Breadmaking is about passion, insist its most ardent practitioners, a task that asks for the patience of a saint and the devotion of a small and loyal dog. “Breads from the La Brea Bakery,” a new book by Nancy Silverton (Villard, $30), tests that passion to the limits, challenging the mettle of even the most intrepid breadmakers.
This is not to suggest that the book isn’t excellent. It most certainly is. La Brea Bakery in Los Angeles is often named as one of the greatest, largely due to Silverton’s dogged pursuit of mastering the breadmaker’s art. The book is a tell-all of what she has learned. But be wary, casual cooks and bread-machine bakers: It’s not an easy ride, but there are some great times along the way.
The book jacket offers the first hint that dilettantes need not apply:
“All great cooks, of course, are obsessed . . . They cook for themselves, to some inner compulsion, and they are never satisfied.”
What does this mean in a bread book? To begin with, it means you have to make a sourdough yeast starter, a fairly simple mixture of flour, water and yeast that is then used to leaven the bread. Such starters usually lie at the heart of the most interesting breads, those that have sturdy character, well-defined taste, chewy texture and great crust.
Thing is, Silverton’s first lesson is that yeast doesn’t come in little envelopes. It does, of course, but Silverton suggests a delightful prehistoric alternative: gathering wild yeast spores from the air.
With a pound of grapes, some flour, water and patience, readers are instructed how, over the course of two weeks, to corral this wild yeast and turn it into a sourdough starter.
This is where things get sticky. Literally.
Each morning, a strange bowl of stuff greets you in the kitchen. Early on, it’s not altogether pleasant. The grapes are smashed up a bit, tied in a cheesecloth bundle and suspended in a paste of flour and water. The goal is to get the stuff to ferment. When it does, the bubbling brew gets a bit whiffy for a day or two, although not enough to drive you out of the kitchen.
But this is primal stuff, and there’s an undeniable thrill in watching it gurgle and grow and become something that’s very much alive.
Voracious appetite
Things escalate toward the end. The final five-day stretch requires three feedings a day to nourish the ever-expanding number of yeast spores that populate the slurry. While that may not sound like such a big deal–after all, most people also eat three times a day–it takes some creative scheduling to accommodate the starter’s ravenous appetite.
At this point, it reproduces like crazy. Each morning, there’s a bit more than a pound of starter and by day’s end, it has grown to better than seven times that.
Unless you have a large circle of acquaintances who are similarly obsessed, you end up dumping some of your lovingly nurtured starter down the drain each morning. If, instead of discarding excess starter each day, you feed all of it, you’ll end up with 576 bowls of the stuff, each one of them like a baby bird, hungrily looking for a daily ration of almost 2 1/2 pounds of flour.
If you haven’t jumped ship yet, the reward is a bowl of goop, rather like the simple paste that’s made in kindergarten or used for papier-mache. But there’s a subtle difference in aroma and texture, hard to describe but quite evident. Its most amazing characteristic is that it can be used to leaven bread forever. The starter has built up enough resilience and determination to live for a century or longer, if it’s properly tended to–that is, baked with occasionally and fed.
Even having accomplished this much, however, the time for warm bread and smug satisfaction has not yet arrived. Making bread with this starter takes at least two and sometimes three days. Sponges, risings and baking all set their own slow pace.
The method for making the first recipe in the book, an excellent basic country loaf, is detailed in 16 pages of text. Much of the information is helpful, but it’s also loaded down with some details and steps that are far more crucial to a professional baker than a home cook, even the most maniacal.
Labor of love
Is the bread worth it? That depends on how success is measured. It is an expensive exercise. In addition to the ingredients, several key pieces of equipment are required, such as a thermometer, kitchen scale, bread peel and rising baskets. (Some of the expense can be postponed if you’re wavering in commitment at this point. The March issue of Gourmet magazine ran instructions for the starter and several recipes, if you want to take a preview look.)
Nabbing yeast from the air is only the start. Each time bread is made, you will be asked to fully devote yourself to the task. Anyone who is less than rabidly committed will do well to go to Corner Bakery or Whole Foods to pick up ready-made loaves. And if you have squawked in the past about paying $6 for a loaf of bread at one of these shops, that will seem like quite a steal when stacked up against the amount of work involved.
But Silverton’s breads are fabulous and for some, that’s more than enough reason to persevere.
Recipes such as red pepper scallion bread, olive onion breadsticks, chocolate sour cherry, fig anise and raisin brioche are small symphonies of the breadmaker’s art. Their texture and taste are unmatched, as is the sense of accomplishment that comes with having mastered this artisanal skill.
Besides, it makes anything else you do in the kitchen seem easy by comparison.
