a lightly floured surface and knead for ten minutes. You will know when the dough is ready as it will have a smooth appearance and will spring back when lightly pressed with a finger. It is important not to take any shortcuts here as the kneading develops the gluten that will impact the texture of the finished bread.

Unproven dough

Place the dough back into the mixing bowl that has either had a light coating of oil or a sprinkle of flour (I prefer flour personally as I don't want a greasy dough), cover with a damp tea cloth and leave in a warm place until doubled in size. This could take 20mins in a very warm room or over an hour in a cooler spot. The dough will no longer be springy, you can make a 'belly-button' and the dough will hold the indentation.

The dough is now double the size and the gluten has relaxed and is no longer springy to the touch

Preheat oven to its maximum setting, French bakers ovens are a lot hotter than home ovens so we need to get as close as we can. Ensure the cooking stone or upturned tray is in place if using, and place an empty tray on the bottom of the oven... you will see why shortly.
Gently turn the dough out onto a floured surface and slap the dough a few times to remove any large packets of Co2 that have formed. Cut the dough in two and create a “backbone” in both pieces of the dough by following the technique below...



As you can see my technique is not up to scratch, but I have a feeling the bread will be OK, don't know why, I just do... ;-) I folded and pinched etc three times and after this the dough was elongated and more cylindrical.

After one go at shaping the dough and 'inserting the backbone'.. hmm more practice is needed!

This will help the dough have a nice round shape as a baguette should and not a flat bottom like a ciabatta.

Gently roll the dough to the desired length. If you are baking the bread on a conventional baking tray that is not heating in the oven, place the dough upon this, cover with a cloth and prove for 15-20mins in a warm place or until nearly doubled in size.

Shaped dough on floured tray ready to "slide" onto baking stone after further proving

If using a baking stone or similar, place the dough on the back of a floured upturned tray or chopping board, cover and leave to prove for 15-20mins in a warm place until nearly double in size.

To make a poppyseed baguette, beat an egg and lightly brush the dough, sprinkle with poppy seeds and then take a lame (bakers razor) or a slightly serrated knife (what I used) and quickly and confidently slash the bread seven times... I cant count so I only did six, mother will be cross. Of course you don't have to add the poppy seeds, just bake without the egg wash.

 Egg washed and poppy seed coated.. ready for the oven

Slide the dough quickly from the board or tray onto the hot baking stone in the oven, pour ¼ glass of water onto the baking tray at the bottom of the oven and quickly shut the door. The steam, strangely, helps to give baguettes its characteristic crust.

After 5-6mins open the oven to vent the steam, if there is still water on the tray remove it from the oven. Continue cooking for 6-10mins until it is golden brown and sounds hollow when tapped on the underside. Leave to cool on a cooling rack and don't eat for at least 20mins!!! Hard to resist but the inside needs time to dry out a little.

Venting the steam from the oven, here you can see the granite chopping board I am using as a baking stone

To make the lovely looking 'Epi' you could have followed my pictures... had I taken any. Instead follow this video...



Make sure you do this either on the baking sheet you will cook it on, or on the board you will transfer it onto the stone with. Again with the stone, confidently slide the dough onto the stone with a good jerk.

Bake as per the baguette.

Let me know how you get on... because this is soooo easy you will be making it, won't you?!?!?!

Bon appetit!

Dylan

p.s. a great site for recipes involving yeast http://www.wildyeastblog.com/category/yeastspotting/

Undersell/Over-deliver... The Budget Lunch

If there is one thing that annoys me more than any when it comes to dining out, it is how dishes are described. Its all good and well telling me what is in the dish but I don't need to know everything! There seems to be a worrying trend where restaurants are trying to out do one another by detailing each and every component that forms a dish, and this has gotten worse of late by telling me where every item on the menu has come from!

I understand restaurants want to highlight there use of seasonal and regional products, but just tell me that's what you do at the start of the menu, I will believe you, and I for one will be a happy chappy. By all means restaurants should have this information available, but to be honest if I wanted to know where my lamb chops grew up I would ask the waiter to find out. I could then take it upon myself to drive down the road and find the farm and heckle the remaining lambs telling them that their brother or sister tasted very good, and that next week I will be back again, for one of them (insert sinister laugh). Maybe I would take an empty bottle of Reggae Reggae Sauce with me to taunt them with the prospect of ending up under its sweet and spicy blanket, while all the while I sing along to the Levi Roots song....




You see I believe that as with most things in life, a little bit of mystery does one good. Isn't that the very reason that Lingerie was invented? When you order a dish from a menu that has detailed the DNA profile of the dish, all you are waiting for is for it to be delivered so you can consume it and go and find the mother of the Dunfermline Dexter Steak you just devoured and lick your lips and rub your belly in front of her. My personal preference is for understated menus that give you a surprise when it turns up as you weren't quite expecting what you see before you.

Of course for all the fussy eaters out there they will probably have an acid reflux attack at the very thought of what I am suggesting, but if I had my way these people would have been dealt with by Darwins Theory of Natural Selection, that and a little help from me and a blunt object. Alas with the UK laws being what they are at present this is unlikely to become a reality for at least a couple of years.

A  clear case of Over promising and Under delivering!

In the stock market world they call my preference “Undersell and Over-deliver”. Steve Jobs and his team at Apple are famous for giving earning estimates which they know they can easily beat. The analysts cottoned on to this quite quickly, raising their own estimates above that of Steves, yet Apple still leave room to allow them to over deliver on the analysts expectations most of the time. Of course the equation could be reversed... but who would want to risk a dish being perceived as under delivering? My point is over explaining a dish could lead the diner to expect too much, thus leaving room for it not to meet the standard they have created in their head... with the dish served having no faults.

Now imagine this from a diners point of view... a few select words describing the key constituents of the dish, the mouth starts to salivate, the mind starts to imagine how its going to look when it arrives.... and then it does, but with a few little things that you weren't told about, a few little nuggets of flavour and texture you hadn't been preparing your tongue, nose and brain for. Ohhh yes, that's what I am talking about, that little bit of, as the French say “je ne sais quoi”! Marco Pierre White had a tenancy to do this at Harveys, it would seemingly slip his mind that a dish contained not just a little, but a whole mountain of truffle shavings for example, resulting in an unexpected and greedily welcomed surprise for the diner. I would wager this doesn't occur too much nowadays, and the world is a sadder place for it.

So its with this in mind I would like to introduce the Budget Lunch task I will have to undertake in about 6 weeks time at Tante Marie. We have been challenged to create a family meal for 4 guests, comprising of 3 courses for the total sum of £8. That's £8 for the whole thing, not £8 per person or £8 per course £8. Total.

Having thought about this a few times since we were informed of task last week, I believe I have settled on a menu.

Soup

-------

Shepherds Pie

-------

Rice Pudding

Isn't that lovely. What more do you need to know? Is it understated? Yes. A little too understated? Maybe. I guess the challenge for me now is to develop serious flavour into each dish, as well as utilising a number of techniques to allow me to expand the descriptions a little, but still leave room for that little bit of “je ne sais quoi” of my own. Working with the budget I have, my skill set and the time limit of 2hrs 45mins may make this a difficult goal to achieve, but as ever I am always up for a good challenge. Don't be surprised if I bite off a little bit more than I can chew... as I fully intend on chewing it!

More on the Budget Lunch task to follow at a later date. For now, just ponder what 3 courses you would make remembering to stay within that £8 limit.... my menu is not set in stone, any suggestions are welcome in the comments area below.

Dylan

Week 2 part 1 - Trout, Omelette Arnold Bennet, French Onion Soup and More!

***SORRY FOR THE LACK OF PICTURES... I EITHER LEFT MY CAMERA IN MY LOCKER... OR LEFT IT ON TOP OF MY LOCKER.. I HOPE IT WAS THE PREVIOUS! WILL UPDATE THIS IF/WHEN I LOCATE IT ***

Ok I am sorry I have lapsed a little with the blogs, mainly due to coming down with some good old flu and a nice fever to boot. The number of emails I have received quite literally threatening me with imaginary physical violence if I don't post again soon, have been really quite underwhelming.

To illustrate the extent of my illness, on Friday afternoon we baked a Frangipane Tart, something to which I am quite partial, although it doesn't hold a candle to a good Bakewell Tart. My tart was excellent, great pastry (pâte sucrée), excellent filling made with triple the amount of Kirsch (what can I say I was knocked while measuring it out) and a fine drizzle of icing. So what did I do with this fine example of a almond and cherry flavored tart you ask? I gave it away! Why? Quite simply because the way I was feeling by the end of the day, I could not gather the strength or motivation to carry it home. Its a sad tale I know.

However on this glorious Surrey Sunday I feel I should make the effort to recap some of the things we did last week and take a look at what is on the menu over the next 5 days.

Monday – Was a full day in the kitchen making a number of items. I say items because it seems we are not learning complete and refined dishes at this stage, but more of a mix of components that may or may not be a suitable accompaniment to each other. I believe this is purely to introduce skills that are all of a similar level of complexity to one another to ensure the less experienced in the group do not struggle so much with the tasks at hand.

The items were as follows: Brown Stock, Omelette Arnold Bennet, Coleslaw Salad (Sauce Mayonnaise), Plum and Blackberry Cobbler, Basic White & Brown Bread, Celebration Cake (pt 1.), Mexican Choc Chip Cookies (dough)

The star of these was the Omelette Arnold Bennet, a Omelette with the inclusion of poached smoked haddock covered with a Sauce Mornay flavoured with the milk from poaching the fish, then browned under a grill. The bread making was enjoyable, something about seeing and feeling the dough change whilst kneading is quite satisfying... along with the later consumption with copious amounts of foie gras courtesy of my mother at Christmas. Ta Doris.

Tuesday – We had a demo in the morning, followed by cooking in the afternoon. Quite a straight forward day really, we finished our celebration mixture and baked the Mexican Cookies we started on Monday and made the filling for a Latticed Apple Flan.  Using a gas oven was a bit of a nightmare for the cookies as you cant bake two tray successfully at once due to the differing temps between the two levels.  We ended up with one ok tray, the other spread to much as the fat melted before the other ingredients had a chance to set meaning they spread out like a mofo.  If you would like a definition of the term 'mofo' click here.

Wednesday – After a good 3-4 inches of snow fell over night there were a few students missing from class so we baked their Celebration cakes for them. We are nice like that. We worked in pairs to cook a Soupe á l'oignons (French Onion Soup) something I made every week for 5 months on a ski season. I therefore left the crucial browning and caramelisation of the onions to my partner who had never made it before. As more students slowly dribbled in late, I moved downstairs to another kitchen leaving my partner explicit instructions to stir the now 'fudgey' onions every 60 seconds for 5 more mins or it will catch. I should note at this point that French Onion Soup is my favourite soup, there is nothing better than a perfectly executed example, and nothing worse than an insipid undercooked one. The key is in the onions, they need to be browned so very slowly over 40-60mins stirring regularly especially towards the end. Imagine my pain when I returned just 5 minutes later to add the previously made Brown Stock, to see my partner scraping the bottom of a pan, so thick with carbonised onions it probably had to be thrown away. Devastation doesn't come close to describing my emotions.  I turned and walked away in a mixture of despair, anger and self loathing that I hadn't stayed until the crucial moment.  NEVER AGAIN!

Part 2. to follow shortly....

Dylan