How to Make Homemade Bread

Anthony Courteille, executive chef of the Atelier Guy Martin, explains how to make homemade bread. Four essential ingredients to make bread dough are: flour, water, salt and yeast.

1. Kneading
We have 500g of flour to which we add 10g of salt and 25g of baker’s yeast.
The baker’s yeast is an anaerobic fungus which means that it does not need air to live. In fact, air destroys the yeast so do not leave it exposed to air or it will be damaged. The water should be a certain temperature, between entre 25°C and 30°C. This will activate the yeast and favor rising. The quantity of water is not very precise. For 500g of flour, use between 250 and 300g of water.

Now we are going to knead the dough with our fingertips. We want to obtain a more liquid dough. The baker’s hand, or in this case your hand, will determine the consistency of the dough. You have to knead the dough for about 5 minutes.

Cover the dough with a dish towel and let it rest for about an hour and a half at room temperature. The dough has risen. Now we deflate it and form a ball. The dough is less sticky because the dough worked and became more consistent. Baking bread is just a question of time, and of love, of course. Let the dough rest another hour.

2. Shaping
An hour later, the dough has risen again. Now we can shape the dough, which means giving it the form that we want before baking. You’ll need to dust your work surface with flour. Take your dough and place it on the work surface.

The dough has risen for about two and a half hours. This time allowed the dough to develop its aromas and flavors. We are going to make rolls. Cut the dough into pieces weighing about 50to 60 grams. We can shape the dough into rolls or a baguette. Be careful never to place the seam of the bread facing up: the bread will split. Always place the seam facing down on the baking sheet. Now we spray water on the surface of the bread, to avoid the formation of a shell which results from contact with the air.Allow the dough to rest for 40 minutes.

3. Baking
Before baking the bread, we first spray it with water so that it shines when we take it out of the oven. The temperature of the oven must be at 240°C. Before putting the bread in the oven, spray the oven with water to create humidity. The bread is done 25 minutes later.
Once the bread is nicely colored, you can take it out of the oven.

Anthony Courteille – Chef Exécutif à l’Atelier Guy Martin
http://www.atelierguymartin.com