Home > Everyday Gourmet > Archives > 2009 > May > 15 > Entry
Artisan Bread
The “Everyday Cheapskate” article in the Waco Tribune-Herald on Monday, May 11, caught my attention and interest. Mary Hunt recommended Artisan Bread in Five Minutes: The Discovery That Revolutionizes Home Baking, a 2007 publication co-authored by Jeff Hertzberg and Zoe Francis. This approach to bread-making has revolutionized her life, for she has not bought a loaf of bread for two years.
Angela Tekell and others in the Waco area are involved this bread revolution. She is now having classes to teach this new idea of bread-making. She has not bought bread for two months estimating that each loaf costs about fifty cents compared to four dollars a loaf at the bakery.
What is “artisan bread”? A google search produced 1,710,000 sites. From this search I learned, among thousands of other things that artisan bread is crafted rather than mass-produced. It is baked in small batches and usually has about five ingredients as opposed to mass-produced bread that may have as many as twenty. An artisan baker is a craftsperson who is trained to the highest ability to mix, ferment, shape and bake a handcrafted loaf of bread. Although some doubted that truly accomplished bakers would appreciate the quality, many contributors on the Amazon.com website were thrilled with the results.
On my shelf is a cookbook entitled No Need to Knead by Suzanne Dunaway. The subtitle is “Handmade Italian Breads in 90 Minutes. H-m-m. That’s 85 minutes I can save. I’m ordering that “5-Minute” book! And we’re going to start doing a lot more baking at Gourmet Gallery!
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By ja
May 18, 2009 3:18 PM | Link to this | Report comment abuse
The book is here. Start cookin’.
By Chef Oz
May 18, 2009 8:51 PM | Link to this | Report comment abuse
As a true poor culinary college kid, I can honestly say that I too need dough. Send some my way and I’ll send you flours. I think that if I ever do something so bad the authorities strap me in to “old sparky,” I’m going to request some of Angela’s Artisanal bread for my last supper. And maybe some artisanal butter from a farm in Vermont, and some artisanal cheese from Brooklyn, and some artisanal bratwurst from Minnetonka, and some artisanal root beer from San Francisco, and…………an artisanal lawyer from Waco?
By jim jones
May 19, 2009 8:05 AM | Link to this | Report comment abuse
Mrs Miller:
Please clarify something for me. Is it true that in order to called a chef, one must have attended and graduated from a culinary school of higher learning?
Thank you!
By Mrs Miller
May 19, 2009 8:47 AM | Link to this | Report comment abuse
According to one source—Chef (from the Latin-caput)abbreviated form of French chef de cuisine or “head” of the kirchen. English use of the word has come to mean professional cook regardless of rank. FOOD LOVER’S COMPANION has a comprehensive explanation of the “Brigade System” that was begun at the end of the 19th century by Georges Auguste Escoffier. He established separate kitchen stations, each responsibile for a certain part of the menu…pp.86-87. I think that we in Waco or much closer to the English use of the word, but we are appreciative of the French contribution to “haute cuisine.”
By Chef Oz
May 19, 2009 12:04 PM | Link to this | Report comment abuse
Howdy there Jim Jones— Hey, are you a cook too?