DB Challenge #1 – French Bread

 

Well this month, I’m lucky to call myself a Daring Baker.  I was so excited to become a part of this group!  Then I got notice of my first challenge… Julia Child’s French Bread.  Well I would say this was a challenge indeed.  This was only my second time working with yeast.  I was extremely nervous!  And then I printed out the 14 page recipe and got a little more nervous.  (You can find there here). 

It went a lot better than I thought.  I knew it would all be ok when my little ball of dough came out of the mixer and was ready for its first rise.  It looked so smooth and perfect.

The first two rises went fine… took a little long, but were fine.  My friend, Nina hooked me up with some tips since my house was a little cold and the rises went off without a hitch.  When it came time to form the loaves, I got nervous again.  I didn’t have a canvas, but I used my Viking cooking class apron.  It worked out fine. 

Is that wine in the background?  Hmm, how did that get there?  Achem, anyway…they rose once again and were ready to be unmolded.  Yay for a pizza box hubs hadn’t brought out for recycling. 

One of these things is not like the other…can you tell which one I did first?  I can .  Into the oven those little puppies went.  I really wish I brushed them so they could be all goldilocks and whatnot, but I didn’t, so…they were albino, but still looking cute.

This is the part when I got really cocky and proud.  (and perhaps opened a bottle of wine…note the corkscrew and cork…hmm?)  My babies cooled before their photo shoot and then struck a mean pose:

So there you have it.  First challenge a success.  I learned I could do something I never thought I would do, and hey, that’s the whole point of Daring Bakers, right?  So thanks a bunch to Mary and Sara for pushing me to my baking limits!  I can’t wait to see what’s in store for March! 

Oh yeah, and check out all those other beautiful loaves on the Daring Baker’s Blogroll!