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The Bread Baker's Apprentice: Mastering the Art of Extraordinary Bread Hardcover – November 14, 2001

by Peter Reinhart (Author), Ron Manville (Photographer)

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Co-founder of the legendary Brother Juniper’s Bakery, author of the landmark books Brother Juniper’s Bread Book and Crust & Crumb, and distinguished instructor at the world’s largest culinary academy, Peter Reinhart has been a leader in America’s artisanal bread movement for over fifteen years. Never one to be content with yesterday’s baking triumph, however, Peter continues to refine his recipes and techniques in his never-ending quest for extraordinary bread.

In The Bread Baker’s Apprentice, Peter shares his latest bread breakthroughs, arising from his study in several of France’s famed boulangeries and the always-enlightening time spent in the culinary academy kitchen with his students. Peer over Peter’s shoulder as he learns from Paris’s most esteemed bakers, like Lionel Poilâne and Phillippe Gosselin, whose pain à l’ancienne has revolutionized the art of baguette making. Then stand alongside his students in the kitchen as Peter teaches the classic twelve stages of building bread, his clear instructions accompanied by over 100 step-by-step photographs.

You’ll put newfound knowledge into practice with 50 new master formulas for such classic breads as rustic ciabatta, hearty pain de campagne, old-school New York bagels, and the book’s Holy Grail–Peter’s version of the famed pain à l’ancienne. En route, Peter distills hard science, advanced techniques, and food history into a remarkably accessible and engaging resource that is as rich and multitextured as
the loaves you’ll turn out. This is original food writing at its most captivating, teaching at its most inspired and inspiring–and the rewards are some of the best breads under the sun.

— Food52, Most Anticipated Cookbooks
— Every Day with Rachael Ray, Round-Up

Print length

320 pages
Language

English
Publisher

Ten Speed Press
Publication date

November 14, 2001
Dimensions

9.4 x 1.05 x 10.28 inches
ISBN-10

1580082688
ISBN-13

978-1580082686
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Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

"A bread baker, like any true artisan or craftsman, must have the power to control outcomes," says Peter Reinhart, author of The Bread Baker's Apprentice. "Mastery comes with practice." As in many arts, you must know and understand the rules before you can break them. Reinhart encourages you to learn the science of bread making, but to never forget that vision and experimentation, not formulas, make transcendent loaves. The Bread Baker's Apprentice is broken into three sections. The first is an amusing tale of Reinhart's visit to France and his discovery of pain à l'ancienne, a cold-fermented baguette. The second section comprises a tutorial of bread-making basics and Reinhart's "Twelve Stages of Bread." And finally, the recipes: Ciabatta, Pane Siciliano, Potato Rosemary Bread, New York Deli Rye, Kaiser Rolls, and Brioche, to name a few. All recipes include bread profiles and ingredient percentages. Reimagined for modern bakers, these mouthwatering classic recipes are bound to inspire. --Dana Van Nest

From Library Journal

Author of the well-respected Brother Juniper's Bread Book and Crust & Crumb, baker-turned-culinary instructor Reinhart draws on his baking and teaching experience to provide an authoritative but unintimidating guide to baking professional-quality loaves of all sorts. He begins with an account of a recent tour of specialty bakeries in Paris, including Gosselin, where he learned to make the young baker's unique pain l'ancienne which, Reinhart says, would be better called pain moderne, as it uses a modern invention (the refrigerator) to produce a "cold-dough delayed-fermentation" baguette, the best he has ever tasted. He found this technique revolutionary, and he includes the recipe here, along with a wide variety of other artisan and classic breads, from Ciabatta to Poilene-Style Miche to Tuscan Bread. The recipes are preceded by a 50-page primer on the "twelve stages of bread," and there are dozens of photographs, including particularly helpful ones of shaping different loaves. Valuable for both the professional and the novice, this is highly recommended for all baking collections.
Copyright 2001 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Booklist

The staff of life, homemade bread satisfies many a craving. In The Bread Baker's Apprentice, Peter Reinhart, noted bakery operator and author, has written a thorough, well-organized, and helpful introduction to bread baking that nearly everyone can profit from. Classifying the types of breads and presenting ingredients in tables helps the baker understand relationships and commonalities among seemingly dissimilar breads. Reinhart covers only yeast breads except for a single recipe for a triumphal cornbread full of fresh corn and topped with bacon. If a cook can do the math, Reinhart's tables of bakers' "percentages" allow for adjusting the recipes to any model bread machine, and the truly expert may use the numbers to create wholly new breads. A bibliography, a directory of ingredient sources, and a comprehensive list of bread-baking Web sites make this book a fount of practical, valuable baking lore. Mark Knoblauch
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Review

"Peter has combined the knowledge, passion, and expertise of a professional baker with the clear persuasive language of a born teacher. I predict immense well-deserved success for this extraordinary book."
–Carol Field, author of The Italian Baker

"As we continue our bread-making journey into the 21st century, Peter Reinhart’s The Bread Baker’s Apprentice should emerge as the definitive text on the subject. There is simply no other work where a student, and for that matter, many seasoned bakers, can turn to understand how the magic of great bread baking works."
–Charles Van Over, author of The Best Bread Ever

"Peter has yet again woven a fine tale about great bread, and his passion abounds. In The Bread Baker’s Apprentice, he delivers a tool box of information and insight–tools that empower us to roll up our sleeves and keep those ovens full!"
–Peter Franklin, Chairman of the Board, The Bread Bakers Guild of America

"This remarkable book is written and designed to bridge the information gap between professional artisan baking and simpler home baking. The tricks, the tips, the checklists, the math, the lingo, the path to perfect fermentation, are all here at my fingertips."
–Beth Hensperger, author of Bread Made Easy

"If you are a serious home baker and wish to raise your level of baking several notches, then apprentice yourself to master bread baker Peter Reinhart in his new cookbook, The Bread Baker’s Apprentice. He instructs with gusto in this delightful and comprehensive volume."
–Bernard Clayton, author of The Breads of France

"Just as bread nourishes the body, The Bread Baker’s Apprentice nourishes the baker’s soul. Peter Reinhart’ s explicit recipes and detailed instructions are so well written that he takes the mystery out of mastery, giving you the sense that he is standing right beside you, coaching you to success."
–Flo Braker, author of The Simple Art of Perfect Baking

"Both novice and experienced bakers have cause to celebrate Peter Reinhart’s The Bread Baker’s Apprentice. Peter’s years of hands-on experience combined with his excellent teaching skills make this book the closest thing to having a master at your side as you bake."
–Lora Brody, author of Basic Baking

About the Author

PETER REINHART is a full-time baking instructor at Johnson & Wales University in Providence, Rhode Island. He is the author of the acclaimed Brother Juniper’s Bread Book: Slow Rise as Method and Metaphor, Sacramental Magic in a Small-Town Café, Bread Upon the Waters, Crust & Crumb, the winner of the James Beard/KitchenAid Cookbook Award in 1998, and Peter Reinhart’s Whole Grain Breads, the winner of the James Beard Cookbook Award in 2008. Peter is a regular commentator on food and culture for public radio’s One Union Station.

Product details

Publisher ‏ : ‎ Ten Speed Press; First Edition (November 14, 2001)
Language ‏ : ‎ English
Hardcover ‏ : ‎ 320 pages
ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 1580082688
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1580082686
Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 3.21 pounds
Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 9.4 x 1.05 x 10.28 inches

Best Sellers Rank: #355,981 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #396 in Food Science (Books)
- #501 in Bread Baking (Books)
- #32,026 in Health, Fitness & Dieting (Books)

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4.8 4,228 ratings

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Peter Reinhart

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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.

Photo by VerbDared (Own work) [CC BY-SA 4.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0)], via Wikimedia Commons.

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Very Highly Recommended Source on Artisinal Breads

Reviewed in the United States on July 22, 2004

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Just when you think you have seen the best possible book on bread, a new volume comes out, generally written by Peter Reinhart, which tops the previous book. This is certainly the case with the author?s ?Crust and Crumb? being trumped by his latest bread volume, ?The Bread Baker?s Apprentice?. Both volumes have won James Beard awards up the wazoo, and both books deserve all the praise they get for how well they address the relatively difficult and arcane corner of gastronomica that is artisinal bread baking.

Before you form any impressions that this praise means you simply must get this book, be warned that you will be perfectly capable of making superior bread at home without cracking any one of Reinhart?s books. There are several more accessible sources. My favorite, recommended by Reinhart himself is the bread baking chapters of ?Baking with Julia (Child)? co-authored by baking writer Dorie Greenspan. Another even broader and older source is Bernard Clayton?s ?Complete Book of Breads? which covers over six hundred pages without once using the words ?poolish?, ?biga?, or ?sponge?.

Reinhart?s books are for professionals (especially ?Crust and Crumb?) and very serious bread baking enthusiasts and hobbyists (especially ?The Bread Baker?s Apprentice?). If you go back to Reinhart?s very first book ?Brother Juniper?s Bread Book?, you may even say these books are for those people who treat bread as part of their religion. Being true to the derivation of the word ?religion?, it is for people who truly wish to be connected to bread making.

?The Bread Baker?s Apprentice? is no less serious and no less rigorous than Reinhart?s earlier books, but it is clearly more accessible to the lay reader than ?Crust and Crumb?. Aside from having one of the most attractive covers I have seen on a culinary work in a long time, it is glossier and more invitingly designed by Ten Speed Press, the publishers of both volumes. ?Apprentice? opens with a story of the author?s winning a James Beard Bread Baking competition and how that lead him to a trip to Paris and a tour of several of the French Capital?s leading boulangerie. His experiences with the French apprentice system, especially as used by some of the city?s leading bread bakers is the source of the book?s title, as well as being the source of the great pound sign marked boule being held by the very attractive Reinhart apprentice on the cover of the book.

?Apprentice? also devotes close to eighty pages to explaining in great detail the steps of artisinal bread baking. Reinhart?s books, especially this one, are some of the very few I have seen which explain many of the things which go on while making bread. Everyone who uses yeast knows these microorganisms eat sugar or starch and exhale carbon dioxide. What people do not commonly know is that they also exhale ethanol and, in artisinal breads, wild microorganisms that create lactic and acetic acids that give sourdoughs their distinctive flavoring enhance their action. The book also explains that the first rise in bread baking has much more to do with flavor development than it does with creating the airy texture in the bread?s crumb. The only other book which does as good a job of explaining bread baking technique is Joe Ortiz? ?The Village Baker?.

?Apprentice? also has as good or better illustrations of baking techniques than both ?Crust and Crumb? or ?The Village Baker?.

?Apprentice? presents several of the same ?formulas? that appear in ?Crust and Crumb? but in every case, where the same bread is presented, ?Apprentice? goes into greater depth regarding the history of the bread, the special techniques needed, and the variations commonly done with the same basic formula. Both books use the Bakers Percentage Formula presentation of ingredient amounts, but both also present ingredient amounts in very easily measured ounces. I am surprised that neither book includes metric weights, as they are immeasurably easier to scale up or down, especially when you are dealing with such small amounts as in fractions of an ounce of salt or yeast. One complaint I have seen of Reinhart?s books is in the large size of some of the recipes (meaning an implementation of a formula). I sympathize with this comment, but point out that Reinhart is not writing for the occasional home baker, he is writing for the professional and the devoted amateur baker.

In the author?s treatment of Brioche, both books deal with this bread as the archetype of a whole family of breads; however ?Apprentice? goes into this family tree to a greater depth than I have seen in any other book. It gives formulas for ?Rich Man?s Brioche? with 88 percent butter, ?Middle Class Brioche? with 50 percent butter, and Poor Man?s Brioche with 24 percent butter. While ?Crust? gives formulas for brioche family members Kugelhopf and Challah, ?Apprentice gives formulas for brioche cousins Casatiello and Challah.

If I were a consecrated member of the bread baking fraternity, I would want both of these book. Well, I want both anyway, since my philosophy is that a 35-dollar book has paid for itself if it yields up one good ideas, and both books are goldmines of information and ideas about bread baking. If you must choose between the two and you are not a professional, take ?Apprentice?. The cover alone is worth the price of admission. If you are a professional or professional wannabe, take ?Crust?. It has a more extensive bibliography and list of mail, web, and professional sources.

In a culinary publishing niche with lots of excellent sources, Reinhart?s books, especially ?The Bread Baker?s Apprentice? is clearly one of the best for the serious baker.

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Dolunay Kiz

A No-Brainer for Any Serious Baker

Reviewed in the United States on November 26, 2011

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If there is one book I would recommend hands-down for anybody who wants to learn bread baking the right way, then it is "The Bread Baker's Apprentice", lovingly called "BBA" on some bread baking forums I frequent.

Reinhart begins with an overview over gear and ingredients, including why some are to be recommended over others. My favorite aspect in this part of the book was the instructions on how to make improvised proofing bowls (p.36). I own several proofing baskets myself and am keenly aware how insanely expensive they are, so this is a good, low-cost alternative.

Most people will be tempted to skip the part about baker's math (pp. 41), but I would urge them to read on. Baker's percentages, while odd to get used to, are still the best measurement system when it comes to bread. After using them for a while, just looking at the percentages will tell the artisan baker all he/she needs to know about the general characteristics of the dough.

For anybody who has been wondering about general classifications of certain kinds of bread, pages 46 and 47 contain a graph listing the most popular breads and where they fall, from dough characteristics to rising method. More important to the novice baker, however, is the explanation on the twelve stages of bread, starting on page 48.

I am a strong autodidactic learner, and every good how-to (cook) book should include a section like this. Armed with this knowledge, if you cannot churn out amazing bread afterwards, you should maybe consider another past-time - it does not get any more comprehensive than this.

In this context, BBA includes some very helpful photographs on shaping bread (pp. 72). The one criticism I have here is that Reinhart's way of shaping pretzels (top of page 80) is - sorry to say it - PATHETIC. I have never seen such a sorry excuse for a pretzel; children can do a better job than this. I would strongly recommend a complete redo of the related photographs.

Yet, this is the only real sore point about this book, which I otherwise love. The formulas are clearly written, and while I would have appreciated a column with grams included in the recipes, at least BBA is listing both volume and weight (the latter albeit in decimal ounces, when most smaller scales I have seen will give them in fractions - but hey, it is a start).

Unlike "Crust & Crumb" (featuring an awkward two-column layout), the recipes are listed in a large column with a tiny side column containing commentary, baker's percentages and tips. The formulas are written out in clear paragraphs organized in ordered lists, and the first sentence of each paragraph starts with bold letters giving you the first idea of what is coming. Many recipes also include "grace notes" at the end, often disclosing the kind of information you would have to hunt the Internet for, like making your own herb oil for focaccia (p. 163).

Also, many recipes are accompanied by "how to" photographs as appropriate, for example when it comes to shaping the bread a certain way. And speaking of photographs, the majority of pictures included in the book are really nice and in color, unlike "Crust & Crumb", which relies on awkward drawings for most of its illustrations (with the exception of some color photographs in the center of the book).

It seems inevitable, though, that every cook book contains a few recipes which, for the life of you, will not work, no matter how faithfully you follow them. BBA is no exception. Just like you would buy a CD for the one single and a handful of other songs you really liked, and accept that the other songs were not really your cup of tea, I guess one has to accept that the same applies to recipe books.

There are a few recipes in this book which I have not been able to replicate ever, no matter how faithfully I stuck to the letter of the formula. Neither have other people I have talked to, which would indicate an inherent issue with the recipe itself, not operator-related error. For some this only meant that some aspects of the method were erroneous, like using a stamp for making Kaiser rolls (p. 177). Interestingly enough, the photograph featured on page 176 shows rolls that have been hand-knotted or (dare I say it?) machined - but there is no way they were baked using a stamp. I should know, because I bought a stamp following what I read in BBA, and more or less tossed it the first time I tried it out. What does yeasted dough do when it proofs, and later baked, after being stamped? Even when it is placed, as directed on its face for proofing? Exactly.

Other recipes that did not impress me very much were the one for pumpernickel rye (p. 246) or the one for ciabatta (p. 136). But most of those are outweighed by the parts that make this book indispensable in every serious bread baker's collection - both regarding what I have outlined above, and by some other formulas in this book, like the one for lavash crackers (p. 178) or Vienna bread (p.261).

Get baking!

29 people found this helpful

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Kena

Amazing book!

Reviewed in the United States on October 1, 2023

Verified Purchase

I love this book! It comes with so much detail, examples, colored pictures, and so many styles of bread! This was an amazing buy and I’m so glad i purchased this book! Only down fall i would say is it’s hard cover with a paper cover rather than the actual hard cover being the cover! Other than that it’s a super good read!

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Pary01

Bread techniques

Reviewed in Australia on October 27, 2023

Verified Purchase

It's a great book but the dialogue in the recipes is long winded and technical. Once you get your head around the way it's written you can cut out the white noise and go direct to the need to do's. The bread I have made using this book has been on point. Have had to double the quantities on some recipes to get two or three larger loafs but it works well.
In short it's a technical written book but that's a good thing once you get use to it.

André

Not 100% converted from US Quarts & Pounds to Metric, But gives tables for you to do it

Reviewed in Australia on April 19, 2023

Verified Purchase

Ordered 13April2023-Delivered 18April2023. Delivery within Australia.
The Bread Baker's Apprentice :Mastering the Art of Extraordinary Bread.15th Anniversary Ed. 1st Revised Ed. 2016. Peter Reinhart. ISBN: 9781607748656. Hard cover. w/ Dj. 322pg. mostly sour dough bread, with Pre-ferments, starters. White bread (Pullman loaf). Walks through the ingredients, the process of each stage of making bread, as principle. Then teaches you Bakers Math, Percentages, or rather shows you how it works, (plenty of utubes online show if you don't know what bakers Math is). Any recipe that has FLOUR can use math (%) as scaling, eg 25 x 800g multigrain bread loaf's to 1 loaf. Each recipe is set out with the timeframe for making each component, like Pre-Ferments (Biga, Poolish, Pâte Fermentée), Dough, Mixing, Resting, Shaping, ..... to Baking times & cooling. The book reads like the original 2001 Ed, was written for the USA market & then updated with metric in this 2016 Ed. though not Perfectly. References to products or services direct you to back page which then says because things change so often it's better to just search the internet for it. (chainbaker. bakewithjack). Great Bread recipe & Reference book for keeping. I've had this book on my want list for ages, Not disappointed I now have it.

Amazon Customer

Solides Wissen

Reviewed in Germany on July 11, 2011

Verified Purchase

Das ist ein echt tolles Buch. Die autobiografische Einführung, die die Erfahrung des Autors beim Besuch von Bäckereien in Paris zusammenfasst, ist vielleicht nicht jedermanns Sache, verrät aber einiges an Leidenschaft zum Thema. Das Kapitel über Brotmachen ist sehr ausführlich und sehr praxisorientiert. Es geht nicht in die Tiefe der physikalischen und chemischen Reaktionen beim Backen, dafür muss man schon McGee lesen. Aber es werden genug Grundlagen vermittelt, um zu verstehen, was Fermentation und Glutenbildung sind, und wie sie durch jeden Teilvorgang des Backprozesses beeinflusst werden. Er führt ein nützliche Klassifikationen von Brotarten, die dem Anfänger helfen, sich zu orientieren. Die Rezepte an sich gelingen richtig gut, und sind von hoher Qualität. Und die praktischen Tips sind wirklich sehr nützlich und an den Heimbäcker orientiert (z. B. wie man am Besten Brot im normalen Haushaltsofen bedampft).

Die Brote selbst sind meistens weiße Hefebrote. Die in Deutschland verbreiteten Roggen- und Weizensauerteigbrote werden sehr kurz abgehandelt. Aber das stört mich nicht weiter, denn Rezepte sind leichter anderswo zu finden als Grundlageninformation. Und das eine oder andere Exot findet sich immer noch im Buch, z. B. ein Maismehlbrot mit Melasse.

Das Buch ist in sehr hoher Qualität verlegt, mit schwerem Papier in Stoffeinband. Die Fotografien sind wunderschön. Manche sind informativ, z. B. die Erklärung, wie man Zöpfe flechtet. Andere machen einfach Lust auf zartem, duftendem Brot. Alle sind perfekt ausgeführt und gut platziert (kein buntes Bilderbuch).

Allerdings vergebe ich nur vier statt fünf Sterne, weil das Buch für den europäischen Leser doch nicht die beste Wahl ist. Erstens arbeitet der Autor wie jeder erfahrene Koch nach Gewicht anstatt nach Volumen. Er wollte besonders benutzerfreundlich sein und hat daher bei allen Rezepten sowohl das Volumen als auch das Gewicht der Zutaten angegeben. Allerdings ist das Gewicht ausschließlich in Unzen aufgelistet, für alle Zutaten. 4 Unzen á gerundet 27.5 Gramm sind relativ leicht im Kopf umzurechnen, im Vergleich zu alten Feinden wie die Fahrenheittemperaturen. Aber wenn man 0.055 Unzen Trockenhefe braucht, renne ich mit bemehlten Händen zum Taschenrechner, und das nervt auf Dauer.

Das andere Problem an der Internationalisierung ist, dass er für fast alle Arten von Brot das amerikanische bread flour empfiehlt, was einen besonders hohen Eiweissgehalt hat. In Deutschland ist es aber praktisch unmöglich, dieses Mehl zu finden, weil die benötigten Weizensorten hier nicht wachsen. Die Rezepte gelingen immer noch mit einem deutschen Weizenmehl mit höher Typenummer, z. B. 812. Aber dann muss man etwas weniger Wasser nehmen als im Rezept, und zwar muss man nach Gefühl gehen, wie viel Wasser richtig ist. Das ist für halbwegs erfahrene BäckerInnen kein Problem, aber nichts für diejenigen, die gerade anfangen. Der Geschmack ist auch anders als beim puren Weißbrot. Als Alternative kann man pures Gluten hinzugeben, das braucht aber dann viel mehr Kneten.

Das macht das Buch nicht ganz leicht umzusetzen. Manche werden davon bestimmt frustriert sein. Für mich ist die ausführliche, gut präsentierte Grundlageninformation Grund genug, das Buch zu lieben. Und Brotbacken ist sowieso etwas für Geduldige, denn Brot braucht viel Arbeit. Ich persönlich würde es wieder kaufen.

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Experience Guy

Best book on baking bread so far!

Reviewed in Canada on August 26, 2023

Verified Purchase

I have several other books on bread baking but this one seems to be the most comprehensive one in that it covers a lot of different areas not just artisan bread, but making baguettes and ciabatta, different types of breads and so forth which gives it a leg up on some of the other books that I’ve seen this one is great!

Gill Burrows

Makes bread making a joy

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on March 10, 2023

Verified Purchase

I have bought many bread making books and after following their various recipes have had just as many failures.
This book, which I thought was a bit of a expensive indulgence has proved that it was money well spent.
The results of my labour, with the guidance of Peter Reinhart are something to be proud of.
I would highly recommend this book to anyone seriously interested in baking better bread and also understanding the science involved. Money well spent.
Also I have adapted the "formula's to use in my Bread Machine, successfully !
Buy the book and see for youself.

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