My Bread Year: Buckwheat Batards

I don't really take recommendations from people. Well, people often give me recommendations, which I disregard, but also file away in one of the darkest corners of my brain. Which is to say, that I don't welcome ideas from others. For me, things just have to happen organically.

For example, earlier this month, Smitten Kitchen featured Shakshuka. I thought it looked interesting, but didn't run to my kitchen to immediately make it. Then, I finally put in a cookbook order at Amazon.co.uk, and got the Ottolenghi cookbook. No, there's no skakshuka recipe in there, but days after I got the cookbook, I came across a video of him making it.

And there you go. Now I want to make it.

But wait, you ask- There's a picture of bread at the top of this post, not of some awesome red pepper and egg concoction. I know, I know. All I have to say is that this are the Buckwheat Batards from Daniel Leader's Local Breads. I picked up some buckwheat flour at the store after reading about it, and all of a sudden, it started appearing everywhere.

I remembered the recipe, noted that the measurements were inconsistent, and checked to see if there was a correction on the Errata PDF released by the man himself. There was.

Why no more pictures? The starter was really ugly and dark, almost like a ball of mush. The loaves themselves weren't much better off, and the dough just didn't behave. I'm starting to think I'm settling into a comfort zone of sorts with the German wheat flours.

It wasn't so much that I didn't like the bread, but that I was underwhelmed by it. I did give a loaf away, and it was reported that the people who tried it thought it was amazing. So maybe I'm just too hard on myself or maybe I'm just way too used to wheat breads.

Yes, I'll revisit this one. But maybe I'll wait until people start a critical mass for Buckwheat.

For some truly beautiful Buckwheat Batards check out this post on The Fresh Loaf.

BBA Challenge #33: Poilâne-Style Miche

Here is is. The bread on the cover of the Bread Baker's Apprentice.

This is part three on my experiences with Pain Poilâne. The first two posts can be found here and here.

Last year, after much poking about on The Fresh Loaf website, I decided to get a few bread books. Feeling intimitdated by people's comments on Hamelman's Bread, I decided to get The Bread Baker's Apprentice instead, figuring that it was a good place to start.

The Bread Baker's Apprentice is where I first really learnt about Baker's Percentages, and where I made my first bread using weight measurements. I made the Pain a l'Ancienne maybe about twice when I kept reading about this challenge to bake through the Bread Baker's Apprentice, which I had gotten just a few weeks before, and which I was reading cover to cover. I hesitated for a bit, but in the end, contacted Nicole from Pinch My Salt, and decided to join. I thought I would probably bake maybe about half the book, and then lose interest.

But here we are. To date, I'm only three breads shy of completing the Challenge, but still a way to go in posting.

Since the beginning- Since the day I got the book, I've wanted to make this bread. Indeed, I've made variations and have also eaten about a dozen loaves of Pain Poilâne- for the sake of research, of course- and I've visited the original bakery on Rue Cherche-Midi in Paris. Because this bread is made with sourdough, however, I couldn't even think of baking it. Instead, I stuck to the Pain a l'Ancienne with its rich flavor and awesome provenance.

As soon as I started my own sourdough starter, I've wanted to bake this bread. But I didn't make this exact recipe until I got to it in the order of the Challenge. I have baked other variations, as in my last post, and the results have only gotten better as time progresses. My oven and I have gotten to know each other fairly well, thanks to the thermometers who helped our relationship.

For the cover bread, I decided to make two variations. The first, with sifted coarse-ground whole wheat flour, the second, with Type 1050 flour- which is finely ground. I didn't really scientifically stagger any of the times, so the 1050 loaf actually got about an hour more rise time in the bulk ferment.


I prepared the pre-ferment the night before, using Beatrice, having fed her sifted whole-wheat the week before. You'll notice bran specks here and there on the loaf made with the 1050 flour. Here, the sifted whole-wheat is on the left, the 1050 on the right.


Here's the whole-wheat pre-ferment. I pulled up some of the top layer to reveal the structure underneath. Essentially this is the same as a firm starter.


The 1050 pre-ferment also had a beautiful structure, though it was a bit tighter.


Here's the mise en place for the miche made with the sifted whole-wheat flour. In addition to the flour and pre-ferment, all you have is water and salt. I still find it quite amazing to bake breads that have so few ingredients.


As usual, in the Electrolux Assistent, water goes in first, followed by the pre-ferment and a little bit of the flour.


Eventually, all the flour is added in and the machine is allowed to work its magic. I love taking pictures like this. It looks like the machine is going super-fast when it's just going moderately fast.


Note that even with 2kg of dough, this mixer does not even break a sweat. I've even mixed the occasional miche with a schedule of 12min mixing on low, 5 min rest, 12 min mixing, 5 min rest and a final 12 minute mix. It makes wonderful dough. I'd like to see your Kitchen-Aid do that!


This is the ball of dough at the end of the mixing. I put in some hand mixing for good measure. Because it is sifted coarse whole-wheat flour, you inevitably get some bran in the final product, which does cause the dough to take longer to develop.

Here's the part where I would normally talk about my secret weapon. But the truth is that I have none. I do, however, have ready access to salt from Brittany, which is used in the original Pain Poilâne. This is a kilo of grey sea salt. Because the grains are so large, I usually grind about a quarter kilo at a time in my coffee grinder (which has actually never seen coffee) and use it up as I need.


The mise en place for the miche using the Type 1050 flour.


Again, the DLX handles the dough with ease. Even though the machine goes to a crazily fast speed, I rarely mix the dough above the slowest speed. It's just that good.


And just to reiterate: It kneads wonderfully even at the slowest speed.


Here's the comparison shot with the 1050 miche on the right. Because that flour is finely ground, the dough was less lumpy, probably because of the quicker flour absorption. Curiously, that dough was also much more slack even though the two had equal amounts of water.


I usually do a bulk rise in the 8 liter bowl of the DLX if I'm not using it.


Otherwise, I'll use the largest glass bowl I have.


My proofing basket is a colander, lined with a square of linen. I actually sewed it in with a length of kitchen thread and a large needle.


The miche with the sifted whole-wheat came out quite stiff. I was worried that it would come out too dry.


It came out maybe a tad dry, but overall, it looked good.


Even the bottom was pretty brown despite all the flouring. Of course, I only got a few cracks, nothing like the complex structure of real Poilâne loaves.


The scoring was lovely, but not perfect.


And the loaf was not as dark as it could have been.


I even complained about the height. The loaf was simply not wide enough, and not low enough. I realized that the dough should have been wetter. It would have spread out more.


And while we're on the complaining part, the crumb was merely so-so. It was pretty tight in the middle, with some holes towards the outside, but it really could just have been sandwich bread. Again, hydration was too low.


The miche made with the 1050 flour was a whole nother beast. Because this flour is pretty much finely ground, the dough was quite slack. Usually, it takes me less than a minute to have the dough plopped on the peel, photographed, scored and shoved into the oven. I take a pause of a few seconds before pouring water into the pan on the floor of the oven.


It was obviously underproofed because there was tons of oven rise. Also, if you look closely, you'll see a ring of lines in the middle of the loaf. That's from the thread at the bottom of the proofing basket.


Also, on a closer inspection, there is a curious line on the bottom of my loaf! This wrinkle resulted from having to readjust the loaf on the stone so that it wouldn't fall off. In the last two posts I mentioned that the Poilâne loaves have odd markings on the bottom. In addition, the last loaf of Pain Poilâne that I bought was curved inward at the bottom. I stacked them to photograph, and the two pieces fit perfectly. So the markings could also be from a cooling rack, or from being packed tightly on a rack to cool.


The 1050 miche came out flat. Maybe a tad too flat, but it definitely had the right form.


The oven spring, on the other hand was just too much. The bread split open.


And revealed its bready guts.


I actually liked the crumb of this one better, even though it was too hydrated.


A quick comparison shows the major differences between the two miches.

As for the taste? I found them not as sour as the original, but still good, with that rich taste of almost-whole grain. The crust was chewy and the bread was remained soft when left out. Of course the exposed parts dried out, but once that piece was chopped off the rest- the inside was still soft.

Amazing.


Not being one satisfied with half-perfect bread, I re-did the recipe the next weekend and hit the maximum allowed hydration with the coarse-ground whole-wheat flour. I even left it in the oven longer than usual. AP269 of Family and Food mentioned that she got a sour flavor by retarding the bread in the oven overnight.


I did just that for the last rise and the bread pulled out a much better sour profile. Curiously, while the original loaves did not get much sour as the days progressed, this one did. The flavor underwent a transformation on the third day. Of course, I didn't even cut into it until the day after baking, so it was officially the second eating day.

The flour dusting, again, is not ideal. Poilâne has lots of flour on the top that turns into a rich light brown, perhaps serving to insulate the crust undeneath, and the scored parts, exposed to the heat, are almost black.

As for the crumb. Open and light. Almost perfect!


Other bakers that have dared to bake "The Bread On The Cover" include:

Oggi from I can do that!

Janice from Round the Table

Sally from Bewitching Kitchen

Anne-Marie from Rosemary and Garlic

Cheryl from A Tiger In The Kitchen

Cindy from Salt and Serenity

AP269 from Family and Food

txfarmer's blog in chinese, but with lots of pictures

Phyl from Of Cabbages and Kings

Others BBA Bakers on the cusp of baking the Miche:

Kelly from Something Shiny

Mags from The Other Side of Fifty

Rebecca from Grongar

Chris from Eating is the Hard Part

Victoria from Goth Panda

Originator of the Challenge, and all-around awesome blogger: Nicole from Pinch My Salt

Eating Pain Poilâne. Baking miches.

This is the second of a three-part series on my experiences with Poilâne bread. You can find the first part here.

A short while after we got back from Paris, I was poking around the Poilâne website checking the price of shipping a loaf to Berlin (about 36€, shipping included), when I noticed that Galeries Lafayette on Friedrichstrasse was one of their international distributors. Almost immediately I headed over there and scoped out the bread counter. They not only sold huge, round whole loaves in their signature white bags, but they also sold half and quarter loaves in small plastic bags.

Because I still had a third of a loaf left over from Paris, I didn't need to buy any just yet. I held off, thinking that I could whip up a batch of flour, sourdough and water and bake my own loaf. I mean, how hard could it be? I put all ten digits on my blank keyboard and tirelessly researched Discussion Forums, brushed up on the German flours available to me, and even bought whole Spelt Flour based on what I had read.


This was the first miche I ever baked.

Somehow intoxicated by the idea, I baked another one. On the same day. Okay, I didn't just decide to bake this one, I also baked the following one. For some crazy reason, I decided I should bake two at the same time.


For these two breads, I used Fred, the sourdough starter that I had bought from the store. I actually think this might have been my first experience with Sourdough, because, even though the loaves look okay from above...


They were completely flat from the side.

I was crushed. Disappointed. I thought I would never be able to master sourdough bread, and in turn, never be able to reach the standards set by the late, great Monsieur Poilâne.


The second loaf was a bit flatter, everyone who got a piece of the bread ate it up. Literally. Flattish, moist, almost gummy rye breads are common in Germany, and most people are easily deceived by the nice scoring at the top. If I had told everyone that this was a loaf of rye bread they would have believed me. Well, aside from the taste.


Instead, I snuck back over to Galeries Lafayette. So started my dirty little secret. Well, my flour-dusted little secret. I wouldn't buy a half or quarter loaf...


I would buy a whole loaf.


The coating of flour on the loaves is amazing. The flour coats the top surface of the bread and even forms cracks. The scoring is also quite amazing. The "P" is scored with attention to detail. The tail shows how the bread is scored ever so lightly on the tail of the letter.


Again, the mystery line appears. A fine coat of ash dusts the bottom of every loaf.


The crumb is just beautiful, with larger holes along the edges of the bread, and the crust is thick. The brown edges line every slice, providing a generous chew, or a crunch when the bread is toasted.


Here's my next attempt at making a miche. For this one I used Type 1050 German flour, which would become my standard flour for these loaves. Type 1050 flour is flour with an ash content of 1050mg per 100g. In Germany, it's basically one step down from whole wheat, and is generally used in breads where the color doesn't matter, and in breads where rye is mixed in.


The crumb is still tight, but at least I was making progress.


Despite being able to bake 2kg loaves, there is nothing like taking the U-Bahn home with a huge white bag inside an even bigger red bag with the Lafayette logo. People look at you like you've just bought the latest coat from Paris, when all you really have is the most amazing bread in the world.


The crumb is always random.


And the loaves themselves are never the same as the one from two weeks before. They're irregular- measured by diameter, they usually range from 28-23cm.


As for my adventures, it wasn't until I started making loaves from my own cultivated sourdough starter that I began having success with larger breads. Here's one of the early test breads that wasn't as wide, but definitely rose higher than I had expected.


Unfortunately, I'm terrible at thinking up scoring designs. I try to be creative but it all ends up crooked.


The other thing I love doing is baking the breads until the flour dusting turns brown, and the breads themselves are a dark, rich mahogany. I'm unfortunate enough to have an electrical oven, but fortunate to have direct heat from the top.


By this point, I was getting pretty good at making the monster loaves. The line, or tear, on the left side is where I plunged the thermometer into the loaf to take a reading. It was mere coincidence that I happened to cut it along the same line.


The bags are one of my favorite things about the bread. They usually come double bagged. I take the bread out, carefully smooth out the bags and then put the bread into older bags that I keep. Thus far, I've only had to toss one bag that was torn from overuse. Aside from the beautiful logo, The bags themselves are plain paper bags that soften after repeated use, and are printed with descriptions of grains (in French) that are used in making bread.


Again, note the scoring of the loaf. The "P" is different, but no less elegant, on this loaf.


This particular loaf is actually quite round, in comparison to some of the other loaves I've bought. However, no loaf has been any less delicious because of its shape, though. Note the cracks and grooves in the base of the bread.


The very first thing I do (after I take photos) is cut the loaf in half and immediately freeze one half. I wrap it in plastic wrap, then aluminum foil, then stick it in a huge Ziploc bag, the likes of which are quite rare in Germany. For reheating, I leave it wrapped in foil for an hour in a 180C oven. Of course, it's difficult to keep your hands off one when warm.


On some loaves, the dusting of flour can be as thick as a millimeter, and the scoring always varies. Every loaf is essentially hand-made, with the only automation being the mixer used to develop the dough.


Two days after buying the loaf above, we were on a plane to visit my sister and her family. On the plane I noticed that the bread was packed inside of a plastic pillow. I had pre-sliced a chunk of the bread to take with us on the plane ride, and thought it would be funny to photograph the meal with the Pain Poilâne.


I was right! The ravioli was amazing with the bread, and the vegetable salad had a certain je ne sais quoi.

Okay, I jest. Although, as a vegetarian, I find most vegetarian plane food rather decent, but that might just be because I have no other choice, or maybe because I almost always get served first. Still, it was quite an experience to have good bread during a day in which all one could do was sit still and watch movies. Imagine if all bread on airplanes was freshly cut from a massive loaf!

In early February, I headed over again to Galeries Lafayette. This time, though, I got there five minutes too late. The saleslady at the bread counter had just cut the very last loaf into four quarters. She mentioned that the price was the same for one whole loaf or four quarters. I stared at them in their perfect plastic bags, but I could just not bring myself to do it. There's something just magical about having such a huge chunk of bread. Instead, I decided on two halves, which I later found out were mismatching!


This is the most recent loaf I bought. Half is still sitting in my freezer, and I'm already planning my next visit to buy another giant loaf. It doesn't hurt that it's only a 10 minute detour on the way home.


One of the things I love most about the packaging and presentation is the twist on one side to close the bag. It forms what looks like an ear as well as a handle.


The irregularity of the holes, is astounding, particularly around the outer crust. The first and last few slices of any half are usually almost completely filled with holes. Well, that is, if holes can fill something.


One of the most distinct flavors of the bread, which is missing from my own loaves, is a certain smokiness. It's not there in every slice, but when it is, it's usually very faint. This makes sense, as the bread is baked in a wood-fired oven. If you look closely, you'll notice an ever-so-delicate dusting of ash from the oven, which probably contributes to the amazing flavor profile.

My Torn Miche:


One of the things I learned in my research, and one of the things Peter Reinhart simulates in The Bread Baker's Apprentice is the use of a piece of old dough as leavening agent. For a while I actually had a starter at 65% hydration, with 2% sea salt. However, measuring minute amounts of sea salt proved too difficult for me.

This time, however, bad luck fell upon me and I was able to quickly turn it into good luck: I was dabbling with spelt flour, and had even formulated a recipe that had a final amount of 25% whole spelt. Another 25% of the flour came from a 100% Sourdough Starter. Somehow, I goofed and let the bread rise too long. How long is too long? Oh, about 14 hours at room temperature. I think it might have had something to do with me going to sleep without putting the dough in the fridge, then forgetting about it the next morning until noon. That dough was terrible. There was no structure left when I got back to it. It rose high enough to just be able to brush the firmament with a feather, so that when I got to it, the gluten immediately fell apart when I degassed it. I used that fallen-apart-unstructured dough and made this bread.

The loaf is torn in the middle because it stuck to the linen rather than coming out, and the dough folded over onto itself. In the oven, however, it realized it was the weakest point and burst forth through the crevice. Note my crazy scoring. At least that is consistent.


I really can't complain, though. The flavor is great, though not amazing- I think I'll have to have the second rise overnight in the refrigerator to get my desired sourness.

In case you're still breathing after all those bread pictures, here's the recipe for the above bread. I've gotten to a point where I can bake this type of loaf with my eyes nearly closed, which comes in handy when the dough has risen overnight and the loaf has to go into the oven fairly early.


Recipe: Poilâne-style Torn Miche

(Note that I actually made 3kg of what is now the Old Dough starter, so I've backtracked and reformulated that part to reflect what I actually ended up using.)

Old Dough:
160g Sourdough Starter at 100% (80g Flour, 80g Water)
80g Whole Spelt Flour (You can substitute Sifted Whole Wheat Flour)
170g Sifted Whole Wheat Flour
134g Water
6g Sea Salt

This basically gets you a dough with a final hydration of 65%, and 2% Sea Salt.

Knead as you would for a bread and let rise until it has doubled, or for about 6-12 hours. You can also put this in the fridge, but be sure to give it a head-start of at least 4 hours before you refrigerate it, and at least 4 afterwards to let it come back to room temperature.


Final Dough:
550g old dough (from above)
1000g Sifted Whole Wheat Flour
650g Water at room temperature
25g Sea Salt

Note that the old dough is already at 65%, so the final dough will basically just be a threefold batch based on the first dough. The final weight of the dough will be just about 2,2kg.

Again, knead until the dough looks almost right. Stretch and fold every thirty minutes for the first two of the 4-6 hour rise. Shape and refrigerate in linen-covered colander.

Take out of fridge two hours before baking time to let it warm up.

Turn onto floured bread peel and allow the middle of the bread to stick to the fabric. After some prodding, take your hand and scrape out the dough that won't come out, making sure that some is left behind to create a tear in the bread.

Arrange the torn dough one piece atop the other so as to hide the mistake.

Score the sides of the loaf like a crazed baker and load onto a baking stone in the oven. Dump about a cup or a half cup of water into the pan you always keep at the bottom of the oven.
Bake for about an hour at 230C.

Cool on a wire rack.

Photograph. Post. Repeat.


Further Reading:

In case you missed the small update to my last post:
Dorie Greenspan just posted an amazing video of the late, great Lionel Poilâne making Punitions. Her recipe, from the man himself, is on her essential post on Butter.

The Bread Baking Babes tackled this bread in May 2008. Here's the roundup post at What Did You Eat

Here's Sherry's post on this wonderful bread at What Did You Eat

Another one from Apple Pie, Patis, Pâté

Bake my Day's Poilâne post

Petra's Brotkasten five-grain-flour variation (in German)

Another recipe courtesy of tengby.com

Kenneth's Poilâne on Kitchencookingrecipes.com

A post on Kenneth's Poilâne-style Miche at the very excellent and very fresh, Fresh Loaf

Recreating the miche in Australia at Brasserie Bread

Stay Tuned for Part Three!