Easy Bread | Judith Fertig
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Intro: Welcome to the number one cookbook podcast, Cookery by the Book with Suzy Chase. She's just a home cook in New York City sitting at her dining room table, talking to cookbook authors.
Judith Fertig: I'm Judith Fertig, and my latest cookbook is Easy Bread: 100 No-Knead Recipes, and it really is easy
Suzy Chase: Before diving into this book. I'd like to thank my new sponsor Bloomist. Bloomist creates and curates simple, sustainable products that inspire you to design a calm, natural refuge at home. I'm excited to announce they've just introduced a new tabletop and kitchen collection that's truly stunning. Visit bloomist.com, and use the code cookery20 to get 20% off your first purchase, or click the link in the show notes. Now on with the show. Before we chat about the cookbook, I want to talk to you about how long we've known each other. I think it's been since the early Nineties, I was working as a cookbook publicist at Karen Adler's Pig Out Publications, Two Lane Press, and that's where I met you. You are quite the epic cookbook author. Now how many cookbooks have you put out?
Judith Fertig: It's over 20.
Suzy Chase: Oh my God.
Judith Fertig: So I've been at this for quite a while.
Suzy Chase: And how many novels?
Judith Fertig: I'm actually working on my third. I have two that are published by Berkeley, an imprint of Penguin Random House. And this will be the third.
Suzy Chase: So I must credit Karen Adler for my love and curiosity of cookbooks. I would not have this podcast without her, and she was a real trailblazer for women in the cookbook publishing industry. And you both together were trailblazers in the cookbook and barbecue world. And you guys were competing in barbecue competitions back when there weren't very many women in it, right?
Judith Fertig: Right, and we were kind of unusual, in that we were women in barbecue. And we had to find our niche in that. So we weren't going to be hauling around giant slabs of meat, and a whole hog and all that. So we specialized more in kind of the finesse things with barbecues, such as fish and vegetables, and we still did meat and all that. But we would pay like a great steak with a Bearnaise sauce that you don't often see in barbecue books.
Suzy Chase: So I also have to mention that time when you, Karen and I went to the IACP, International Association of Culinary Professionals, say that three times fast, their conference in San Antonio. And I think it was like 1990. I remember I thought it was out of this world to see Julia Child there in person. And you and Karen were like, oh, it's Julia. Like you guys knew her for so long. And she was an old friend.
Judith Fertig: Yeah, she came to Kansas City. And Karen and I, for different events, and Karen and I both had a chance to sit next to her. And we found it hard to talk to this icon, but we did. We chatted with Julia, and she had such a great sense of humor when I was first married. And I was in my twenties, I bought a Julia Child cookbook and I did a chapter a week. And so that was of course before blogging, or I could have been Judith and Julia, but that's another story.
Suzy Chase: You were so ahead of your time.
Judith Fertig: Well maybe, maybe so.
Suzy Chase: So on to bread, I feel like everyone was pandemic bread baking, except me. Bread seemed so stressful on top of everything that was already stressful. So when I saw that you made a cookbook called Easy Bread, I wanted to see what it was all about. And you say, if we can make a batch of brownies from a box mix, we are ready for easy bread, the Judith Fertig way.
Judith Fertig: I didn't come from a family of bread bakers. Yes, I should say my great-grandfather during the Depression had turned his home into a bakery, but the proceeding generations after that had kind of lost that. So I sort of came to this as a novice, and the book sort of unfolds. You do the most simple thing with four ingredients, and by the end of it, you could be my making croissants. And so you learn something gradually, of course you can skip chapters, but it is easy. And once you've mastered like a certain method or a certain technique, you can go on to the next, and they're easy to do.
Suzy Chase: On page 11 you wrote, "so relax, just follow the steps and you're on your way to your first boule or a baguette." I like that this cookbook is in steps, steps that are simple and clear.
Judith Fertig: In my own process of learning how to make bread, what are some of the things that are touch points or that there are ways to go wrong? So the first one is of course measuring the flour. Today people could have a kitchen scale and measure the flower, but then you have to go out and buy a kitchen scale and you have to get the batteries for the kitchen scale. And if you're an advanced bread baker, you would probably do that. This is for people that are starting out. So you don't need a kitchen scale, you just have to measure properly, and that's easy too. You just take a measuring cup, and put it in the bag, or canister of flour, and dump it into another measuring cup. So I actually measured this in my kitchen to see what would happen if you just dumped the measuring cup into the bag, and dump the rest of it into the bowl. And you actually end up with a couple extra ounces of flour, and that makes a heavy bread. So just by measuring correctly with this method, you're on your way to good bread.
Judith Fertig: And then the another one is the yeast. So when if you read traditional bread baking recipes, it always says to activate the yeast with a little sugar and a little water. It's going to bubble, or it's going to turn creamy or whatever it is. And sure enough, when you try to do it yourself, that's not what happened. The yeast doesn't bubble. It seems to foam, or it's not beige, it's gray. When you're trying to make bread for the first time, it causes tension. So just don't use that kind of yeast use instant or bread machine yeast. And you just put that right in the flour, so that's easy.
Suzy Chase: You start things off with three pointers for success, for all our breads, what are those? And those are on page 11.
Judith Fertig: Yeah, the first one is measuring correctly, that we just talked about. And the second one is water. You want to make sure that the water that you add to the flour and the yeast is the proper temperature. You want it to be lukewarm. So one person's lukewarm might be another person's hot, so you don't want to start off by killing the yeast with water that's too hot. And too hot is 130 degrees Fahrenheit. So if you use an instant read thermometer, just the first time you make bread, and you just make sure your water is under 130 degrees, you're going to be fine. But the easiest way to do that is to do half hot, half cold water. Then you've got lukewarm right there.
Suzy Chase: That's funny, because I was thinking about this in this cookbook. Because on Instagram it looks like everyone is an expert baker, and I literally thought I was the last person who really didn't have my together around bread. So I just love that you put this cookbook out for people like me.
Judith Fertig: Yeah. And then the last point for success with bread is if you read traditional recipes, it says after the bread is baked, how do you know it's done? And they suggest thumping or tapping or whatever. But when you thump it, it never sounds the same when you tap it. It never sounds the same. So how do you really know? And I say, take the temperature of the bread so you can use your same instant read thermometer, insert it in the center of the loaf. And if it registers 190 degrees Fahrenheit, your bread is done. So you don't have to wonder, you don't have to guess. You don't have to hope. You just know. And that's easy.
Suzy Chase: For your easy artisan dough, you recommend a Danish Dough Whisk, which I had never heard of. Talk a little bit about the whisk, and how did this get on your radar?
Judith Fertig: I think it was at a cooking class, and I saw somebody use it. And I thought that looks great because I have a lot of different kitchen gadgets. I have a stand mixer. I have Cuisinart, I have the whole thing. But sometimes if I don't have to use all that equipment, I am very happy. And this Danish dough whisk it's not like a regular hand whisk, it has a long wooden handle. And on the business end of it is a thick wire whisk attachment that looks like a big mitten. And what this does is it allows you to mix the dough by hand, and clear the sides of the bowl. And so I use this for when I'm making anything that I don't want to get the mixer out for, and it does a great job. So this has become one of my kitchen tools. My one of my favorite ones, and I spread the gospel of the Danish dough whisk.
Suzy Chase: What are some variations of the easy artisan dough?
Judith Fertig: Oh there are a ton of variations all through the book. So there's the first chapter, which just has the four ingredients with the flour, the yeast, the water, and a little bit of salt. And then the next chapter you go in, you might change the liquid. Maybe you're going to use buttermilk, and you can make shaker buttermilk bread, which is fabulous in the winter. You might add beer, you might add pumpkin or butternut squash puree. And then another chapter you might learn how to knead dry ingredients into the dough, like spices or herbs or Kalamata olives, or something like that. So you can flavor breads as you go. So each chapter you learn how to do a different thing, so you feel quite accomplished.
Suzy Chase: So on page 21, you have characteristics of easy artisan dough. And I love how you give us this extra information. What are the three c's of artisan bread?
Judith Fertig: Well, the first one is color and this comes from the crust. Through this book, you learn how to get various crust colors, and various crumbs, and various textures and all that. But the first one is the crust. This bread bakes set a higher temperature. And so in order to get the darkened and the crisp crust, you need to have a little moisture with that. So you can either use a boiler pan of hot water, of boiling water underneath where the bread is baking. Or another technique you can spray the top of the loaf before you put it in the oven, so that's going to give you a dark crust. The second one is crumb. So the first chapter you're going to get a bread with what's called a custard crumb. So it's kind of a close, very moist crumb.
Judith Fertig: But if you really hanker for a baguette, kind of like you would get at a bakery in Paris, you want more of a slow rise dough. So you kind of do the same thing, only you let the dough rise. You put in less yeast, you put in a bit of starter and you let the dough rise very, very, very slowly. So then you get that honeycomb crumb that you expect when you get a baguette at a French bakery. So you get different kinds of crumbs depending on the method and the type of bread that it is. So whether it's regular artisan bread, or slow rise, or a sweet dough you don't want a softer crumb, if you're going to make a challah or a Danish pastry. So it's you learn how to do that throughout the book.
Judith Fertig: And the last thing is color. And so every loaf is going to be sort of a different color. It depends if you add pumpkin puree, or there's a gluten free chapter in which you can make a sort of a rye bread without the rye flour. And actually the flavor in rye bread comes from caraway seed and of all things, cocoa powder to give it that dark color. You can buy gluten free bread now, but you can't always rye bread. So this is a great take on gluten free rib bread.
Suzy Chase: So at the back of the cookbook, you have something called the artisan pantry. Can you talk a little bit about that?
Judith Fertig: Another thing I really like about it is once you start and you've got the technique down pat, and you go through the different chapters and you think, oh I would like to make Danish pastry. And I would like to make a croissant, but I want to change out the filling, or I want to change out the frosting. These are different add-ons or add-tos that you could plug into that particular recipe. So there's almond paste that you can make, or there are different icings that you can make. And fillings and frostings and caramelized onions. With the first chapter, with the easy artisan dough, with the four ingredients, you could have a bowl of that ready in your refrigerator. And when people come over, maybe unexpectedly, I try not to have friends like that, but...
Suzy Chase: Call before you come.
Judith Fertig: Yeah. Call before you come. So you can spread the dough out into a baking sheet and top it with something. If you've got caramelized onions on hand, or pesto, or whatever. And then top it with cheese or some other thing, and you've got instant casual meal or cut it into small pieces and you've got instant appetizer. So the last chapter of the artisan pantry helps you have some of those ingredients on hand.
Suzy Chase: There were so many light bulb moments for me in this cookbook, and one of them is your easy caramelized onions. And hold onto your hat, I had never thought about doing them in a slow cooker.
Judith Fertig: I learned this from two other Kansas City women who specialized in the crock pot. They worked in the Rival test kitchen for a while. Roxanne Wyss and Kathy Moore, that was my light bulb moment with them. I thought, wow, this is great. But my favorite thing is the butter. You can make artisan homemade butter in your food processor. If you give a loaf of bread and your homemade butter as a gift during the holidays or after, people think you slaved all day with the butter churn in the corner of your house. And you've actually just added cream to the food processor and let it go.
Suzy Chase: What tips do you have for a first time boule baker? And what if we don't have baking stone, asking for a friend.
Judith Fertig: I love those friends. The purpose of the baking stone is to create an even baking field in your oven. Because most people think if you set the temperature in your oven to 400, it's going to be 400 in every spot of your oven and it will not be. So if you have a baking stone or some other heavy thing, like a cast iron skillet, for example, that's a guarantee that that surface will be the temperature that you want it to be. So you could bake your boule, like the Jim Lahey method. You can bake your boule in a cast iron skillet and it'll turn out great.
Suzy Chase: Okay, I'm going to use my skillet. I mean, I'm going to tell my friend to use her skillet.
Judith Fertig: Yeah. Use your skillet. Especially if you have a small apartment, and you have a small oven. Then use the skillet works out great. And then when you bake, we encourage you to wrinkle corn meal into the baking surface. They act like little ball bearings that helps the loaf kind of scoot along where it needs to go.
Suzy Chase: Now to my segment called Dream Dinner Party, where I ask you who you most want to invite to your dream dinner party and why. And for this segment, it can only be one person.
Judith Fertig: I would ask one of your most celebrated subjects for your podcast, Nigella Lawson. And I think she would be first of all, a lot of fun. And she would not be critical of your food. It's always nerve wracking to invite somebody who's really good at cooking to a party that you do. Because sure enough, something you're going to take the pie out of the oven, and part of it falls or whatever. But I think she would be very forgiving because she's self-taught cook. I think she would be a lot of fun and have a lot of stories, and be very appreciative of your food.
Suzy Chase: Where can we find you on the web and social media?
Judith Fertig: So it's judithfertig.com. @JudithFertig on Instagram, Judith Fertig Author on Facebook.
Suzy Chase: To purchase Easy Bread and support the podcast, head on over to cookerybythebook.com. And thanks Judith for coming on Cookery by the Book podcast.
Judith Fertig: Thanks so much, Suzy. It's great to talk to you again.
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