Well, after a lot of toil and trouble, the baguettes were finally finished.
Results of the battle? Hmm...hard to say. The baguettes turned out well--they were pretty much everything a baguette should be. Golden brown and crunchy on the outside, soft and moist on the inside.
The only issue is that they just didn't have a lot of flavor. This is to be expected, since I don't have quite the right oven (a brick pizza oven would be a little better, probably) and I don't have a starter dough that has been aged and fermented perfectly.
But overall, they turned out pretty good. Is it worth it to go through all of the trouble to make them at home? Absolutely not.
Nope, nada, no.
Unless, of course, you can't buy the unbaked baguettes at your grocery store, and you would have to get one of the pre-made ones. Those ones are nasty. After tasting what real baguettes should be in Spain and France, I will never be able to eat one of those stale, hard baguettes from an American grocery store.
So, if you have to have a baguette and those are the only ones around, then I guess it is worth it to go through the 20+ hours of kneading and waiting and crashing and mixing and forming and all that good stuff.
They did, however, make for some dang good crostinis for my soup, with a nice layer of golden, melted fontina cheese on top. Oh yum.
3 comments:
I guess I'll stick to making regular bread--20+ hours is a bit much for me. They look pretty, though!
They look delicious! I really want your recipe for the soup. You should send it to me.
bummer, lot of work... but they LOOK great!
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