It's a cozy Sunday today. The type one plays soft music, opens the windows and doors, and write long letters whilst sipping a cup of tea. I decided to spend some more kitchen time, prepping some very make ahead things. Like caramel sauce for the apple hand pies I'll bake for dessert on Thanksgiving. I'm finally making bread today too, and making bread always makes me feel happy.
I make bread for my daughter a few times a week, but those are simple affairs. A few ingredients in a machine that I can set and walk away from. There is a magic in that too. 3.5 hours later, the house smells like a bakery, perfumed by the aroma of yeast and caramelizing sugars. But there's a luxury in making bread by hand that makes the experience better than the machine.
Today I am not making the basic bread machine loaf. I am MAKING BREAD. Two harvest loaves, to be precise. No shortcuts. I made a sponge last night at 22:30 which I let rise until 8:00. It is 12:22, and I will not be able to taste my bread for perhaps three hours more. But it is good bread. The type where the crust shatters under one's teeth and the crumb is chewy and soul filling.
I've learned a lot in my years of doing this. Though as most things, it was a rough start. Like... I remember my sad first attempt, a few months after graduating college. I had a baking book I bought in the Borders clearance section in hand, a cheap bread pan, flour, and an excitement to try making bread. I did not understand half the terms, and the half I understood seemed pretty open to interpretation, but I pressed on, excited. It had been a lifelong dream of mine to make bread. I don't know why. The genesis might have been a cooking show, or maybe it was the fact that I wanted to reproduce the joy when my uncle's car pulled up as he brought bread from the local bakery. I could hear his bachata from 3 blocks away, so you can imagine my excitement!
Oh yeah... that first bread SUCKED. I mean, to the extent that it was inedible, a brick. It was more appropriate to classify it as a weapon than food. I was discouraged and decided to try again later. In retrospect, I continued to fail a lot. But I studied the subject a lot through the years. I read Tartine Bread, Josie Baker, Rose Levy Barembaum, James Beard. I watched videos, fed my sourdough, and battled gloopy 80% hydration dough. But after all the stress, failures, messes... I learned. I now choose my steps when I make my bread based on what I see the dough needs. Today I saw the dough was stubborn on mixing, so I gave it an autolyze and focused on building strength in the gluten network. Even this bench rest now is my last boost to make my bread nice and strong, instead of unwieldy. It does look quite pretty, holding up and not melting into the cutting board.
I feel joy today that I learned to make bread. Sometimes I get so caught up and the negativity in life and I in essence freeze. I deny myself all the small pleasures, thinking I do not deserve them. But today my heart feels so quiet and at ease as I anticipate tasting the bread I gave all my hard earned knowledge and love to make.
May your crust be crisp and your bread always rise!
– Peter Reinhart (The Bread Baker's Apprentice)