This simple, fast-rising recipe incorporates some semolina flour which is not traditional but gives this loaf a bit more “tooth”, meaning it’s soft and light but not Wonder Bread fluffy.
12 1/2 ounces (2 1/2 cups) bread flour
5 1/2 ounces (1 cup) semolina flour
2 tablespoons sugar
2 1/4 teaspoons instant yeast
1 1/2 teaspoons salt
12 ounces (1 1/2 cups) milk or water if you prefer, room temperature
1 1/2 ounces (3 tablespoons) soft butter
I thought you’d never ask, reader Ellie! It’s called a “Pullman” pan because here in the States these square, crustless loaves were most often associated with the legendary Pullman rail cars. Not only did the soft, perfectly shaped slices match the Pullman company’s elegant style, the stackable loaves were great for dining car kitchens where […]
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It’s nothing more than a straight-sided loaf pan with a lid on it. It yields a loaf of bread with perfectly flat sides all the way around and perfectly square corners. What good is that you say? Well granted it’s an aesthetic thing mostly. A perfectly square loaf — as seen from the ends — yields perfectly square pieces of sandwich bread and pieces of toast. That’s great for us uptight types who like our foods neat.
READ ONOh yes, mine needs a workout, kids. And some nice soul-baking will be a breath of fresh air after so much fussing with cannelés (though as I said, that project is continuing). We’ll do some pain de mie, sausage in brioche…who knows what I’ll get up to. Because comfort, friends, is what I need.
READ ONLast week’s post about acoustic music (Colombia’s Monsieur Periné and the American Texas swing trio Hot Club of Cowtown) was well received, and in fact several readers wrote in asking for more recommendations on contemporary acoustic, non-rock ensembles. Exciting alternatives to alternative rock and pop music abound these days, especially and including Mumford & Sons, whose modern-day sea chanties have taken the alternative rock scene by, er, storm. Red Baraat, a Brooklyn-based pan-Asian, acoustic funk band
READ ONQuite a bit I think. On the one hand I’m learning what I like and I don’t like in a cannelé. On the other I’m learning what a cannelé actually is. It’s not a “cake” as it’s often described. Rather it’s either a very eggy candy or a very, very sweet custard. I lean toward the latter interpretation, as it explains why so many of my attempts before I tried the Malgieri recipe look and taste like broken, collapsed, syrupy custard pie. It also explains why the Malgieri version, which includes an egg tempering step, produces a cannelé with a consistent interior texture.
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Well now this is more like it! These don’t have the shiny finish I want and I didn’t take photos of the process, so I’ll need to do another batch…which might take me a couple of days now that I think about it. But heck, I can always move on to another topic in the meantime. Suffice to say…thanks, Nick! That formula is a winner…and not difficult to do.
Oh man I need a drink. This has been a long week!
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I had higher hopes for the Hermé recipe I have to say. I wasn’t expecting perfection by any means, just something a little closer to the open crumb that I’m after. I do wonder if differences in the base ingredients aren’t part of the explanation, particularly the flour. As I’ve noted many times in this space, European gluten is plastic while ours is elastic. That elasticity might explain some of the spring-back I’ve gotten the last couple of tries. Anyway, it’s funny that my first attempt is the best of the bunch so far, but there are more coming today. Let’s see how the Malgieri recipe bakes up. They’re in the oven now!
READ ONAnd now for something completely different. This recipe calls for sugar as well as sweetened condensed milk. Considering how sweet Hermé’s recipe is, I’m starting to see that successful cannelés may well fall into the realm of confectionery rather than pastry. I’ll make these at the same time as the below recipe in order to speed up the testing process.
16 ounces (2 1/4 cups) sugar
8.25 ounces (1 2/3 cups) unbleached, all-purpose flour
14 ounces (1 can) sweetened condensed milk
3 eggs
2 egg yolks
2 1/2 ounces (5 tablespoons) dark rum
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
18 ounces (2 1/2 cups) water
2 ounces ( 1/2 stick) butter
1.25 ounces (1/2 cup) nonfat dry milk
I’ll be curious to give these a try. They’re very sweet, but then even less sweet cannelés are quite sweet. As a note I should say that this recipe was written for a convection oven (50 minutes at 350 degrees), which I don’t own, so I fiddled with the baking temps and times in an effort to compensate for that.
16 ounces (2 cups) milk
1 vanilla bean
1.75 ounces (3 1/2 tablespoons) melted butter
8.75 ounces (2 cups, 3 tablespoons) powdered sugar, sifted
2 egg yolks
2 eggs
3.5 ounces (2/3 cup) all-purpose flour, sifted
1/2 ounce (1 tablespoon) dark rum