Our very favorite thing about fall isn't apple picking, or seeing all the great produce at the market, or even gearing up for the approaching holidays. It's the ability to turn on our oven again! And for us, that means a return to bread baking. Do you have any bread baking plans this weekend?
One thing that we'd really like to master this fall and winter is a really good multi-grain loaf - one of those bread that's heavy with nuts and rich with dried fruit. We've had our eye on this recipe for quite some time. It uses no actual flour, but uses sprouted whole grains instead!
• Sprouted Bread from the Boston Globe
We'd also like to try our hand at baguettes. We've only made them once or twice before, and would love to get into the habit of making them more often. They're easy to freeze, too, so we can make several loaves and have them ready for quick weeknight dinners. Our favorite recipe is still the "baguette normal" from Local Breads by Daniel Leader.
And of course, we'll have to get a few sweet breads in there! Certain members of our household have been begging for some cinnamon bread, and we're happy to oblige! We'd like to try it with the Oatmeal Toasting Bread that Faith reviewed last year around this time.
What are your baking plans?
Related: Food Science: What Is Sourdough?
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I TOTALLY agree!!! I already have it on my weekend to-do list...baking bread.
I just made an oatnut bread using stoneground oats a few days ago. It was amazing, and also pretty hard to mess up.
Just the other day I bought an older Williams Sonoma bread baking cookbook at a book sale for only $1! So its funny that you put this topic up because I definitely planned to try my hand at one of the recipes this weekend (despite the 100 degree temps expected for tomorrow-ugh!).
As soon as I saw this post I thought, "this is the perfect time to make my first attempt at baguettes." But...I have had 3 failures this week alone. Three! I haven't had a total kitchen failure in...years! I've made things we've liked less well, or things I wouldn't make again, but just flat out "this didn't work, chuck it?" No. Three in one week.
Is bread a good curse-breaker or am I tempting fate?
Sourdough to eat and freeze will be baked this weekend.
Either flax no-knead or pitas. I have not yet decided.
Plans? This year it's the BYOB (Bake Your Own Bread) challenge, and I'm trying very hard to bake all, or at least most of our bread. Also, currently baking through The Bread Baker's Apprentice Book.
Then there's Beth Hensberger's book, The Bread Bible, currently checked out from the local library and sitting on my coffee table with myriad colored wings sticking off the pages.
Yeah, I don't think I'll get through all of that either, but it sure is fun (and tasty) trying!
haha, maybe I am crazy, but I've been baking bread every other weekend the entire summer. And we don't have AC either. I actually think the best bread is made on really hot & sticky days (it rises way faster). I will be making some honey wheat bread this weekend :)
I'm sure it's been covered before, but can anyone recommend a good beginner's recipe? Last year I tried once and failed miserably (the dough didn't rise). This year I have a new oven and a renewed desire to try making my own bread.
Last weekend I made beer bread with some Dogfish Head Black & Blue I had opened. This weekend, I'm going to try to find a recipe to use some blue cornmeal I have.
@cmcinnyc - If you can get your hands on it by this weekend, the baguette recipe I mention in the post is really excellent. I hadn't had much success before this recipe either!
@PrettyKitty - I'll try to get a post up about beginner breads asap. In the mean time, my own starter recipe was the white bread from Joy of Cooking. I also really like the Classic Sandwich Bread from King Arthur Flour.
I'm baking my way through Bread Baker's Apprentice as well (there's the BBA challenge, here: http://pinchmysalt.com/the-bba-challenge/bba-breads/ .. although I'm going out of order!) I did Anadama last weekend, Casatiello and l'ancienne the weekend before. This weekend is Greek Celebration Bread. Looks tasty!
Beer bread! Been thinking about it for weeks now.
Hmmmm...a honey wheat bread sounds like a good plan.:)
Are you familiar with "yeastspotting", a weekly collection of yeast based recipes from the food blogs. It's an amazing collection of bread recipes from around the world and full of ideas.
http://www.wildyeastblog.com/category/yeastspotting/
Haha funny, I'm actually in the midst, coincidentally, of the bread unit in pastry school. I have been bringing home piles, literally, of bread products every night. Love bread.
Made bread (honey whole wheat sandwich bread, the usual) last night for the first time since a) summer hit and b) I got pregnant and spent the summer puking and lying on the floor.
I can't believe I lived off safeway bread for almost 4 months...the first bite into my homemade bread again was heaven.
Recipe: http://hannaishungry.blogspot.com/2009/02/whole-wheat-sandwich-bread.html