The Bread Baker's Apprentice a Must-Have for Bakers
The Bread Baker's Apprentice, 15th Anniversary Edition
Mastering the Art of Extraordinary Bread
by Peter Reinhart
Ten Speed Press
Cooking, Food & Wine
Pub Date 06 Sep 2016
Review
The Bread Baker's Apprentice is a book that every bread baker should have on their shelves whether amateur or professional. While some of the science behind bread baking went over my head. (I am an amateur who enjoys baking bread at home), the explanations and detailed directions led to excellent results. (I always weighed my ingredients according to the recipes)
Many of the recipes require a pre-ferment of some kind, such as a barm or poolish. As I wanted to jump right in, I tried several of the loaves that I could make immediately, such as the cranberry walnut loaf and the raisin bread. Both came out delicious. I had a little more difficulty working with poolish, but that was my poor planning. It is important to be prepared. Have your ingredients ready and know what you are going to do with your preferment. Also you can't easily switch one preferment for another.
I liked the detailed descriptions and illustrations. The explanation of shaping methods was particularly helpful.
I would not recommend The Bread Baker's Apprentice to an absolute beginner. It is best for bakers with some experience. It is truly a well done book and an excellent reference.
5/5
I received a copy of The Bread Baker's Apprentice from the publisher and netgalley.com in exchange for an honest review.
--Crittermom
Description
In this new edition, Peter Reinhart, the pre-eminent author on bread baking, updates his groundbreaking and award-winning classic.
Never one to be content with yesterday's baking triumph, Peter Reinhart continues to refine his recipes and techniques in his never-ending quest for extraordinary bread. In this revised edition of his beloved and bestselling classic, he further perfects his recipes by adding metrics and conversion charts, incorporating baker's percentages into the recipes, and updating methods throughout. He shares his latest bread breakthroughs for classics like ciabatta, kaiser rolls, English muffins, and Swedish rye, and adds three all-new bonus recipes for onion and poppy seed bialys, sprouted wheat and brown rice bread, and ultimate cinnamon rolls made from bialy dough. With an updated resource section, this will surely continue to be the go-to bread baking book for amateur and professional bakers across the country.
