Baking Bouchon - Recipe 29 - Campagne Boule

More fancy pants names for not so fancy stuff.  This is a country loaf, made with a mixture of flours which gives the bread a more interesting flavor than the standard baguette dough I've made from this cookbook (posted here and here).

This bread contains all purpose flour, a little rye flour and a touch of whole wheat flour.  I really love the flavor of different types of flour in my baked goods, so I was happy to mix it up a little. 



























The craziest part of this recipe is that is uses a levain.  Levain is a kind of pre-ferment that is similar to a sourdough starter.

The previous breads I've made from this book contain a poolish instead of a levain which only takes a few days to grow, the levain takes about a week.

You start a levain by combining equal parts flour and water and letting it sit out on the counter.  As it sits, it grows lactic acid bacteria that when baked.... Ahhhhhhhhh, there's too much science in baking!!!!  Anyway, I mixed together the flour and water, let it sit out and fed it with more flour and water until it was bubbly and smelled like sour milk... it was actually pretty gross.  See the picture above of the schedule of feeding times?  I didn't do that.  I kept forgetting and only fed the thing once a day.  How can I be expected to feed something other than my dog twice a day?  He reminds me with his whining and pacing.  This thing just sat in the corner and didn't say a word.  To make up for starving the levain, I let it sit out a couple of extra days.  And you know what?   I think it still worked.  Take that science! 

Once the levain was made, the bread dough came together easily.... flour, other flour, other other flour, yeast, levain, water and salt.  My mixer did all the work kneading the dough or 20 straight minutes.

This particular dough was shaped into a Boule.  Also known as round.

When it was time to let the dough rise,  I was instructed to do so in a bowl lined with floured linen so that the boule would keep its boule round shape.

It also got to cut some crosshatches into the top of the dough.  However, by the time it rose and I transferred it to the baking stone, all signs of those cuts were lost.  But I wasn't really worried about it because pretty only matters so much... especially when it comes to bread.

This loaf turned out really well.  The crust was nice and crusty and the inside was soft and chewy.  I really like the added flavor you get from the addition of the whole wheat and rye flours.

This is how I enjoyed mine tonight.  A big, warm hunk of bread with butter along with my salad and a glass of Vinho Verde.  Perfect!

Julie