Tuesday, August 15, 2006

S Bread

I am addicted to rustic bread making, and I am blatantly happy about it. Ever since buying The Bread Baker's Apprentice by Peter Reinhart a few months back, I am still spending time 'poring' over the wide variety of information and recipes.

I thawed out half of my pate fermente and made a 'long-winded' recipe - Pane Siciliano. It is a long recipe since it takes one day for to make the pate fermente (pre-ferment), mixing of the main dough the next day, followed by overnight retardation in the fridge. Finally on the 3rd day, the shaped dough is ready to be baked. I managed to use only two days since my pate fermente had been sitting in my freezer, ready to go.


This bread has a slightly gritty and nutty flavour, due to the use of semolina flour combined with bread flour. I chose to shape it into an S-shape, following the tradition. Only after baking then I realized that mine is an 'inverted' S, silly me.


14 comments:

Edith said...

aiyo throw some over please. yum yum.

Edith said...

aiyo throw some over please. yum yum.

Gracio said...

Angie, nice blogskin!! and yummy bread!! :)

Cuisine Paradise said...

Wow...need 3 days to make a loaf of bread! Angie, you are really very paitent... if it was me, i won't be doing there... U are GOOD! Angie, the new layout of your blog is good too.... :)

Rene said...

Hi Angie,

Nice crumb! *Drool* You new page looks great!

Unknown said...

Edith, catch some!! ;p

Thanks to all for your kind words. It's your encouragement that keeps me going with my bread obsession ;)

Getting a little bored, so gotta change the template a little to spice things up *lolz*

diddy said...

looks so delicious and fluffy!

Peony said...

I love baking these types of bread too, but my family not too keen to eat these..they prefer the soft, fluffy and sweet local type, like Bread Talks..

Rene said...

Hi Angie,
Just realised that you have left me msgs on my page. Didn't realise it until just now. Sorry! I must have seemed rude for not replying. Pls accept my apologies.

Unknown said...

Thanks Diddy!

Peony, yeah, many of us are all accustomed to the soft and fluffy asian-style breads, that's why we have bakeries all over the island.

Rene, don't worry abt it, I thought your settings may have some problems.

Gattina Cheung said...

Angie,
just love everything - its big hole, its moist interior, and that top crust! Did you brush the top with salt water? Look so delicious!
Saw Peony mention Bread Talk... I tried their bread in HK, texture was nicely soft but the flavor was funny...

Unknown said...

Gattina,

My favourite is the top crust too. I just used water to brush to stick the sesame seeds.

Breadtalk breads are very asian-style, guess the funny flavours comes from the whatever-chemicals they use to keep the bread soft... Their breads used to be quite good when they first started, but now it's downhill, at least to my taste lah.

Gattina Cheung said...

Angie,
I think you're right on chemicals... last time I bought a bag of mini cutie rolls and some bear-face choco bread, couldn't take more than one bite, all went to trash... Their shop looks very pretty though.

Unknown said...

Gattina,

Ya, they have nice shops and pretty breads. You should have seen the queues when they first opened, snaking all the way out of the shops. But now the 'fad' is gone, and a few branches have closed down. I think I much prefer home baked breads without all these preservatives.