Customer Reviews

The Village Baker: Classic Regional Breads from Europe and America

5 star:		(17)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Joe Ortiz's book changed my life. I had been baking straight yeasted breads for several years. These were good, decent breads, but plain. I longed for a more complex loaf - one with the irregular holes in the crumb, one that had a chewier texture, and longer shelf life. Joe Ortiz's book showed me how to achieve all those goals. His book also explains why certain methods produce different results. Another of the helpful features of his book is that he distinguishes his recipes by fermentation method(i.e. sourdough, sponge, old dough, or straight yeast), which makes it a book a beginning baker can use, and grow with as the baker's skill develops (the straight yeasted doughs are the easist). I think this is a must-have book for any serious, or semi-serious homebaker. This is THE book for the homebaker who wants to take their baking up to the next level.

As a nearly 30 year home bread baker, I was not expecting to find this fresh new look at breadmaking by the traditional artisans of France, Germany and Italy. But Joe Ortiz's "The Village Baker" is both a joy and a revelation. Here are many easy to follow recipes based on starters and sponges ("poolish" in French). Here you can see, and almost smell, the fresh-baked peasant breads of Europe as they come out of the traditional brick oven. It's all here -- whether you're looking for french pain de campagne, or Italian pane integrale, you need look no further. The Italian ciabatta recipe, which appears thoroughly unlikely to succeed, produces an exceptional flat bread honeycombed with airy holes to soak up sauces, or extra virgin olive oil. Above all, the book conveys a sense of timelessness , and the enduring value of good bread made according to its own timetable. The recipes are clear and easy to follow. I have spent several months happily working my way through this exceptional book -- some surprises but no failures. At least five stars...

As an Artisan Bread Baking Instructor, I found Joe Ortiz' book, The Village Baker to be the best book on the market for helping the novice bread baker to understand in plain language the magic of true bread. I have had 35 students use this book so far, and they have all exclaimed it to be the best. The depth of knowledge shows through, without being pretensious, and the breads themselves were crisp, sensual, and tasty, without exception. If you were allowed only one book on the art of true bread this is the one to have.

This book was written by Joe Ortiz of Gayle's Bakery in Capitola, California and published eleven years ago. At the time, the `Library Journal' said that good books for the home baker are few and far between. In 1993, Ortiz' book was just on the crest of renewed interest in artisinal breads. At the time, the most noteworthy books on artisinal bread baking were Carol Field's `The Italian Baker' and Bernard Clayton's `The Breads of France'. Peter Reinhart had written the small, quirky `Brother Juniper's Bread Book' which was long on one big idea, but not very detailed about some other aspects of baking. Bernard Clayton's giant `The Complete Book of Breads' did not even cover two of the three main types of yeast rising bread methods. It was more concerned with giving good, easy home recipes for a wide variety of different breads based entirely on `La methode directe' or the direct method. Therefore, Ortiz' excellent bibliography contains mostly works written in French.

In the last eleven years, a number of excellent books on artisinal bread have been written and published, especially by Peter Reinhart, Nancy Silverton, and Rose Levy Beranbaum. I have not read or reviewed Reinhart's award winning `The Bread Baker's Apprentice', so my favorite artisinal bread text before today was Beranbaum's `The Bread Bible'. Ortiz' book has just taken it's place. Beranbaum's book is almost twice as long and has a long introduction on ingredients and general techniques, but her presentation of the differences between the three major methods for yeast bread making simply do not succeed in making the subject quite as clear, as interesting, and as convincing as Ortiz' book. Beranbaum's book is still a great work with recipes for lots of types of breads that Ortiz does not cover. Before becoming too enmeshed with praise for Ortiz book, I must say I have taken a quick look at `The Bread Baker's Apprentice' and it appears to be the equal to `The Village Baker' on many points and may offer illumination on subjects Ortiz does not cover completely.

The heart of Ortiz book is simple artisinal bread made with flour, water, salt, and yeast. In some Tuscan bread, even salt is left out leaving three ingredients. In many breads, the yeast is captured from the ambient microflora, leaving but two ingredients added by the baker.

The thing that Ortiz makes so clear is the distinction between the three main methods for using yeast to leaven bread. The oldest method responsible for true sourdough breads, and the method most clearly characterizing `artisinal' baking is what the French call the `levain' method. With regional variations, this is THE method for rising dough until the production of brewer's yeast in 1810, a conversion which became complete with the production of baker's yeast in 1900. The `levain' method required at least 24 hours, as long as you had a viable starter. To create a starter required another four to seven days.

The direct method of leavening with commercial baker's yeast reduced production time from 24 hours to seven (7) or eight (8) hours. The problem is, breads made with the direct method simply did not taste as good or keep as long as levain breads, which benefited from the creation of acids as a byproduct of the natural fermentation. Hence, we get sour doughs from natural yeast fermentation.

The solution to improve the taste of breads without relying on the long and somewhat unreliable levain method was the invention of the sponge method or `Pain sur poolish', possibly named by the fact that it was invented by Polish bakers in Paris. This method creates a sponge from baker's yeast and flour on one day that rises overnight, when it is combined with more flour to form the dough. The overnight rising creates some of the acidic fermentation byproducts to give some of the sourdough tang. The brioche family, including challah is made using the sponge method. Italian bakers use a similar method, calling their version of a sponge a `biga' which is best for high gluten breads with a high water content for ciabatta and like breads.

Giving us an understanding of these three major approaches to yeast leavened bread may, itself, be worth the price of admission for this $20 paperback, but there is much more. True to the title of the book, the author' main focus is to give us an understanding of the traditional local professional baker, and to enable us to reproduce what this baker can do. To tell the full story, Ortiz gives recipes for many traditional breads as they may be done at home AND as they are done in the professional bakery. The professional recipes follow the same format used by other books for the professional baker such as Gisslen's `Professional Baking' and the recent Culinary Institute of America's `Baking and Pastry'.

In spite of the heavy use of French sources, Ortiz gives full coverage of Italian, German / Austrian, Italian, and American artisinal methods. That's right, American artisinal baking, headlined by the justly famous San Francisco sourdough. The only thing I miss is a reference to any special microflora native to the San Francisco area that makes this bread so distinctive. My hunch is that it is all due to the mist off the bay. In the section on American breads, Ortiz cites a large number of artisinal bakers, almost all of which are on the Pacific coast (that mist again) or in New York City. As the list is eleven (11) years old, I would verify any locations before getting into the car. Thankfully, I know that Zabar's in Manhattan is alive and well and still credited with having the best bread in New York City.

If you are interested in understanding serious bread baking basics, this is the book for you. Be warned, this is not simple quick stuff, but worth the read even if you never open a pack of Fleishman's yeast.

I like a lot of things about this book. Excellent recipes. Lots of things to help you understand bread baking. However, I was a little startled on its emphasis. The book is split into 6 chapters. (1) Basics, (2) French breads, (3) Italian breads, (4) German breads, (5) American breads, and (6) Information for bakery scale production of breads (recipes in kgs, rather than cups and the like)

However, nearly all the emphasis is on the French and Italian breads and there is very little on German breads, which have always struck me as having just as remarkable a tradition, if not a more impressive one. One interesting consequence of this is that certain kinds of techniques are short-changed as it appears that sourdough is on the decline in France and is gone in Italy, but is alive and well in Germany.

All things considered, this book should be strongly recommended, but its emphasis should be understood. Perhaps a 2nd edition could address some of these.

When I outgrew my bread machine, five years ago, a (chef) friend of mine loaned me his copy of Ortiz's book. Within a couple of weeks I was on my way, using a sourdough starter that I made from scratch, by following Joe's step-by -step directions, to bake good, basic sourdough loaves.

In "The Village Baker", the author shares his travels, experiences and conversations with some truly skilled and honest regional bakers in Italy, France and Germany. Throughout the book, related recipes follow the account of the respective village baker's professional lifestyle and dedication to his craft. The book contains in-depth descriptions of all aspects of bread making, including a short section on decorative bread techniques. Recipes are provided for both serious amateurs and professionals alike.

Eventually, I had to go out and get my own copy of the book, and have since read through it many times. The Village Baker is a wonderful blend of technical reference, human interest, and travel writing.

This book is certainly a very knowledgeable book and I quite agree with some of the reviews by other readers. However, comparing this to some other bread books now available in the market, I find this one rather complicated and difficult to follow. One reason is its format. When I use some of the recipes there, I have to frequently go through some of the pages before or after. This makes the whole process a bit troublesome. On the other hand, speaking about the recipes I have tried, they are not really that superior and that is why I have some reservations towards the merit of the book. It does not seem to be worth that trouble. However, I do appreciate the efforts the author spend to share those researches with the readers. I think the book is not for the beginners and it takes quite some time to follow the formulas.

This book is good because of two reasons: It gives you a lot of authentic and traditional recipes and shows you how to use them. Joe Ortiz seems to be very forthcoming in that respect, that he teaches the techniques of the professional baker to a larger audience. He will teach you how to make bread without commercial yeast, but rather using home-made starters that will use "wild yeast" fromt he air. A bread like that can take about a week to make. The author is also very clear about the fact, that only experience can make you proficient home baker and that you will need well developed senses to decide when the dough can be taken to the next stage of its development. This means, you sometimes have to change a recipe slightly. Sometimes he will use recipes with a reduced amount of water to make the dough easier to handle, but in such cases a remark is added to the recipe (professional bakers seem to be used to handling very wet doughs with ease).

Reading this book really is like getting a glimpse into the inner workings of a professional bakery. There is a chapter about professional recipes that will yield dough quantities in the 80 lb range. First, I totally disregarded that chapter because I thought it's not of interest to the home baker, but then I discovered that it included a lot of good remarks about baking in general, that will improve your skills as a home baker too.

A book you can really sink your teeth into with a wealth of amount of material to study.

I've been baking bread for 20 years and am very particular about the bread books I buy. Ortiz's book is without equal. Some of the recipes may seem long and complicated, but trust me, they *can* be adapted to the schedule of a working person, and really, those tiny quantities of yeast really do work.

...I recommend this book! My fiance has been baking a loaf of bread every weekend since the start of the new year, so I've bought him a few bread baking books. He continues to use The Village Baker most frequently, and says it's his favorite book. Every time he bakes from it, the bread is decidedly unlike store-bought bread (even from the deli). Last night I was lucky enough to eat "Porridge-Method Italian-Style French Bread" with my lasagne - and it was quite a treat. Highly recommended to home bakers - and their tasters!