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The Sicilians must really know what a gem of a bread they have here. The use of semolina flour is just wonderfully incorporated to produce these golden, chewy, and earthy breads. The only drawback to making this bread is that it took 3 whole days! However, the end product was so delicious, I guess it wasn't too much of a pain in the retrospect. So it seems that I am halfway through now seeing that this is bread #23 in the Bread Baker's Apprentice Challenge, where people all over the globe seem to be possessed in baking every single bread recipe in Reinhart's book.  but again, if you don't have the book, look here.
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The pate fermentee has to be made first, and then retarded overnight in the fridge. Mine was made using my wild yeast "Adam". The next day, I cut the pate fermentee into about a dozen or so pieces and let it come to room temp before mixing all the ingredients together.

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The directions says to continue kneading until the dough passes what is called the "windowpane test" . This actually took a little longer because of the semolina flour, but in the end, the texture of the dough was silky and easy to handle.

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Then let the dough bulk rise until doubled in size before punching down and separating into battons and then shaped like the letter "S". You then cover the formed loaves and again retard them in the refrigerator overnight.

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Here you can see the lovely crumb. This bread was incredibly chewy and had a touch of sweetness from the honey. The crust was perfectly crunchy and deliciously studded with the sesame which also aided in the crunch factor. Hmmm... crunchy and chewy... my kinda bread.
yeastpotted!

 
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Another rustic bread from The Bread Baker's Apprentice. According to Peter Reinhart, this is the classic country bread of France and can be made into all kinds of different shapes and sizes. It usually is made with a small amount of either whole wheat or rye flour to give a denser crumb. And although so many of the other folks who have participated so far in this challenge had chosen to use a more interesting shape, I thought I would just make plain old batards and celebrate the simplicity of the bread. You should know that this is a two day bread starting with a pate fermentee, and If you don't have the book you can find the recipe here.
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Here is the finished dough being left to rise until it doubles in bulk. This dough was actually pretty easy to handle, even with the use of my wild yeast, "Adam". I chose to use a touch of whole wheat in mine, since Adam is a whole wheat starter.

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The loaves were shaped into batards, and I covered them to let rise a second time  until they rose to 1 1/2 of it's original size, before scoring and putting them into the oven.

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This bread was really delicious. It had a nice earthiness from the whole grain, and the crust was wonderfully hard and golden brown. The texture was chewy and the flavor from the pate fermentee was so complex. I see why so many other bakers have experimented using different shapes. Maybe next time I will give more attention to forming a different shape. I can definitely see myself making this one again.
yeastspotted.

 
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This is bread. If you have never tried this bread before, you're in for a treat. In The Bread Baker's Apprentice, Peter Reinhart gives the simplest of ingredients here and makes use of a slow cold fermentation in the fridge to extract sugars from the wheat. According to Mr. Reinhart, this develops loads of flavor from the dough and creates a final product that is oh-so complex. Naturally, the Bread baker's apprentice Challenge folks does not wish for me to share the recipe, but it's all over the internet already, like if you look here.
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This was a VERY wet dough. The original recipe says that: "The dough should be sticky on the bottom of the bowl, but it should release from the sides of the bowl." I wasn't sure quite what that meant, but I just mixed until it looked a little "stringy".

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The dough was allowed to ferment in the refrigerator overnight and then left out at room temp to double in bulk. Because I used my wild yeast(Adam) here the rise was a bit different from the pictures from other bloggers.

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When I first saw the recipe, I realized that it made up to 6 baguettes, so I halved the ingredient list and ended up making only 2 or 3 instead. After scoring the loaves, I baked them at 500 degrees and sprayed the oven twice at one minute intervals at the beginning baking cycle. I then turned down the temp to 375 degrees and baked until done, which took me about 24minutes or so.

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The final bread was delicious and crusty, and I was a little disappointed to see the lack of a BIG open crumb, but it was tasty, nonetheless. A definite keeper in the bread making repertoire.
yeastpotted.

 
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Finally, a bread with some real character! Who could not like the chewy, toothsome, and not to mention the wholesomeness of  multigrain bread.
Multigrain bread is bread made with multiple grains such as oats, cracked wheat, buckwheat, barley, millet and flax. Some multigrain bread is also whole grain bread. Yet all multigrain breads are not necessarily whole grain breads as found in this next bread in The Breadbakers Apprentice book. I have played around with many multigrain recipes, but this one is uses both brown sugar and honey, and  since it also uses "bread flour", it delivered a slightly lighter, and sweeter loaf. Reinhart suggests toasting the slices because the sugars in the bread then caramelizes into a beautiful golden color. If you have been following along in this challenge and you have your own copy of the book, turn to page 187. Otherwise, you can find a version here.
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Beautiful quinoa unraveling

As usual, Reinhart gives a soaker to soften and release enzymes in the "multi" grains used in the bread the night before. I used a combination of quinoa, cornmeal, and wheat bran.

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The next morning, I assembled the ingredients together and tried to mix. The dough was stickier than most so I ended up adding more flour to get a cohesive ball, but eventually, it did come together.

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After the initial rise the dough was then punched down and formed into a  loaf and into a 9" pan.

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After about 90 mins, this is what I got. You can see the dough had cracked and split in several places. I am not sure what could have caused that to happen, so if anyone can shed some light, I would really like to know. I just sprayed with water and then topped it with poppy seeds anyway, and baked.

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This was a delicious recipe, although, my loaf looked a little "rustic", it still tasted quite delicious. The texture was pleasantly "lighter" than 100%whole wheat multigrain, and I could definitely taste the honey. Mr Reinhart was right, it was divine toasted with butter the next morning. Another for yeastpotting.