Loaves 14 – French Baguettes and a Boule
This is a follow-up attempt from Loaf 11, my French baguettes that only tasted okay.
This time I used the same recipe, but corrected what I thought were the errors from last time.
- The dough came out too sticky again, so I added a bit more flour until it became tacky.
- I handled the dough more gently after rising in the fridge.
- I made two smaller baguettes (each just under 10 ounces) and used the remaining dough (just about 20 ounces) to make a boule from. The smaller sized baguettes rose nicely in the tray and didn’t overrun the ends. The boule was just fun to make.
- I took off the plastic wrap 15 minutes before baking, but it didn’t solve the problem of being difficult to score. I must not be using my lame (a French razor for scoring bread) properly. The baguettes just stretched as I cut through them, so I used a serrated bread knife to score the boule, then scored one of the baguettes with it also.
The flavor this time is wonderful. In my 9:30pm taste test I ended up eating half a baguette. The crust is crispy, and the crumb inside looks nicer than before, but I’d still like to see it have larger holes and more irregularity. And the boule looks beautiful! Still a bit to learn, but I’d happily serve this to anyone.
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- Ingredients in a coarse shaggy ball.
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- Mixed, a bit of kneading, and ready to rise overnight in the fridge.
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- After almost 24 hours in the fridge.
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- Two baguettes and a boule shaped from the dough and ready for another 1 1/2 hour rise.
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- Boule ready to rise.
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- Baguettes, risen and ready to bake.
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- But first, a poor job of scoring.
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- Better job scoring the boule.
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- Boule right out of the oven.
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- Baguette, right out of the oven. This one was scored with a bread knife after the “lame” didn’t work.
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- Boule and baguettes.
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- Boule and baguettes.
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- Close up of the scored “ear” on the baguette.
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- Crumb inside the baguette.
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- Crumb inside the boule.
