The Baking Answer Book (48 page)

Fresh-baked, cooled bread freezes beautifully. Wrap it in plastic and then foil and freeze for 2 to 3 weeks. Defrost the bread on the countertop for a few hours (thin baguettes will take less than an hour, large rounds may take up to 4 hours) and reheat in a 350°F (180°C) oven for 5 to 10 minutes to refresh before slicing and serving.

BREAD-BAKING EQUIPMENT

Here is a list of equipment necessary for making a variety of breads at home. If you are a serious baker, or intend to become one, gather everything on the list. If you are just starting out, purchase equipment as necessary and improvise when you have to.

Baker’s peel.
Use this long-handled metal or wooden sheet to slide breads onto a preheated baking stone. If you don’t have a peel, you can use a rimless baking sheet. Just take care not to touch the hot stone.

Baking stone.
Look for a large rectangular stone that can accommodate the largest breads and pizzas. To avoid cracking, season a new baking stone by heating it a few times in a 350°F (180°C) oven for 30 minutes before preheating it to 500°F (260°C).

Bannetons.
These willow baskets lined with canvas are traditional implements for helping dough rounds maintain their shape. But a shallow bowl lined with a floured kitchen towel will do just as well.

Bench scraper.
This rectangular steel blade with a wooden or plastic handle is great for dividing dough as well as for scraping sticky dough off of a work surface.

Clear, straight-sided rising container.
You can let your dough ferment in any bowl large enough to contain it as it rises, but clear rising containers, with measurement markings on the side, make it easy to see when your dough has doubled.

Heavy-duty stand mixer.
Many bakers enjoy kneading dough by hand, but if you are not one of them you will need a stand mixer with a powerful motor and a dough hook attachment to
do the job. I have used the same KitchenAid model to knead bread dough for over 20 years and it is still going strong, so I highly recommend that brand.

Instant-read thermometer.
Use an instant-read thermometer, inserted into the center of your loaf, to accurately judge its doneness.

Loaf pan.
A metal pan is better than ceramic or stoneware; it will conduct heat more efficiently, resulting in a crisper crust.

Parchment paper.
Sometimes when shaped loaves proof directly on top of a baker’s peel, they stick to the peel and become misshapen when you attempt to slide them onto the baking stone in the oven. Place your shaped loaves on a piece of parchment paper set on top of the peel (or on top of a rimless baking sheet, which works just as well) before proofing and you will never have this problem. Just slide the parchment, with the loaves still on top, from the peel to the stone.

Razor blade or lame.
The best implement for slashing dough before it goes into the oven, although a very sharp chef’s or utility knife will also do the trick.

Rubber spatula.
Before you begin to knead, either by hand or machine, you’ll need a large, strong spatula to combine your ingredients into a rough dough.

Scale.
Weighing ingredients is a more accurate way of measuring them than by using measuring cups and spoons, and these days most bread books list both the weight and volume of ingredients. So if you are serious about bread-baking, invest in a good digital scale with a tare function so you can bring the display back to zero before adding each new ingredient.

APPENDIX

High-Altitude Baking

If you usually bake at sea level but are planning to bake at an altitude above 3,000 feet, it’s smart to have an idea of how your doughs and batters might behave differently up there. The air is thinner and drier at higher altitudes, and water boils at a lower temperature than it does at sea level. These conditions usually call for a 25°F (4°C) increase in the baking temperature, and occasionally a slight adjustment of ingredients, to duplicate sea level results. Sometimes a little more liquid is necessary so your baked goods don’t dry out. Sometimes less leavening is better, because carbon dioxide is produced at a greater rate in the mountains. You might need to cut back on the sugar in a recipe, because at high altitudes sugars become more concentrated when they bake.

Before you start fiddling with a recipe, try it first as it is written, increasing the oven temperature. In many cases ingredient adjustments won’t be necessary. If you do have one of the common problems discussed below, experiment with the small changes that are suggested, or look at a similar recipe designed especially for high-altitude baking (for a good high-altitude baking cookbook, see
page 363
) to see what kind of quantities and ratios of ingredients have been proven to work well in the mountains. What follows are answers to some of the most common questions.

Q
My banana bread batter overflowed in the oven, causing a real mess. What can I do to prevent this from happening next time?

A
At high altitudes, baking powder and baking soda quickly produce more carbon dioxide than they do at sea level. The rapid expansion of the gas bubbles in the oven can cause batter to overflow the pan. When adapting a quick bread recipe, try cutting back on the leavening by about 25 percent for a less dramatic bubbling up (and over).

Q
Is it my imagination, or do my corn muffins taste overly sweet at a higher altitude?

A
When muffins or any other sweetened baked goods are placed in a hot oven, liquid in the batter evaporates more quickly than it does at lower elevations, concentrating the sugars and affecting flavor. For pleasantly sweetened baked goods, reduce the sugar in the recipe by a tablespoon for every cup.

Q
How can I prevent my drop cookies from spreading into brittle discs as they bake at 5,000 feet?

A
Cookie dough that contains a lot of butter and sugar can give bakers a real headache at high altitudes. Because of the low boiling point, the water in the butter evaporates from the dough more quickly than at lower altitudes, before the dough has time to set. The sugar concentrates and caramelizes, resulting in overly sweet and hard cookies. To give the cookies less sweetness and more shape, cut back on the sugar (1 tablespoon for every cup in the recipe) and substitute an egg yolk for 2 tablespoons of the butter.

Q
How can I make a tender piecrust at 5,000 feet?

A
Just as when you are mixing and rolling pie dough at lower altitudes, be observant and sensitive to your dough as you mix and roll it. At higher altitudes you will probably need to add more liquid to the dough to compensate for the dry flour. Restrain yourself from overflouring the countertop when you roll the dough. You don’t want it to stick, but you don’t want to add so much flour that your dough is underhydrated, which, at high altitudes will result in tough and dry pastry.

Q
My butter cake is usually moist and well risen, with a velvety crumb. Why did it bake up flat, dry, and crumbly when I made it at a high altitude? What adjustments to the recipe should I make to prevent this from happening again?

A
Lower air pressure causes water to boil at a lower temperature, which causes liquid to evaporate from cake batter more quickly than it would at a lower altitude. This evaporation has a couple of consequences. A cake that will be moist at a normal altitude may taste dry when baked above 3,000 feet. Cakes that lose too much moisture in the oven may have a compromised structure, since the starches in the flour won’t gelatinize and be able to support the rising cake without an adequate amount of liquid.

Slightly increasing the liquid in your recipe will help. Or you could add an egg or an egg yolk to give the cake more structure in the form of coagulating protein. But don’t add egg whites on their own, as they will further dry out the cake. If your cake is very buttery, you might try cutting back on the butter, which softens a cake’s structure. You could also try increasing the oven temperature by 25°F (4°C), which will allow the starches to gelatinize before too much evaporation has occurred.

Compounding the problem of structure is a cake’s tendency to rise high and then collapse at a high altitude because of decreased air pressure. Cutting back on chemical leaveners will prevent this from happening.

Q
Are the guidelines for baking foam cakes the same for butter cakes?

A
Foam cakes rely on beaten eggs and egg whites for their rise. Because air expands more rapidly and to a greater degree at high altitudes, it is important not to beat too much of it into your eggs when making a foam cake batter. Delicate cake batters won’t develop a gluten structure strong enough to support this expansion, and the result will be a fallen cake.

Q
Do doughs containing yeast behave differently at high altitudes?

A
Your flour will probably contain less moisture, making it necessary to add a little more liquid to your dough. Take care not to add too much extra flour to the dough during kneading, which may make your bread dry. When you let your dough rise, don’t let it rise too much, which can lead to a collapse in the oven. Overproofing (see
page 336
) will occur more quickly and easily at high altitudes where the air expands more rapidly. To control the rise, either cut back on yeast by 25 percent, or count on a quicker rising time. It’s best to avoid rapid-rise yeast when baking at high altitudes, since an accelerated rise will more quickly lead to overproofing.

Metric Equivalents