Sourdough baking can be a challenge. Despite years practicing, I have frequently had disastrous results. The primary challenge? Perfecting the levain. When it fails, the starter can remind you of all your imperfections as a baker. Feed it like it's your...
My mind navigates toward bread. Whether biking city streets, traveling New York’s subways, or walking our wonderful avenues and less wonderful boulevards, my mind inevitably brings me back to bread. Baking it, savoring it, chewing it. The web is particularly...
While waiting on a technician to fix my ovens keyboard pad, I’ve been reduced to using my mini toaster oven in the mean time. Not too many successes, but being deprived a loaf a day is a drag. And when finally the technician did show and had the wrong part...
Two summers ago I met Pierre Ragot at his boulangerie in Marseille. I’d heard of him through our common friend Thierry Delabre. While I tried to speak some French, he joked about my lack of linguistic skill, simultaneously sharing his plans to open more places...
I’m addicted to this grain. Or obsessed. Whatever, it’s worth an addiction by anyone who loves bread. With various names in the world, enkir, piccolo farro, petite épautre, it’s known as one the worlds first domesticated plants. It has multiple...