Peter Reinhart's Artisan Breads Every Day [Hardcover]

Peter Reinhart (Author)

Book Description

Release date: October 27, 2009

Peter Reinhart's Artisan Breads Every Day distills the renowned baking instructor' s professional techniques down to the basics, delivering artisan bread recipes that anyone with flour and a fridge can make and bake with ease.

Reinhart begins with the simplest French bread, then moves on to familiar classics such as ciabatta, pizza dough, and soft sandwich loaves, and concludes with fresh specialty items like pretzels, crackers, croissants, and bagels. Each recipe is broken into "Do Ahead" and "On Baking Day" sections, making every step--from preparation through pulling pans from the oven–a breeze, whether you bought your loaf pan yesterday or decades ago. These doughs are engineered to work flawlessly for busy home bakers: most require only a straightforward mixing and overnight fermentation. The result is reliably superior flavor and texture on par with loaves from world-class artisan bakeries–and all with little hands-on time.

America's favorite baking instructor and innovator Peter Reinhart offers new time-saving techniques accompanied by full-color, step-by-step photos throughout so that in no time you'll be producing fresh batches of: Sourdough Baguettes • 50% and 100% Whole Wheat Sandwich Loaves • Soft and Crusty Cheese Bread • English Muffins • Cinnamon Buns • Panettone • Hoagie Rolls • Chocolate Cinnamon Babka • Fruit-Filled Thumbprint Rolls • Danish • Best-Ever Biscuits

Best of all, these high-caliber doughs improve with a longer stay in the fridge, so you can mix once, then portion, proof, and bake whenever you feel like enjoying a piping hot treat.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

With "no-knead" bread recipes all the rage now, expert baker Reinhart (Whole Grain Breads) has come back with a process that is slightly more involved but much more productive than the limited classic no-knead method, yielding all manner of sweet, savory and sandwich breads. He introduces a "stretch and fold" technique that, combined with a slow rise and without the lengthy prefermentation that his and other artisan bakers' recipes usually require, means more freedom and less active work time, but still a very flavorful product. To make French baguettes, for example, only one brief knead is required; then, after an overnight or multiday rise, the dough is ready for shaping—much better than being shackled to the kitchen for an entire morning for multiple rises, as is usually the case in baguette making. Other great breads, such as focaccia, soft cheese bread and even panettone, get similar preparation makeovers. Reinhart occasionally calls for a starter, but his carefully constructed, nonintimidating mother starter method should encourage the wary. For bakers who have come to bread through the no-knead route, Reinhart's thorough, detailed recipes offer a perfect way to expand their repertoire without getting their hands too sticky or giving up too much of their time, while those who are already fans will appreciate having a little more room in their schedule while still producing terrific breads. (Nov.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Review

“Peter Reinhart is the Leonardo da Vinci of bread; his recipes are foolproof, his research exhaustive and yet a delight to read and follow, and his hunger for knowledge and technique is boundless and infinite. He is without a doubt the definitive source of true style and information when it comes to all things baked and delicious, and my go-to guy for all things leavened and sandwichable”
--Mario Batali, author of Molto Italiano

“I’ve been using Peter’s overnight pizza dough technique religiously for years--mix, knead, chill overnight, shape, bake. So simple, and minimal planning is required. In this book, many of the recipes use a similar approach–no poolish or pre-fermenting. From pain au levain and pretzels to panettone and pizza dough, all the greatest hits and every day favorites are covered.”
--Heidi Swanson, author of Super Natural Cooking

“Peter Reinhart’s thoughtful, steadying presence combined with his matchless teaching skills and down-to-earth approach make reading and using Artisan Breads Every Day a great pleasure. His information demystifying the preparation and use of sourdough starters is both much needed and superb.”
--Nancy Baggett, author of Kneadlessly Simple: Fabulous, Fuss-Free, No-Knead Breads

“For most cooks, artisan bread baking is close to metaphysics. And each succeeding book about it only tends to deepen the mysteries and make trying it even more unlikely. Peter Reinhart’s Artisan Breads Every Day is one of the first books of its kind that actually made me want to stop reading and start baking.”
--Russ Parsons, author of How to Peel a Peach

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 224 pages
• Publisher: Ten Speed Press (October 27, 2009)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1580089984
• ISBN-13: 978-1580089982
• Product Dimensions: 8.3 x 0.9 x 10.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (137 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #8,725 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #4 in Books > Cookbooks, Food & Wine > Cooking by Ingredient > Rice & Grains
  • #14 in Books > Cookbooks, Food & Wine > Baking > Bread
  • #32 in Books > Cookbooks, Food & Wine > Culinary Arts & Techniques

More About the Author

PETER REINHART is widely acknowledged as one of the world's leading authorities on bread. He is the author of six books on bread baking, including the 2008 James Beard Award-winning WHOLE GRAIN BREADS; the 2002 James Beard and IACP Cookbook of the Year, THE BREAD BAKER'S APPRENTICE; and the 1999 James Beard Award-winning CRUST AND CRUMB. He is a full-time baking instructor at Johnson and Wales University and the owner of Pie Town restaurant in Charlotte, North Carolina.

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

134 of 141 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Great book for both novice and accomplished bakers November 20, 2009

By Pamela Schmidt

Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase

I was a tester for this book. I tested all of its recipes and almost all of the variations. This book is perfect for either a complete novice or an accomplished baker. It is written in a straight-forward, down to earth manner and has great pictures illustrating all the techniques, various stages, and final products. Even though I am an accomplished baker, I learned a lot of new techniques from the information contained in this book that either improved and or simplified my bread making. All of the recipes work. There is not one dud in the entire book! The recipes run the gamut from lean relatively simple breads, e.g., basic baguettes, to more complex products, e.g., croissants. If I could only own one of Peter Reinhart's books this is the one I would choose. There is a lifetime of baking in this book.

141 of 149 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Another Great Work From Peter Reinhart October 29, 2009

By Chad J. Robertson

Format:Hardcover

I have been baking bread as a hobby for a little over 2 years. I have always been fascinated with baking bread but I never found a satisfactory resource until I found Peter Reinhart's "Bread Baker's Apprentice." This was a great resource as Peter is a very skilled teacher and conveyor of information. I also purchased a copy of Peter's "Whole Grain Bread's" and was equally excited by the bread baking techniques that he shares. Also, you can see an evolution in the baking style between the two books as the author seems to learn from each publication. I purchased this newest book yesterday, and after reading through it I can see that he has continued to learn and I really appreciate the techniques used in this book as they are even easier to perform, and easier to understand, than the first two books. This book is great for people just getting into bread baking as it contains many of the same fundamental styles of bread found in Peter's other books. However, if you already own Peter's previous publications do not let that deter you from purchasing this one as there are new techniques and formula's for different breads. I am especially looking forward to trying the formulas in the section on Cheese bread, as well as the onion and wild rice bread. The techniques presented in this book are simpler, and more straightforward than previous ones as the formulas are streamlined so that the use of a seperate pre-fermented dough is not necessary. Also, these recipes, although still requiring at least two days, take less hands-on time to make. I am very excited to try the breads presented in this book, and I would highly recommend anyone who enjoys baking bread to purchase this exciting new work from Peter Reinhart.

78 of 85 people found the following review helpful

3.0 out of 5 stars Nice Recipes, iffy format December 6, 2010

By Catherine

Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase

I purchased this book as a gift for my daughter, who is learning to bake artisan breads, but has young children and limited time. I like the color photograph illustrations and the recipes seem good, but I do not like the format. The instructions are all in paragraph format and difficult to follow. My daughter says she finds herself reading and rereading several times to remember the order of all the steps. A 1, 2, 3 style list of instructions would have been so much easier to follow. I, too, like to be able to glance at a recipe quickly (while my hands are all floury) without searching through paragraphs, looking for what I need to know. Imagine trying to keep track of steps with 3 little children at your feet...not so easy.

I own the Bread Baker's Apprentice by Peter Reinhart and love it, so I expected this to be in a similar format, just with simpler processes to produce great bread. Bread Baker's Apprentice is laid out with a clear 1, 2, 3, etc. step by step of the instructions. I wish he had done the same with Artisan Breads Every Day.

Another small gripe is that the bakers' percentages are all listed in a table near the back of the book, rather than with each recipe. This is useful, but I would like to have the reference right at hand with the recipe. Some books use a chart format for ingredients, listing the ounces, grams (sometimes cups and spoons volume) as well as bakers' percentage so all is right at hand.

I do like that Artisan Breads Every Day gives measurements in grams as well as ounces and volume. I would like to have seen grams in the Bread Baker's Apprentice. As I make each recipe, I use the unit conversion on my scale and pencil in the grams beside each ingredient. Grams are more universal as well as more precise. I admit that seeing the volume measures, as well, helps my mind's eye to visualize the amount from a lifetime of using this method. So, even though I don't measure by volume, I like that it gives me a rough idea of what is needed to have at hand before I begin a baking project.