Success bread and fail pretzels

I made some baguettes as a test run for a party we'll eventually be throwing.  This was my first time making baguettes.  They're delicate, require time and patience, and don't respond well to improvisation.  So they're basically the antithesis of my baking style.

Nonetheless, I rolled out of bed by the crack of noon and had dough ready and rising by one.  The recipe called for it to triple in size during both the first and second rising.  Exciting!

We left the house during the first rising, so when I got back it looked amazing.  (Leaving the house is the only way I can resist poking it every ten minutes.)  Check out that gluten structure!

Six people for dinner, so I cut it into six pieces.  Then they rest for a few minutes and the shaping begins.

Check out that mat!  It's a brand new silicone rolling mat that I got so I can have a large, clean surface to knead on.  The nonstick is helpful, and I have no qualms about covering the entire thing with flour and dough.  I'm pretty unreasonably stoked about this purchase.

Left to rest, then rolled out and set to double in size again.  Covered with only a light napkin so they can get some air and form a light crust.

Before

And after!

Check out that crust!

And that crumb!

Bonus chocolate shapes

They bake for 25 minutes in a 450F oven full of steam.  Turns out keeping the oven at 450F brings our induction stove to its knees and makes Greg and Nathan sad when they are both trying to boost dishes for dinner at the same time.

The bread became Vietnamese sandwiches and tomorrow's breakfast.  I'm really happy with how it turned out--I've rarely made anything this delicate before.

I also decided to try out making chocolate decorations, mostly because I wanted to do some fancy stuff with icing and I don't actually like iced cookies.  Turns out you can just melt chocolate on the stove and pipe it like icing onto parchment paper to make cool shapes.  And that's super easy to do, so I definitely didn't 1) melt a silicone spatula and not notice for five minutes of chocolate stirring and 2) burn chocolate in a pan when I forgot to turn the stove off.

My next project was pretzels for a coworker's birthday.  Same recipe as last time, same lye, same oven, same bowl for the lye, same baking sheets...but I forgot the salt and I used a different brand of parchment paper and the pretzels stuck to the paper just about permanently and etched the cookie sheet through the parchment paper.  Basically everything is terrible about them.  It's probably the end of the world.  I'm not sure I can ever bake anything again.

Awful.

Anyway, I think they'll still be tasty in the morning, and Adem got some photos with his nice camera while I was making them, so I'll upload those when I get them.  The chocolate is tasty and amusing (Claire made the pretty patterns, I made the hedgehogs and fancy letters) and the bread was just plain excellent.  On balance I'll call it a success.