Pain Rustique

Josh makes these amazingly good sandwiches with a local product called field roast, aoli and caramelized red onions. We usually go out and buy the bread rolls for them, but this time I decided to make them.

This bread is called Pain Rustique. It's a rather wet dough that requires more folding then punching, but it's a pretty easy dough to work with once you get the hang of it. I think they key is to not worry about the shape too much, instead spread the dough out on your counter top in a roughly rectangular shape, and use a metal bench scraper to cut the dough into squares. Easy as that!

This bread is once again from the Hamelman book 'Bread: A Bakers Book of Techniques and Recipes'.

Pain Rustique or the Beasts 1st child

Ok, I'm not saying I didn't have some serious issues making my first bread at home, using my own oven and levain (the beast). What I am saying is it's not bad, not at all. 

This has a crunchy top, and a soft, uneven crumb. I was scared to make this for many reasons: we don't have a steam oven, the oven is super hot (460F) and I'm a total novice. But once again the Hamelman book came to the rescue, nice details, bar one. When do I add the second batch of yeast and the salt? Two huge issues. Needless to say I forgot about both. But you know what the bread still tastes like bread but needs a salty spread, topping or something to be truly tasty. It does cut a good figure though!