I met The Man!

Yesterday I attended a 3-hour class taught by Peter Reinhart at Sur La Table where Peter demonstrated several breads from his newest book, Peter Reinhart's Artisan Breads Every Day. The class was fun, I learned a lot of new techniques, and we had some fabulous, delicious breads. Sticky buns, yum!

Here are some pearls of wisdom that I learned from Peter:

• Baking is a balancing act between time, temperature, and ingredients.
• Garnish is important not just for appearance but also for flavor. After all, we eat first with our eyes.
• Sticky buns stick to your buns.
• Baking is an inexpensive hobby where even your mistakes are popular.
• Even Peter makes mistakes (his cinnamon rolls had started moving from the caramelized to the carbonized state)
  

On the more practical side of things, here are some additional baking tips that I learned that hopefully will improve my baking skills:

• When baking lean breads (e.g. French bread), any extra water remaining in the steam pan should be removed after 5 to 10 minutes.
• When a recipe calls for either butter or vegetable oil, go with oil; oil is functionally superior at providing fat content, has better value, and the taste difference is usually negligible. Save the butter for the topping where it really counts.
• Double pan (i.e. nesting pans) to protect breads like rolls from overcooking on the bottom.
• Cinnamon rolls that spring when slightly depressed are done.
• Mixing chocolate with butter helps keep the chocolate soft when the heated mixture cools.
• Shortening (e.g. butter) is called shortening because it shortens the gluten.
  

The class was a lot of fun and hopefully it will help me step up my game. Inspired by the sticky buns that Peter made, I decided to make some today. The kiddies loved them!