The Handmade Loaf
This review was prepared by Simona of briciole.
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“The Handmade Loaf
(from the dust jacket)
“Someone once asked me why I bother mixing and shaping bread by hand. I didn't have the words to answer them, nor could I understand why they didn't just know... There is no instrument in my bag of baker's tools more useful and adaptable than my two hands, and as long as I can use them to make and shape bread, I will.”
(from the Introduction)
That is also how I feel.
The Handmade Loaf
The essays are an interesting read. What makes the book, however, are the recipes. After the Introduction, Lepard talks about “Ingredients” and “Mixing, shaping, & baking.” In the latter chapter, he introduces his method of kneading the dough on a lightly oiled surface. The bread recipes I tried call for short periods of kneading (5-10 seconds) alternating with periods of rest for the dough.
The first bread I made from the book was Sweet saffron bread (page 124), chosen because my husband loves bread with raisins and I love saffron. Plus, the s-shaped loaf reminded me of my initial. “This bread uses what bakers call 'a sponge': equal quantities of flour and liquid mixed with a small quantity of yeast.” (The liquid in this case is milk.) The recipe calls for currants, but I have also made it with a mix of currants and raisins.
Whey bread with butter and honey (page 45) has an interesting flavor and a delicate crumb. Whey “has traditionally been used as a liquid to make bread with. It can be either sweet or sour, depending on the condition of the milk it was strained from. It can be left over from cheese- or butter-making, or after straining yogurt.” For this recipe, I used fresh whey from making homemade chèvre. When it is no longer fresh, I use this bread to prepare French toast.
Another interesting recipe is that for Maize bread (page 73), whose ingredients include polenta and corn flour. I had tried making bread with corn flour once before and was not successful. The photos of this bread made me decide to try Lepard's recipe. Besides being excellent, the result was of a beautiful yellow color. In the headnote, Lepard tells the story of how he got to taste pane di mais for the first time in Italy. Such personal connection with the breads and also with the people who shared their bread-making stories with him gives a particular human dimension to the book.
Thin slices of Linseed and wheat bread (page 94) go well with soup and also with cheese. Regarding linseed (also known as flaxseed) Lepard shares the following interesting piece of information: “A very important seed in European folk medicine, it was reputed to encourage healing if made into a paste and spread over a wound as poultice.”
In the third chapter “The natural leaven,” Lepard introduces a recipe for creating a leaven, “or, perhaps more correctly, a set of ingredients and steps that will promote fermentation in a leaven of flour and water” (page 25). I have not tried this recipe, because I already had my own starter. However, a version of The mill loaf (page 30) was the very first bread made with starter that I baked, some time ago, so it has a special place in my memory. The recipe for The mill loaf is quite versatile, since it “uses a mix of white, wholewheat and rye flour, and... could make use of any other grain flours (60% white to 40% other flour) so long as the white flour stays dominant.”
A recipe that I treasure is that for White bean wafer (page 184): “This thin crispbread uses that old standby for the humble loaf, the bean. When there was insufficient flour to make a loaf, or where the local flour was coarse and unappetizing, the addition of either cooked beans or rice added bulk to the dough and softened the taste.” To make the recipe, I use dried beans that I soak overnight and cook with aromatics (onion, garlic, bay leaf, parsley). None of the people with whom I shared the wafers could guess their “secret ingredient.” They are great to accompany cheese and spreads.
About Barley flatbread (page 176), Lepard says: “These thin, brutal flat breads, with their strange, barley-malt taste, would once have been a staple of a simple breakfast or supper.” The flavor is indeed very particular, and a great companion for my homemade cheese. For this recipe, I used the whole-grain barley flour that I get as part of my grain CSA share. The dough remained wet for me, so I flattened it with my hands rather than with the rolling pin.
There is a version of this book for the US audience, titled The Art of Handmade Bread. I have not seen it, and therefore do not know what the differences are. The volume I have uses grams for flour and water, teaspoons for fresh yeast and salt, and also baker's percentage for all the ingredients.
The first couple of times, I noticed that in my oven, the bread baked faster than indicated in the recipe. I then found this page in the forum of his web site in which Lepard clarifies baking times and temperatures and afterwards, I followed those instructions.
Dan Lepard's The Handmade Loaf is a well-written and beautifully illustrated book that contains a variety of recipes of interest to the novice and experienced bread baker alike. The headnotes position the recipes in the context of people's life and make you feel the heir to an old and vital tradition.
“While travelling through northern Europe, I have met people who bake bread in a considered way: bakers who adapt their ingredients according to what is plentiful or scarce at different time of the year... by watching, living and baking with them, I have distilled the breads we baked into new recipes which walk in the footsteps of those bakers and bring us closer to their traditions.”
(from the Introduction)
What a great review the book looks like a winner to me. OBTW the link to the website about oven temperatures doesn't seem to work.
Wonderful photos you did seem to have FUN doing the recipes. Well written article great work on this review.