Kandy from Edgerton, WI (2018 Week 2: Bread)

Baker

Kandy

Location

Edgerton, WI

Baking Challenge

Eight-Strand Plaited Loaf

Give your bread a name and tell us about your recipe.

Country French Bread, from the book The Bread Baker’s Apprentice.

Would you describe yourself as a rogue baker, or do you strictly adhere to the recipe?

Both, depending on the recipe and if I’ve made it before. This was the first recipe I made from this book and it was a bit challenging, requiring a pâte fermentée formula and four proofing stages. NOT a very braid-friendly bread as it was extremely elastic! By the time I had rolled out the eighth plait, number one had shrunk back up to 4"! It was like wrangling cats! Ha!! It’s still tasty though for being stumpy.

Tell us about how you added a Wisconsin twist to your bread creation.

Although there’s no particular ingredient here that focuses on Wisconsin, bread baking always reminds me of grandma as she spent every Saturday for some 30 odd years next door on the farm, making 5-6 loaves of bread, plus cakes, cookies, pies or doughnuts for the boys who came in from the fields or milking cows. I was allowed the job of sifting the flour using her hand-cranked sifter. So to me, bread says home, which is Wisconsin. <3

How did you do?

Feeling humbled.