all i’m going to say about this recipe is that after making it, i decided that i am never going to the grocery store for bread ever again. let’s not ruin this with any more words - just enjoy.
the girl recently surprised me with a copy of Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day, a book that aims to simplify the process of making fancy high-quality bread. i definitely recommend it, even if i had trouble believing that the authors could pull off the concept before tasting it myself. the basic idea is that you can make bake great bread that tastes like you spent much more time on it than you really did - no starters or kneading necessary. that’s right, no kneading.
with most of the recipes in the book, an overly wet dough is quickly mixed together and allowed to rise in the bowl straight away. it is then quickly shaped into loaves after a few hours of rising. for those few seconds that the dough was actually in my hands for shaping, i was tempted to start working it on the counter to get a consistency i was more comfortable with, but the whole point is to let the ingredients do their job.
restraint definitely pays off with these recipes. i know mark bittman’s no-knead bread was all the rage, but the rising time for the original recipe is 12-18 hours. this peasant bread rose for 2 hours, and then another 40 minutes after it was shaped and as the oven warmed up. the crust and crumb were delicious, and as the smell of this bread filled the apartment, it made me want to grab a loaf and have a picnic in the park with a block of cheese and a cheap bottle of wine.
since my kitchen is about 40 degrees most mornings, there’s only more incentive this season to fire up the oven and bake a fresh loaf of bread every day or two. join me, won’t you?
even though we ate it a lot growing up, at some point i stopped buying white bread and moved completely to whole wheat. today, white bread is frowned upon by many because of its perceived lack of health benefits, but for me, the change to whole wheat was for taste alone. whole wheat has a more rounded and nutty flavor, and it’s come to replace and enhance things like grilled cheeses and peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. this was my first experience using whole wheat flour, and i was pleasantly surprised at how easily this bread came together.
this bread has both a soaker and a poolish. a soaker is a pre-ferment, which means it helps the bread taste like the dough fermented for much longer than it actually did. the soaker does not have yeast in it; the purpose is to help soften the coarse whole wheat grain and also activate the enzymes in the grains to break out some of the trapped sugars from the starches.
the poolish is another type of pre-ferment that is made up of flour, water and yeast. there is yeast in a poolish (very little), but it goes a long way in a very wet flour/water mixture (it’s easier for the yeast to work it’s magic in this state). when the poolish is added to the dough before baking, it not only helps fermentation but also adds incredible flavor.
the trick with whole wheat breads is making sure the flavor is hearty and delicious and not bitter and grassy. increasing the fermentation time helps balance the flavors, and for this reason, you’ll often find pre-ferments in these types of recipes. and while the amount of steps in a recipe like this can look intimidating, it’s really much simpler than it seems. at it’s core, bread has always been just flour, yeast, water and (often) salt.
i decided to test out my bread on an overstuffed grilled cheese with bacon, tomatoes and red onion. needless to say, it passed with flying colors.
i’ll be honest, i’m not much of a morning person. i’m much more likely to be up until 3 or 4 in the morning and then sleep until lunchtime - except for weekdays, in which case I go to bed around 3 or 4 and drag myself out of bed for work at 8:30. it doesn’t sound too healthy, but it works for me. on days when i actually wake up early enough for breakfast, i’m still not very hungry for it. but one of the few things that can interest me in the morning is an english muffin.
there’s something about melted butter flooding over the crispy toasted peaks of warm nooks and crannies that is completely irresistible. even commercials for thomas’ english muffins have me salivating. luckily, this recipe was even easier to tackle than i thought, and i probably won’t ever buy them from the store again.
it’s so rewarding to see a recipe come out to look and taste like the real thing. there was a moment when i was cooking them on the skillet and i got giddy seeing the perfectly toasted cornmeal crusted english muffins really take shape. it’s a moment that makes you think “why isn’t everyone making their own bread?” please, please, please try these out this weekend.
is there anything better than smothering an english muffin (or three) with butter? maybe adding delicious grape jelly is your thing. or topping with a fried egg. or maybe you want an open face ham and cheese sandwich? i forgot how little self control i have around these little fluffy muffins. i’m going to have to make more before the week is out.
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