Even if you don't buy the packet sliced white loaf the chances are that you buy your bread from a supermarket but go for the more over priced mass produced speciality breads that British super amrkets now sell. Very few people in the UK now buy their daily bread from a baker and because of this the village or town bakeries are closing down. If you are lucky enough to have a small bakery near you ensure that you support it, I assure you that the produce that you buy from there will be infinitely better than that of a super market.
Bread has had a bad press over the last few years, many people now see eating bread as one of the slimming deadly sins, but if you chose the correct bread, made using un-bleached white flour, yeast, water, sugar and salt or even the wholemeal version, and ensure that you don't eat too much of it you'll be fine. Good fresh wholesome bread is a lot better for you than many food stuffs that people substitute into their diet.
Bread is the most widely used staple of all, but the home-baked variety is a rare commodity. Making bread is much simpler than you might imagine and is much more an enjoyable process than buying it in the super market. Bread fills me with excitement and anticipation and for these reasons I want to talk about it and share it with everyone I meet.
Bread is a simple pleasure. In Italy no table is laid without it and no meal complete. Made well with good basic ingredients and left to rise for the correct length of time, bread is highly nutritious; a complex carbohydrate that helps to release energy more slowly through our blood system. Bread and extra virgin olive oil have to be one of life's greatest food combinations.
Well taught, all the various stages of bread making are accessible and easy. Any good cook book with a baking section will teach you the basics of bread baking, and as long as you've got the correct ingredients, equipment and an oven you should be able to get pretty decent results. Italian bread is some of the tastiest that there is, and there is a wealth of different style of bread as well. Focaccia is very popular in Italy and is now getting more popular abroad.
Focaccia is a flat oven-baked Italian bread, which may be topped with onions, herbs or other foodstuffs, Focaccia was a bread baked in the hearth of the fire, hence the name with derives from the Latin for fire place or centre. Focaccia is usually seasoned with olive oil and herbs and topped with cheese, outside of Italy it is mainly used as a sandwich bread. Finally, if any of you have ever had a real Italian pizza in Italy at a traditional pizzeria then you'll have tasted the deliciously crisp bread base of the pizza. Simply the best bread on the planet.
Flour is the staple component of any recipe, accounting for the highest proportion of most breads, and for this reason, the choice of flour cannot be underestimated. While organic, stone-ground flours will create more interest in the bread's texture and appearance. The majority of flours are made from wheat and you will commonly hear this type of flour referred to as either 'hard' or 'soft'.
Hard flours contain a larger proportion of gluten, which is responsible for the elasticity of the dough, and an important factor in successful bread making. Hard flours are best for bread making, while soft flours are more suited for pastry making. Plain flours are standard 'all-purpose flours' with low gluten content, while strong white flour is what you'll opt for in baking breads.
Italian flours are widely available in supermarkets these days and you'll often see the label '00', which is a grading based on the fineness of the flour. Tipo '00' is generally used for pastries and fresh pasta, while the coarser tipo '0' is used for bread making. The more nutritious wholemeal flour makes for a denser, but healthiest bread.
Stone-ground flour is a variety of stone-milled flour, which retains all the goodness and is an exceptional 'good-for-you' flour. Semolina flour is commonly used by all good pastifici (pasta maker) to create a textured pasta, which allows the sauce to cling and coat the shells. This type of durum wheat flour also works well to create bread with a particularly grainy texture, although it is generally used alongside a strong white flour.
Spelt flour is gaining a bit of a cult following these days, with food intolerances on the rise. It is easier to digest for those who suffer from wheat or gluten intolerances. Buckwheat flour makes an occasional appearance in bread making, but is traditionally associated with the Russian blini, the delicious yeast pancakes that accompany smoked salmon or caviar.
Whatever your bread, it's best to know your flour. Better quality flour will, as in all cooking make a difference to the finished product. You should always try to purchase the best ingredients that your budget will allow as this could be the difference between being hailed as the next master chef or alternatively being hailed as a disaster chef.
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