Here is my first attempt to bake on of the breads in Daniel Leader’s
Local Breads: Sourdough and Whole-Grain Recipes from Europe’s Best Artisan Bakers. As usual, I had a problem with following instructions, and I had to modify the recipe a bit: Instead of 500g of all purpose flour, I used 400g of AP and 100g of whole wheat graham flour. I did not want to replace too much flour with whole wheat to not change the character of the bread and the consistency of the dough too much.
And, because of time constraints, I had to “rush” the whole process a bit by shaving off a few minutes of every step. The temperature on that day (it was very hot) may have worked to my advantage because the dough did rise a lot faster.
French bread is best fresh, and I did not want to eat three loafs within an hour of baking them, so I also cut short the baking time a bit - hence the somehow pale look of the finished bread.
That allows me to freeze the loafs and then just pop them into my convection toaster oven for 8 to 10 minutes and have delicious fresh french bread.
