Baguette

 

 

 

 

 

Ran out of bread? Don’t feel like going out in the cold? Having breakfast at 12PM and lunch at 6PM this holiday season? Do not despair. Try this easy French bread.

Easy peasy lemon squeezy with a good bread machine.

I’m not the one to be mucking around on the kitchen table kneading bread dough especially with cursed small wrists and slender hands that runs in the family.

 

Wet ingredients:

2 eggs beaten

2 cups tepid water

2 tsp sugar

1 1/2 tbls salt

 

Dry ingredients:

6 cups white flour

1 cup cornflour

3 tsp instant dry yeast

 

Extra flour to dust the baking sheet

1 egg plus a pinch of salt

A little oil

 

1 bread machine

3 hours or make it overnight

Makes 4 great French loaves

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Method:

1. Add all the wet ingredients into the bread machine in no particular order.

2. Followed by the dry ingredients on top of the wet ingredients.

3. Add the yeast last on top of the flour and push some flour onto the yeast.

4. Use the dough setting of the bread machine and let the machine do its thing.

5. From time to time keep checking the bread machine to make sure that all the flour is incorporated into the dough.

6. The end product should be a big ball of dough that is not stick to your fingers.

7. Let the machine proof the dough until the end of the dough cycle.

8. Remove the dough from the bread machine when the machine beeps.

9. Rub some oil onto your hands and the wooden board. Divide the dough into four pieces.

10. Roll out each piece into a huge rectangle (14” by 8” or so) on the wooden board.

11. Take the long edge (or the short edge) and roll the dough like a Swiss Roll.

12. Dust two the baking sheets with flour and place the rolled dough on it, seam side tucked down. Press the dough down gently.

13. Mix the egg with salt and brush the mixture on the rolls.

14. Use a sharp knife and make three to four slashes on top of the dough.

15. Let it rise again for one hour.

 

TIP!

16. Preheat oven to 200° C and place a roasting tin or casserole of hot water in the bottom rack. Place the baking sheet on the rack above the water.

Bake the bread for 15’ and remove the water.

Continue baking for a further 10-15 minutes more or depending on your oven.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The loaves should be really crispy and brown.

Go ahead and give the bread a good knocking. The loaves should sound hollow.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Rub a clove of garlic on a piece and drizzle some oil olive while the slices are still warm or slather them in butter.

Can’t get any fresher than this.

Enjoy and do leave a comment on how yours turns out.