You can buy non-chorleywood bread from bakers and from most supermarkets in the UK (look for their 'sourdough' loaves, some might even give a fermentation time)
But French bread is still particularly good somehow, there is just nothing like a fresh baguette from a baker in a small village in rural France.
So there's something else going on there IMHO. Specifically with baguettes.
(I wish I could find a good baguette here in Western Australia, most of them are utter trash. As are most of the croissants, though I was able to find a specialist baker for those so not all is lost...)
It is mostly the freshness. There is a reason it all comes from small local bakeries - it has to be made that morning. Even by the afternoon it will not be as good.
I learned to bake when I lived in London, because the average bread was simply awful. It's surprisingly easy to get something as good at home, as long as you have a decent dutch oven.
It really makes me wonder what else is going on everywhere else, because it really comes down to just flour, water, salt, and yeast.
I thought so too. When I started, I was obsessed with getting every variable and every step of the process just right. I measured and documented everything: The number of folds, the humidity in the room ...
Then I discovered Jim Lahey's no-knead bread recipe, which gave me virtually the same results, for a grand total of 5 minutes of active work.
Comments
You can buy non-chorleywood bread from bakers and from most supermarkets in the UK (look for their 'sourdough' loaves, some might even give a fermentation time)
But French bread is still particularly good somehow, there is just nothing like a fresh baguette from a baker in a small village in rural France.
So there's something else going on there IMHO. Specifically with baguettes.
(I wish I could find a good baguette here in Western Australia, most of them are utter trash. As are most of the croissants, though I was able to find a specialist baker for those so not all is lost...)
It is mostly the freshness. There is a reason it all comes from small local bakeries - it has to be made that morning. Even by the afternoon it will not be as good.
I learned to bake when I lived in London, because the average bread was simply awful. It's surprisingly easy to get something as good at home, as long as you have a decent dutch oven.
It really makes me wonder what else is going on everywhere else, because it really comes down to just flour, water, salt, and yeast.
The process is more important than the ingredients.
I thought so too. When I started, I was obsessed with getting every variable and every step of the process just right. I measured and documented everything: The number of folds, the humidity in the room ...
Then I discovered Jim Lahey's no-knead bread recipe, which gave me virtually the same results, for a grand total of 5 minutes of active work.