The delightful taste and aroma of artisan French loaves of bread are comforting and tasty. This recipe yields 1 boule, 1 batard, and 1 baguette.
Taste - The out-of-the-oven French loaves of bread offer a satisfying savory bite, bite after bite. Full of delicious baked bread flavor. Mouthfeel - The baked outer crust of the bread provides a lite, satisfying crunch with an enjoyable, delicately chewy bread finish. Aroma - The aroma of freshly baked bread is divinely fragrant.
Baking Techniques
French bread is baked with bread flour, water, salt, and instant yeast. I produced a French bread boule, batard, and baguette. The boule (French for “ball”) is a French ball or bowl-shaped bread. The batard is a football-shaped loaf. The baguette is the long and slender shape of French bread.
I used eight primary baking techniques:
Straight Dough Mixing Method required proofing the yeast in water, combining all the ingredients in a mixing bowl, and mixing. I used my standing mixer;
Proofing the dough to allow the dough to rest for about 10-minutes before doing the windowpane test;
Windowpane test for proper gluten development and elasticity;
Rounding to shape a smooth, round ball of dough;
Bulk Fermentation until the dough has doubled in size (~1 hour);
Makeup and Panning shape the dough for the desired product’s shape and size (e.g., boule, batard, and baguette);
The moist-heat baking method in a standard oven was the means for baking (450F). At the bottom of the range, I added a small baking pan with boiling water at the start of the baking process.
The weight method was used to figure out the “doneness” of my products. You want to achieve about fifteen to twenty-percent weight loss on your product through baking.
Mise en Place
(French for “gathering,” “putting gathered things in their place,” or “organizing required ingredients”)
I assembled and sanitized my kitchen tools, ramekins, baking pans, cooling rack, equipment, supplies, and food production aids. All ingredient proportioning was measured per the recipes using an Ava Weigh commercial food scale. All components were scaled and placed into ramekins or a bowl.
Here are the portions for the dough (Grocery List):
750g bread flour
7.5g Saf-Instant Yeast. Bloom the instant yeast by placing the yeast in 105F to 110F temp 495g water (The best temp to activate the yeast). Add two pinches of granulated sugar to feed the yeast and get it active.
495g water. Use an electric kettle to heat the water from 105F to 110F.
15g of salt.
NOTE: I used the KitchenAid PRO 600 stand mixer. The stand mixer makes the chore of making the dough easy.
Recipe Instruction
All my ingredient combining and mixing was done using a KitchenAid PRO 600 stand mixer.
1. Mix flour, water, yeast, and salt in a mixing bowl. Mix on low speed until thoroughly combined (The stir setting).
2. Knead the dough. Using a stand mixer, knead for about 4-minutes on speed setting number two.
3. Remove the dough from the stand mixer, and round the dough by hand. Place the dough in a lightly oiled bowl (I used a very, very light coating of PAM baking spray), cover it, and let the dough rest for about 10-minutes.
4. Splash your hands and workbench with a couple of pinches of flour. Gently form a gluten window.
5. Place the dough back in the bowl, cover it, and let it rest for about 1-hour.
6. Scale the dough at 350g for a baguette, 450g for a boule, and 450g for a batard.
7. Shape the scaled dough into rounds and let them rest for 20-minutes.
8. Shape the dough for the desired product’s shape and size. This task included the by-hand process of shaping the three loaves of bread.
9. Cover the shaped three loaves of bread and let them rest for about 1 hour.
10. Preheat the oven to bake at 450F.
10. Score the three loaves of bread with a bread lame.
11. Bake using the moist-heat baking method. Keep an eye on your product. Use the weight method to figure out the “doneness” of the products.
12. Take out of the oven and let cool for about 5 to 10-minutes.
Happy baking!