Baking with Yeast - who does this??? About This Page:

[Desurae]

I bake bread for the family about three times a week. Basic sandwich bread, dinner rolls, french bread, etc..... Like everyone else said, once you get used to it you find all the lovely ways to make it a little easier. I love doing it and I have no problem with it taking all day.

[wheatenwalker]

The bread sounds good, I make bread sometimes but I use the no knead recipes that my brother gave me-
And I dont do that all that often either--
Wegmans Placek is the only I ever had and it was awesome- homemade must be even better

[Huntermom]

I used to bake all our breads when my kids were young and I worked very part time. While the process took some time, most of it was waiting-not cooking. When I was home most every day it was easy. The bread could rise while I was doing laundry, working at home, reading to the kids, etc. I think the hard part of yeast baking is when you are working and can't be home all day.

I, too, only used "quick yeast" and learned to skip steps, like scalding and waiting. I also it was important to not over flour. It you can work with a somewhat sticky dough, you will get a lighter bread.

[Dave Marx]

For me, it's not plazcek, but challah. Every culture seems to have a traditional bread, and everyone of those traditional breads seems to be hard-to-make.

It's useful to remember that yeast is a living thing, and like all living things (aquariums full of fish, vegetable gardens, children, etc.), they have to be understood and nurtured to come out right. We actually have an easier time of this than our ancestors (let's say, going back before the days of Louis Pasteur in the mid-1800s). Before yeast was isolated as a living organism and sold in packages, there was relatively little home baking at all. Commercial bakers had the know-how and tools. So, great-great-great grandma probably never baked plazcek (or challah). "Ethnic" baking is something that is a fairly American thing, with immigrant families trying to recapture a taste of the old country. If there wasn't a local ethnic bakery, then grandma would take a crack at it herself.

My grandmother's challah recipe called for old-fashioned compressed yeast, which was very much a living thing. Proofing the yeast in advance was essential, to make sure it hadn't died. Until I adapted her recipe to use dry yeast (consider it to be yeast in suspended animation), I would buy two cakes of compressed yeast, each with either a different maker or a different expiration date (always have a "Plan B"). When we "proof" dry yeast, it's essentially to wake it from suspended animation and give it a good meal before adding it to dough. About the only time that dry yeast is "dead" is if it's really old, or we do something to kill it.

Back in my grandmother's grandmother's day, yeast was captured "live" in the air by the baker (leaving the dough out on the counter). "Sourdough" was probably the most widespread method of baking leavened bread - the baker saves a bit of unbaked dough (containing live yeast), and uses that dough's existing yeast population to "start" the following day's batch of dough. One reason there are so many different ethnic breads is due to the number of wild yeasts around the world. Now, with "standardized" yeast, the old-fashioned results are simulated by changing other parts of the bread making process.

[lukeandbrookesmom]

In the colder months I bake breads with yeast almost every weekend. I'll make a few loaves at a time for the upcoming week. In the warmer months maybe once a month or so.

[Danielle Harmon]

Originally Posted by Dave Marx

For me, it's not plazcek, but challah. Every culture seems to have a traditional bread, and everyone of those traditional breads seems to be hard-to-make.

Foccacia here. You have to get it just right...and homemade is so much better!

[graygables]

Originally Posted by Dave Marx

Back in my grandmother's grandmother's day, yeast was captured "live" in the air by the baker (leaving the dough out on the counter). "Sourdough" was probably the most widespread method of baking leavened bread - the baker saves a bit of unbaked dough (containing live yeast), and uses that dough's existing yeast population to "start" the following day's batch of dough. One reason there are so many different ethnic breads is due to the number of wild yeasts around the world. Now, with "standardized" yeast, the old-fashioned results are simulated by changing other parts of the bread making process.

This is interesting...before I did my kitchen addition, bread never needed as much yeast as a recipe called for and someone told me that it was b/c of the level of yeast spores that had built up over the years of my DGMIL baking in the same room. I didn't buy into it, but after the addition, I needed a full 1/8-1/4tsp more per batch for awhile. After frequent baking, the amount went back down again (I have the crossed out numbers on my recipe card )

[wheatenwalker]

There are sourdough starter resipes that call for NO yeast- just what spores are in the air- never tried it though