My personal challenge: baking my way through "How to Bake". This post is my experience baking and learning new skills from tackling each recipe in Paul Hollywood's, "How to Bake". I will also document any recipe changes that I made - mainly as a result of not having the ingredients on hand (i.e., we never have regular sugar in the house) - and how the recipe fared. I will not be providing the recipes that are in his book. For this post, I am focusing on learning lessons from Paul Hollywood's fougasse recipe.
It's funny when life gets away from you and some of your goals. For me, it was moving, getting a new job and then changing jobs twice, and adopting a puppy while my husband was deployed that got me away from turning the pages in "How to Bake" and finding a recipe to get lost in. Well, after a few years of a break from learning from cookbooks, one night my husband and I searched for a new episode of GBBO and got swept away in the competition, and I in the desire to bake again.
We flipped through a few pages and saw the really neat look of the Fougasse bread, and decided that would be the recipe that would bring me back to the kitchen with "How to Bake" in hand. I was nervous to take much more on since I had Googled a recipe for a Cottage Loaf, and it turned out to be more of a sad mound than two round loaves stacked like a proud snowman. This recipe reads really easy and besides adding garlic and a few herbs, there is not much to mess up or stray from, but still; in keeping with the tradition of sharing my notes from baking this recipe, see below for some takeaways!
Here are some of the lessons that I learned and changes I made to Paul Hollywood's Fougasse:
Dough Rise Issue - House Temperature Too Chilly. We have a husky and in the winter, we keep the house extra chilly to reduce the chances of her blowing out her fur in the winter. To note, our house is usually 55F inside - I bundle with sweaters and beanies and also have a heating pad on my side of the bed to stay warm. But this cold temperature indoors is NOT friendly to proofing doughs. If you have read the introduction, Paul Hollywood mentions that dough proofs best at 18-24C or 64-75F. As a result, I have had to get creative. I usually pre-heat the oven to 350F and place the proofing dough on top of the oven and cover with a warm, damp tea towel for the dough to rise. Now, this usually works great in the summer and the dough rises within the required time, but due to the colder temperature this dough did not rise within the hour time requirement. Yes, even with the oven warmth and the warm tea towel. To help the dough along, I had two rewarm and dampen the tea towel to place over the dough to keep the temperature as warm as possible.
Top of Dough Baby Crusty. Now, I should have known that this was going to happen (see the picture above), but since the dough was taking a while to rise, I forgot to drizzle with a little extra oil when placing the second tea towel over it to ensure that the top of the dough did not dry out. I do not use a plastic dough container or plastic bag for my proofing since I try to reduce waste and plastic in our kitchen. Again, I have had to get creative. There are a couple of ways you can bring moisture back into the bread: 1. drizzle a little more EVOO on top of the bread, and 2. brush the bread with a little water to rehydrate. Since this was the first proof, I was able to add a little water to my fingers and stretch the dough out on the baking sheet for the second proof while incorporating some moisture back into the dough. It would have been easier to do this if you were able to knock air out and knead the dough before the second proof, but this bread required gentle handling. To ensure the proper humidity for the second proof, I boiled some water and placed next to the sheet pan and covered with the warm tea towel (both the bread and the hot water).
Too Much Olive Oil? As you may know, yoo much olive oil can cause the dough to be unworkable and loose - almost gloopy. To avoid this or help you out in a pinch, keep reading! I tried to control the pour of olive oil when coating the bread dough before placing it in the proofing container, but it poured out WAY too fast. So! While baking is an exact science and you should keep to the measurements exactly or the result will vary greatly, I do have one save. Add a bit more flour and knead once more until the texture is elastic and it stretches away from the bowl like intended. And, this may be an obvious, but to avoid this all together, perhaps coat the proofing bowl and not the dough (ha!). I guess you have to make the mistake at least once. Hey, back in the kitchen after 2 years and not everything is screwed on straight, what can I say?
When is it DONE? Now this was a tricky bread to know when it was done because it did not change colors when baked, or like I thought it would. Like the picture in the "How to Bake" cookbook, our fougasse stayed quite pale. However, the underside was nice and golden. I took out of the oven at the 18 minute mark, but it was not hollow to the tap. I baked for about 5 minutes longer than the suggested time. It was crisp on the bottom and nice and fluffy on the inside. For our flavor, I did a garlic and oregano only because we had fresh herbs on hand.
On that note, I hope that you find a recipe book you enjoy, or this one, that I am currently baking my way through. Either way, enjoy baking and nourishing yourself and your family.
All my light and all my love. Namaste.
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