The Quest For England – In Which I Make Bread

hello I’m Richard Vosges the baldExplorer and I’m on my quest for Englandand what could be more English thanmaking your own bread that’s what I’mgonna be doing today and I know ofcourse across the world people have beenmaking bread since I don’t know whateight thousand years ago something likethat I think bread making started in theMiddle East it’s certainly been atradition here in in England since theNeolithicwere discovering that they could mash upsome form of wheat and add it with yeastand create bread and that’s what I’mgoing to do and the thing is in thislockdown as I’m recording this we’resort of slowly getting I think and I’mhoping that this is the end of the lockdown from the Kovach 19 in 2020 I saythat because people may watch this videoin years hence and think what’s he onabout I think that a lot of people areturning to different crafts and skillsand one of the things that I’ve alwayswanted to be able to do and I’ve seenthat lots of people are doing this nowis baking bread and I think making breadfor yourself has got to be the mostprimeval skill that we should all knowhow to do it’s too easy just to go tothe supermarket and pick a loaf off theshelf far better to have a go now hereis my attempt my recent most recentattempt is a half of its gone alreadybecause it’s so delicious this isattempt number six actually it’s thefirst loaf that actually resembles aloaf of bread and I am so proud ofmyself I know that sounds silly andstupid but I really am and so the lovelyJulia who as you know is often in myvideos or there hasn’t been for a longtime because of the lockdown she wasvery impressed that I had managed tomake a loaf of bread I said to her Iwill make you a loaf so that’s what I’mgoing to do today and so this is muchmore about how I like to do things thismay not be the correct way makeout a complete muddle and them sorryJulia if what you get is a complete messbut I’m gonna have another go you’regonna have another go so what you needto make some bread I’m there’s plenty ofvideos out there which will demonstratethis far far better so this is moreabout my philosophy and the approach I’mhaving about making Brit and how I’mgoing to bake it we’ll see that in amoment so just to run quickly by thebasic ingredients so that you if you’rethinking about it you might think ohactually I could do this think the mostimportant lesson that I have learned isthat you need strong white flour orbread flour that ordinary plain flour orself-raising flour is not the rightstuff you’ve got to use that this strongwhite flour because apparently that’sgot the best glutens in it which reallyhelp the that the bread rise and sothat’s very important we’re also goingto need yeast that’s the other secondvery important ingredient the first twoattempts I made with my bread nothinghappened it didn’t rise and it wasbecause the yeast I was using was out ofdate and had died so make sure it’sfresh yeast this one is dried yeast butit’s it’s working and another tip keepit in the fridge once you’ve opened itseems to seems to give the thing a lotof life we need a bowl obviously to mixeverything up we’re going to need somesalt we’re going to need some warm waterand ultimately once it’s all togetherwe’re gonna need a tin to put it in andI’ve got a little bit of baking paper inthere to help me so I don’t have to keepgreasing the tin so that’s really allthe ingredients and bits and pieces thatyou need you have to leave the bread toprove and it then rises and then westick it in the oven so I’m just goingto now very quickly knock this locktogether and we’ll take it to the nextstep so what I’ve done is so far I’veput in 500 grams of flour into the bowlI’ve then followed that up with theyeast which I’ve got seven gramsdown for the quantity for this and thatgoes into the bowl sugar is next adjusta teaspoon of castor sugar sprinkled inand then of course some salt now I’vegot one and a half teaspoons now I knowthere are official measurements for allthis so I’m kind of using a spoon hereto get a vague idea of what 1 and 1/2 iswhich is something like probablysomething like that again that that goesand sprinkles in then we’re going to mixthe whole thing together and it just mixall these are all the dry ingredientsand we just mixed them mix them well andtruly all the way in so that that’s themost important thing now of course onething I should have mentioned is it’sworth pulling up your sleeves at thispoint because the next bit gets gloopyand mucky so the next bit is I’ve got300 millimeters of warm water it’s thewarm water that activates the yeast andthen the yeast starts to make the breadrise because we have to do what they Ihave learnt is called proof the restreprove the dough we’ve got to make thedough so the next part is very gloopyand I’m gonna get my hands all coveredin the yuck so here we go it’s justgoing to pour this in and as I pour itin I’m going to keep one hand going nowI am a novice I’m not a master of this Ido not know if there are better ways ofdoing this and I’m sure there are andthere will be professionals possibly orpeople who make this all the timewatching me and thinking oh Richardyou’re doing this completely wrong as Isay this is number seven of my loaves sohowever that number six has been myfirst successful one and I’m just goingto see if I can repeat the process sothis is nearly done get all of thispretty much in are just gauging howsticky it is in case I have enough ornot too much of the water and it’sslowly going in well actually that isthat is a lot and now the other handcomes in and we make it much more intodoh and away we go so the next part isto now once you’ve got it all mixed upis to start to knead it now I don’t knowhow you need it professionally but fromwhat I gather is you just continuallyturn it in like this and place it onitself it should be sticky not tacky oris it the other way around tacky but notsticky anyway whichever way as you cansee it’s not really sticking to my handsnow and I’m just needing this into anice dough and just keep keep this goingand the point of this is that it’sstarting to activate the yeast and Ithink it’s getting rid of all the airbubbles which you don’t want at thisstage and we just keep kneading this butfor 15 minutes it takes eventually thebread is readyonce you’ve kneaded it and what I gatherif you make it into a nice round ballthis is what I did before like this andwhat it’s got to do it’s got to provewhich means the yeast is going to do itswork and it’s going to expand and it’sgoing to do this twice so it’s going toexpand and then you knead it againyou knock it back as they call it youknead it a bit more and then you againlet it stand and then eventually you getto put it in the tin I’ve lost the tinnow here it is it sits in the tin andthen when it’s ready it goes into theoven and then it bakes for about 20minutes I think and then a little bitlonger on a slightly reduced heat sothat’s that’s really the process I meanI’m not this is you know not necessarilya complete demonstration of how to makebread as I say but I’m going to put itinto this dish but I’m advised tolightly oil it so a little bit of oilgoes in there tiny a little bit of oiljust so it doesn’t stick I suppose soI’m just going to mix that round andonce that’s done that sits in here quitenicely like so put a a tea towel over itand keep it in a warm place now it’s abit of a cold day today I haven’t got anairing cupboard so I’m going to light myse and that’s going to keep it warm it’ssome time later yes I’ve been busy sothe last time we left you we put thedough to prove and then and actually theSun came out so I thought the best thingto do was to put it on the windowsill inmy front room so I put it on there fortwo hours and what started as a smallthing in the bowl over two hours itbegan to rise and quite a monsteractually I was quite surprised so thatwas that was great then what you have todo is you knock it back so then youbring it back and you pummel it again orrather you need it but only for a coupleof minutes it’s just really to knock outthe air and then you do exactly the samecover it with a tea towel put it backinto a warm place and leave it for afurther hour which I did and then itcame back again rose up just similarsort of size you knock it back one moretime and then you put it into the tinwhich is what I’ve done I then went litthe SE and the SE is about an hour agoactually so it gets the kitchen nice andwarm but also of course it gets the ovennice and warm which is the essentialthing and then over this next hour thebread is starting to rise for the lasttime and it’s sitting here looking verynice so here we go it’s beautifullyrisen and I’ve just scald it along thetop actually not brilliantly but I’mhoping that won’t matter inside the ovenI’ve also put justsmall amount of water in a dish just tomake a bit of steam in the oven I’m toldthat that will just soften it so itdoesn’t go to crusty so I haven’t donethat before on this successful attemptbut we’re going to bang it in now forabout 20 minutes and then I’m going tohave to reduce the temperature in theoven because it’s quite hot so in itgoes like that but actually before itgoes any further I’m going to take thattop tray out because that is gonna crushit it’s now time to take it out of theoven and what I’ve done is I’ve taken itout when I thought it was pretty muchdone I’ve turned it upside down so thatI could just guarantee that the bottomwas cooked as well and to for me toreduce the heat in the oven I actuallyhave to open the door a little fractionunless I hit some of the heat outbecause you can’t just turn it downobviously you can stop putting fuel inbut it does take a bit of time so I’veput it back the right way round just fora last little blast it’s so difficult toknow if it’s actually cooked I won’tknow till Julia tells me so let’s get itout and there it is in the oven it’slooking absolutely amazing and I almostdon’t want to go and give it to her nowit’s it’s so nice I want it for myselfbut here it is this is it and it looksand smells deliciousI must shut there cuz that’s so hot sonow what I’m going to do is put it upthere I’m going to take it out the tinand just rest it above the top give it amoment to cool down I shall then with itover to Julia’s obviously with the Covadistance I’ll just leave it outside andshe can take it so thanks so much forwatching don’t forget to follow like andsubscribe all the usual stuff give me athumbs up if you’ve enjoyed the episodeand I’ll see you on the next one untilnext time thanks for watchingbye-bye bye-bye