Artisan Bread Formulas

Now that we have surveyed the concepts, ingredients, and techniques used by artisan bakers, we return to the discussion that opened this chapter: What is artisan bread?

In presenting the basic procedures for making artisan breads, in this chapter we focused on the most fundamental bread formulas—that is, formulas consisting only of flour, water, salt, and leavening in the form of a yeast pre-ferment or sourdough starter. The same concepts are also applied to many specialty breads, such as breads flavored with nuts, olives, dried fruit, and so on. Furthermore, bakers specializing in fine handcrafted breads find they can increase sales by offering not only crisp-crusted sourdough breads but also a variety of rich dough products such as brioche and kugelhopf, preparing these products with the same care as their lean breads. Are these products artisan breads as well? As we have said, it is hard to define the term in a way everyone agrees on.