It's Bread Time!

What am I?

Hi everyone! How are you all? I know this is major late, but I hope you all had a wonderful winter break and New Years. I spent time with family and friends and definitely got my bake on.

Classes actually started on the 7th. I spent that week learning about how to start your own business. While it was a lot of theory to sit and absorb all at once (6 hours a day!), I learned a lot. We broke up into groups of four and over the next two months, we have to write a business plan as if we were actually opening a business. On Thursday, during that ridiculous snow storm, our group drove out to Crowfoot Towne Centre to scope out a potential business space. We ended up picking a space currently occupied by a travel agency. It's a good size and already contains a bathroom. :)

Today I started Yeast Fundamentals. I love bread. The wonderfully crispy crust of artisan bread paired with the chewy insides or the soft fluffiness of sandwich bread. I went on a bread baking stint a few years ago, even inspiring my dad to challenge the baguette. There's something about mixing simple ingredients together, letting it sit, working with it, and watching it all come together into something beautifully delicious that inspires - that makes me go "Ahh...this is baking."

My attempt at garlic and cheese pain d'epi

Today and yesterday have been demo days and heavy in tasting sessions. :) In this class, we'll be making light rye bread, sunflower rye, cheesebread and buns, cinnamon knots and clover buns, kaiser buns, doughnuts, muffins, scones, and soda bread.

The first bread out of the oven was light rye. We exchanged some bread for some steaks with the Chef next door. Bread, butter, and steak, what luxury!

Our class demolished the loaf, we were hungry

Bacon cheddar scones!

Raspberry white chocolate muffins

Along the way we practiced shaping buns. This was my attempt at shaping a kaiser by hand. It is extremely rare to see a hand shaped kaiser bun these days but ones shaped by hand have much more crust than the ones you stamp out.

Stamped on the left, Chef's hand shaped on the right

Fancy bun knot shape

Mini baguette and swirl shaped bun!

Here's how my kaiser turned out. Such a cutie, I took him home. :)

One of the appeals of a hand shaped kaiser is that the folds are much more pronounced. The two buns below were both stamped, but the right one is more ideal because the star shape is deeper. The one on the left wasn't stamped hard enough so it is very round.

Most people in my class seem to have a love affair with cheese. We put it in as many things as we can. And plenty of it.

You better believe there's already a lot of cheese inside

While the cheese buns had a great fluff and chewy texture, it just seemed like something was missing. It would be amazing with some Italian sausage though!

Cheese buns!

Have you ever tasted soda bread before? I haven't and I was really interested. My first bite was actually quite off-putting. The taste of the chemical leaveners is so strong it makes the bread taste metallic. But after a few bites, it started to grow on me. Soda bread definitely wouldn't be my first pick (and the Chef really dislikes it), but it is surprisingly popular at The Marketplace.

Currents and icing sugar

Doughnuts are also part of our line-up of products. Fresh made doughnuts dipped in cinnamon sugar really reminds me of K-days and events like that.

Do you know what that giant smiley face is? Why, it's a giant scone, of course! We decided to push the leftover scraps together and make one giant one for the class to share. :)

If you are a carb lover like myself, look forward to more indulgently bready pictures to come!