Knead to Know, Part II

So maybe I went out Friday night. Maybe I turned off my alarm when it went off in the morning. When my body jolted me out of a pleasant sleep, the clock read 9:45. The second session started at 10:00. I called a car and somehow managed to get to the Institute by 10:15. My fellow bread makers were all already there, but luckily I hadn't missed much.

Today we would be reap the benefits of the previous night's work. The dough had risen and now needed to be compressed yet again, shaped, rested and put in the oven. Below are the shaped whole wheat boules at rest and behind them a fellow breader deflating the chock-full-of-fruit-and-nut bread before it could be shaped.


One thing that was particularly cool was that we were making breads from a wild sourdough starter that Peter had been growing and feeding for about 6 months as if it were a pig fattening to slaughter (or in this case bake). This is the old-school style of bread making. However we also made loaves with commercial yeast. This yeast changed the game and allowed for the mass production of bread, paving the way for the industrialization of food. While the whole wheat boule and fruit-and-nut bread below were made with the sourdough started, we made a Sullivan Street-style no-knead bread (pictured at the beginning of the post), a french baguette, and focaccia using commercial yeast.


Because everyone was going to get to take home each type of bread, by the end of the class, the kitchen really felt like a bakery churning out loaf after loaf. It was awesome. We also got to sample our efforts along with an assortment of cheeses. Not bad a morning in the kitchen.



It was a pleasure learning from my uncle and really interesting finding out about the whole process of artisanal bread making. I've been eating the bounty I brought home all this week. Now all I have to do is practice so I won't have to rely on the store-bought stuff ever again.