Emmanuel Hadjiandreou's recipe and step by step instructions for making 'Levain de Campagne' in his highly acclaimed book 'How to Make Bread' is nothing short of brilliant. He takes the wannabe baker by the apron strings and leads him or her carefully through each stage of making sourdough bread from preparing a starter, kneading (not much), proving (hours and hours) and - the trickiest bit of all - slashing the top prior to baking, to finally delivering a loaf from the oven.
As I finished my loaves and closed 'How to Make Bread' it made me wonder what I might achieve if Emmanuel was actually teaching me face to face. A huge amount if his book is anything to go by. Talk about a genie in a bottle the man's a genius in the bakehouse.
Emmanuel's lessons are extraordinarily instructive - it feels like he is with you in your kitchen as you read the next installment of his text guiding you towards getting that beautiful loaf made. Steve Painter's detailed step by step photographs illustrate the master baker's expert tuition beautifully.
You do need a few bits of specialist kit. Yesterday had me explaining to the pharmacist in Boots why I needed some traditional razor blades. 'No I don't want them to cut my wrists. I am making bread and need to slash the top of the bread before I put it in the oven' I explained. I then had to nip across the road to Costa and ask for one of those thin sticks for stirring coffee. Why? To thread through a razor blade to make an improvised lame. This is the gizmo used to lacerate the pre-baked bread.
Anyway the results are great. The bread is made with organic white flour, a little wholemeal and a tad of rye flour to give texture and help the sourdough fermentation along a bit. I proved the loaves overnight then cooked and photographed them this morning.
Emmanuel works at the School of Artisan Food in Nottinghamshire where he teaches artisan baking to students at all level of competence.
A special mention should also go to photographer Steve Painter. His photographic documentation of how to make Emmanuel's repetoire of bread and baked produce is beautiful enough to hang in an art gallery and accurate enough to use in a virtual learning seminar.
How to Make Bread is by Emmanuel Hadjiandreou and published by Ryland, Peters & Small.£19.99
As I finished my loaves and closed 'How to Make Bread' it made me wonder what I might achieve if Emmanuel was actually teaching me face to face. A huge amount if his book is anything to go by. Talk about a genie in a bottle the man's a genius in the bakehouse.
Emmanuel's lessons are extraordinarily instructive - it feels like he is with you in your kitchen as you read the next installment of his text guiding you towards getting that beautiful loaf made. Steve Painter's detailed step by step photographs illustrate the master baker's expert tuition beautifully.
You do need a few bits of specialist kit. Yesterday had me explaining to the pharmacist in Boots why I needed some traditional razor blades. 'No I don't want them to cut my wrists. I am making bread and need to slash the top of the bread before I put it in the oven' I explained. I then had to nip across the road to Costa and ask for one of those thin sticks for stirring coffee. Why? To thread through a razor blade to make an improvised lame. This is the gizmo used to lacerate the pre-baked bread.
Anyway the results are great. The bread is made with organic white flour, a little wholemeal and a tad of rye flour to give texture and help the sourdough fermentation along a bit. I proved the loaves overnight then cooked and photographed them this morning.
Emmanuel works at the School of Artisan Food in Nottinghamshire where he teaches artisan baking to students at all level of competence.
A special mention should also go to photographer Steve Painter. His photographic documentation of how to make Emmanuel's repetoire of bread and baked produce is beautiful enough to hang in an art gallery and accurate enough to use in a virtual learning seminar.
How to Make Bread is by Emmanuel Hadjiandreou and published by Ryland, Peters & Small.£19.99
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| Improvised lame made from Costa coffee stirrer and razor blade |
I have just been speaking to Emmanuel Hadjiandreou because he has kindly agreed to run a Real Bread workshop for the Guild of Food Writers on 11th April at the School of Artisan Food, Welbeck. I organise some of the workshops for the Guild and so I had the opportunity to pick his brains about critical stages in making this wonderful loaf. "Why", I asked him, "does the risen dough fall like a pancake when I invert the proving basket and turn the loaf out onto the baking sheet?" Emmanuel explained that if I proved the dough to the half way stage in the proving basket the day before it is due to be cooked it can be put in the fridge overnight. By the morning it will be ready to turn out and slash without falling. He also advised me to work fast between turning the bread out of the proving basket and placing it in the oven.
Another of Emmanuel's tips is to adjust the amount of fluid in a sour dough recipe according to the wetness of the sour dough starter. He advised when adding the water in the recipe to only add 3/4 of the stated amount. You then can add a little more if you need to but the dough should be slightly wet and sticky.