The process went well, I thought, but I had too much flour on the board for the last part. It called for 24-28 minutes of baking, and as called for I put 1.5 cups of boiling water in a pan beneath. I safely set the timer for 20 minutes and when I checked them I was surprised at how dark they were, with the middle of the back one almost burnt, so I took them out. They are done but actually not overdone, so I'm wondering if the steam is what darkened the crust, not sure. They are all cool by now and two of them are already in the freezer, ready to eat even from frozen with a few minutes in the oven. The larger, darkest one was left out to sample and make something with later. The texture is good though I'd like to see larger bubbles, and you can taste the sourdough especially in the crust. Overall, a good first try, I think. And I will be doing this again in the future. Recipe here.
I don't have any pictures of actually making the bread until the last stages, but I can put those after the break.
6 comments:
Those look fantastic, well done!
I suspect the darker one was due to a 'hot spot' in your oven. You wouldn't want to turn bread round to mitigate that the way you would if it were a cake - especially with breads requiring steam (ie water to be put in with them) like baguettes.
They look very tasty and great for the first attempt. Butter and French cheeses required!
Thank you. The extra flour on the board may have affected the darkness, too. You can see it in the texture. Noted for next time, and maybe a few degrees less in the oven, too. Not sure what I could do about a hot spot. I could try the top oven, but its smaller so maybe couldn't do the water then.
Pretty much all ovens have hot spots. Nothing that can be done other than turning the item part way through cooking, and, as baguettes need the steam/humidity provided by the water to get a good crust, that's not an option as all the steam would escape when you opened the oven to turn.
This is a good explanantion of baguette magic:
https://slate.com/culture/2012/11/why-does-steam-make-bread-light-and-crusty-it-slows-down-the-cooking-process.html
Just thinking - did you put boiling water in the water pan or cold? And where did you position the pan of water in the oven?
I think you are too hard on yourself, they look great!
Yes, 1.5 cups of boiling water. I don't have a cast iron pan so it went into an identical pan that the loaves were on, on the shelf just below. Pretty much the only choice with our double ovens.
Oh, and thanks for the link. I'd not heard of it, but I did consider spritzing the loaves or brushing with water as an alternative. Sounds like that may help, but in addition to the water in the pan. It may be a couple months before I make this recipe again, so I'll have to refer back here before!
Looks very tasty!!
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