This morning I realized I had never gotten around to making the pre-ferment last night so that I could make French Bread today. I had a few extra children around to distract me but Tristyn and Maia really enjoyed having friends to stay overnight so that was okay. But--how was I to make French Bread? I really like the recipe I normally use but that was out....
Lucky for me, I still had Bernard Clayton's New Complete Book of Breads checked out from the library. I hadn't baked a thing out of it but as I was flipping through it in search of a one-day French Bread recipe I found ....
...these words: "In a small one-man boulangerie in the resort town of Benodet, in Brittany..."
There was something about 'one-man' that appealed to me and I kept reading and by the time I read a second paragraph, "Two things were quickly apparent during my visit with M. Monfort and each contributed importantly to the making of his excellent French loaf."
French Bread---Aha!! I kept reading and sure enough it was a one-day French Bread. Score!
"M. Monfort's recipe takes both of these factors into consideration--the temperature of the room and the consistency of the dough. Becasue of the extended period allowed for resting the dough at lower temperatures, 5 to 6 hours are needed to prepare, raise, shape and bake the bread."
Over the last year, I've developed a much better sense of the proper consistency of various doughs (but I've a long way to go still, I'm sure!) so that part wasn't a problem. Nor was the lower temperature--our house is about 68 during the winter, unless I'm baking bread and then I dial it up to 70. <--and feel guilty about it the whole time, too.
The dough has 3 rises which is a bit uncommon but it respsonded well and rose the third and final time in two cloth lined baskets. I scored the dough in a tic tac toe pattern but as you can see I wasn't as bold with the lame as I should have been. One of these days I shall have to make 10 or 12 loaves all at once and brandish my lame a la Zorro until I've got the knack of it.
*Quotations from Bernard Clayton's New Complete Book of Breads
