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A review by crasscasualty
Make Ahead Bread: 100 Recipes for Melt-in-Your-Mouth Fresh Bread Every Day by Donna Currie, Donna Currie
5.0
I recently became obsessed with baking bread. For me, the appeal of baking is twofold;firstly, it's a tangible connection to my past. There's something magical about making something the way your great great great great great great grandma did. Secondly, the chemistry and science of baking fascinates me. Yeasted bread in particular is an incredibly complex and precise chemical process.
Because of this newfound obsession, I really found Make Ahead Bread useful. It runs the bread gamut. There are sections on loaves, rolls, flatbreads, pastries, spreads, and even what to do with bready leftovers. Thankfully, there are no tedious personal anecdotes accompanying the recipes (which is probably my biggest cookbook pet peeve. Seriously, not one cares about your honeymoon in Martha's Vineyard). The recipes themselves are pretty varied in flavor profiles and techniques; some good ones I made were the yeasted aebleskivers, naan, lemon danish, and tomato, cheddar, and bacon loaf. As someone relatively new to breadmaking, I appreciate that the author was very specific about rising times. As anyone who has ever made bread knows, over or under proving can destroy an otherwise good loaf.
The only real gripe I have is that the weights of each ingredient is not listed with the recipe; you have to flip to the back to look at the conversion chart. I prefer to cook with weights because that kind of precision matters in baking. It would just make life easier if i didn't have to translate every recipe into weights
I'd recommend this book to someone who already has some experience making bread. There's no information apart from a definition about kneading or how to properly shape loaves, both of which are essential to having your bread turn out well. Having learned how to do those things via Youtube, I was able to navigate the book without issue.
I received a free copy of this book via NetGalley.
Because of this newfound obsession, I really found Make Ahead Bread useful. It runs the bread gamut. There are sections on loaves, rolls, flatbreads, pastries, spreads, and even what to do with bready leftovers. Thankfully, there are no tedious personal anecdotes accompanying the recipes (which is probably my biggest cookbook pet peeve. Seriously, not one cares about your honeymoon in Martha's Vineyard). The recipes themselves are pretty varied in flavor profiles and techniques; some good ones I made were the yeasted aebleskivers, naan, lemon danish, and tomato, cheddar, and bacon loaf. As someone relatively new to breadmaking, I appreciate that the author was very specific about rising times. As anyone who has ever made bread knows, over or under proving can destroy an otherwise good loaf.
The only real gripe I have is that the weights of each ingredient is not listed with the recipe; you have to flip to the back to look at the conversion chart. I prefer to cook with weights because that kind of precision matters in baking. It would just make life easier if i didn't have to translate every recipe into weights
I'd recommend this book to someone who already has some experience making bread. There's no information apart from a definition about kneading or how to properly shape loaves, both of which are essential to having your bread turn out well. Having learned how to do those things via Youtube, I was able to navigate the book without issue.
I received a free copy of this book via NetGalley.