I think that was the universal refrain after today, day 4 of bread week. Both sweet and savory breads today and the much anticipated croissants….
Cool new trick – spraying eggwash with a spray gun! I have one of these for chocolate decorating, and if it happened to be out, it sure makes the job easier…
We made two different types of sourdough, chocolate (shown below) and multigrain, from the starter apple peels last week.
In the morning we also shaped and baked the red wine bread, zebra bread, and foccacia (pictured below). I didn’t try the red wine bread as it had Salami but it got very mixed reviews.
A stroll around the interesting neighbourhood at lunch – it is the Arts District and filled with wall murals. Hot in the sun, still 33C at noon. My last weeks’ partner lives in Yuma and says she finds it too warm there when it hits 125F…
The afternoon saw the mixing of pizza dough, “Ingredients” bread (farmer’s market bread with lots of fruit inclusions), Curry bread, Couronne Lyonnaise from SE France, Flatbread, and Oignons de Cérvennes (a local onion spurred the development of this bread, pictured below – we substituted red onions and it was delicious).
And because we were short on calories for the day (not) we made Kouign Amann the easy way (making a caramel first, hardening and then powdering it to spread on instead of sugaring each fold of the Danish dough), sticky buns with macerated raisins and pastry cream, sticky buns with caramel and raisins, and learned how to make bearclaws, windmills, and other shapes with Danish dough. The Kouign Amann were lighter than the traditional Breton version (not a bad thing!) but still loaded with calories and subsequently utterly delicious – apparently calories disappear in the oven during baking, along with caramelization ha ha.
As many of these breads came home as samples, our freezers are groaning. I doubt I’ll need to get bread again during this stay although I have to move everything on Sunday….
An interesting discussion of equipment options – mouth watering but not in my horizon – interesting tips to reduce costs for those establishing a commercial bakery. Apparently croissants are supposed to be a narrow margin item designed to lure people in order to sell other things – not so much in North America. I thought that Vancouver’s croissants were costly but it’s not unusual to be charged $5 US according to the American students – a “luxe” item rather than a lure.
Lots more baking tomorrow, and picture day – a bread buffet. Pizza for lunch!