Knead of the hour

By: Sonal Ved   Date:  2012-03-11   Place: Mumbai

Dough is to bakes, what scripts are to movies. One can't be right without the other. Sonal Ved takes down notes as baking experts teach her how to make fresh dough for breads, pizzas and pastries at home The next time you bite into that homemade bread, which you picked up from a nearby deli, think twice. Is it really homemade? For all you know, it might be made from a premix. Most reputed bakeries and delis around the city rely on this magic potion to get that perfect bread, pie and an array of baking items. Chef Savio Fernandes from the Bombay Baking Company at JW Marriott Mumbai says, "Premix is a flour-based powder that is conditioned with the necessary enzymes that go into making a good bake." To explain its effectiveness in terms of bread making, he cites the example of Ciabatta (an Italian white bread made from wheat flour and yeast). "If you decide to make Ciabatta from scratch, then it can take you as long as five hours, whereas with a premix, you can finish the process within two hours," explains the pastry chef. There are many reasons why chefs rely on pre-mixed powders in commercial baking industries. Firstly, premixes are non-messy to work with and secondly they guarantee a foolproof result, which saves a lot of time and effort for a mass production industry. Also, "Mumbai's flour quality isn't exactly conducive to baking from scratch," explains Fernandes. Some bakers are also of the opinion that the humidity in the air affects the dough and prevents products from rising well. Yet there are some like Chef Viraf Patel who insists on making bakes from scratch at Caf © Zoe, his newly-opened restaurant. "If you regulate the temperature of your kitchen and control oven-conditions, then you can do without premixes," says Patel, who makes puff pastry, short crust pastry and dough for breads such as French loaf, dinner rolls, burger buns and multigrain, at his cafe. He likes to restrict the usage of premixes as they are not fully natural. For some, making bakes from scratch is a passion. Take for instance, Mumbai-based food blogger Nikhil Merchant (from nonchalantgourmand.com). "For me baking is a mentally satisfying activity. I like to put together a good bake -- right from binding the dough to waiting for it to rise in the oven," says Merchant. If you think that making fresh dough in the confines of your kitchen is a cumbersome process, then you are wrong. Experts show us how we can make freshly baked products without sweating it out. Basic bread (Recipe courtesy food blogger Nikhil Merchant) Food blogger Nikhil Merchant adds finishing touches to his basic bread recipe before popping it into the oven. Pic/ Pradeep Dhivar Ingredients: 1 1/2 cups plain flour (sieved) 25 gm active dry yeast 2 tsp honey or 1.5 tsp sugar 3/4 cup warm water 1 1/2 tsp salt 1 tbsp olive oil You can also make focaccia and crispy cheese sticks with a basic bread dough. PIC/ Pradeep Dhivar Method: * Heat water and pour it into a glass bowl. * Add honey/sugar and stir well. * Add the yeast and give it a brief stir. * Cover the mixture and let it sit for eight to 10 minutes. * Once the yeast is activated, add it to cup sifted flour and mix well. This is your 'starter dough'. Cover it with muslin cloth and let it rise. * Preheat the oven to 180 degree celsius. * Once the starter dough has risen, take another bowl, add the rest of the flour, salt and olive oil and mix it well. * Knead this dough evenly until you get a soft product. Ensure that there are no dry flour specks. * Cover the dough again with a wet muslin cloth and let it rise. * This should take around 30 to 60 minutes. * Once it has risen, punch it down and place it in a greased baking tray. Give it an egg/milk wash. * Bake the bread for 20 minutes or until the top is brown. Variations: * You can also make focaccia with the same dough. For this, skip the oil and the egg/milk wash. Instead, fold flat-rolled dough into half and fold it once again. Place this dough in your tin and spread it with the help of your fingertips. Top this with a powdered spice of your choice and bake it for 30 minutes. * Another option is crispy cheese sticks. Here roll out the dough into a thin sheet and layer it with cheese. Fold this into a tube and bake it. Dabble with your dough: "You can flavour your bread with herbs like thyme or marjoram, sea salt and pepper. For a garlic loaf, add garlic powder. Flat bread topped with some sundried tomatoes and chilli flakes also tastes good." Choux pastry (Recipe by baking expert Kiran Salaskar from Country Of Origin) Chef Kiran Salaskar pipes out the Choux pastry at his restaurant Country Of Origin. Pic/ Santosh Nagwekar Ingredients: 100 ml water 130 gm butter (at room temperature, cubed) 125 gm plain flour (sifted) 5 eggs (at room temperature) Vegetable oil to grease the tray Profiteroles with milk chocolates can be made from a Choux pastry dough. Pic/ Santosh Nagwekar Method: * In a saucepan, place the butter and pour in the water. Stir the mixture until it melts completely. This should take about three to four minutes. * Once the mixture comes to a boil, let it simmer on a low heat for about one to two minutes. * Remove from fire and let it cool for a minute. * Whisk the eggs in a separate bowl and add it to the flour mixture. * Beat the batter well with a wooden spoon and keep it aside. * Preheat the oven to 140 C. * Meanwhile, brush a baking tray with oil and fill up a piping bag with the flour batter. * With the help of a plain nozzle, line the tray with small dots or lines of the batter. * Brush the top of your pastry with a little whisked egg and bake it for 15 minutes. Variations: * Depending on how you shape the dough while piping it onto the tray, you can make several desserts. For Profiteroles (light Choux pastry balls filled with cream), pipe the dough in a swirl. For clairs (cream-filled oblong shaped pastry), pipe a straight line. Cheese lovers can add some cheese to the raw dough paste to make Goug re (a savoury Choux pastry) and pipe it as they like before baking. Dabble with your dough: "This is one of the most complicated doughs to make. It can be flavoured with dry herbs such as thyme, basil and chilli powder." Pizza dough (Recipe courtesy pastry chef Savio Fernandes, Bombay Baking Company, JW Marriott Mumbai) Chef Savio Fernandes of Bombay Baking Company rolls out the pizza dough.  PIC/ Nimesh Dave Ingredients: 1 kg flour 25 gm dry yeast 50 gm sugar 75 ml olive oil 20 gm salt 550 ml water Chef Savio with his creations - Three-pepper pizza, strawberry and fudge pizza and doughnuts, which he has made using a basic pizza dough. PIC/ Nimesh Dave Method: * Activate the yeast, as per the instructions given by the manufacturer and keep it aside. * On a large surface, place all the dry ingredients and make a well. * Pour all the wet ingredients in between and mix everything together. * Knead this into a soft dough and allow it to rest until the yeast starts acting. This should take around 30 minutes. * To make a pizza, roll out the dough into thin sheets and sprinkle it with some butter. * Half-bake the bread in an oven for about 10 minutes at 150 degree celsius and save it for use. Variations: * You can use this dough to make dessert pizza as well. For this, sprinkle sugar and extra butter on the fresh dough and bake it for 10 minutes. Remove from oven and layer it with chunks of chocolate. Re-bake it until the pizza looks crispy. Serve it with vanilla ice cream. * You can also experiment with doughnuts. Simply cut the dough with a doughnut cutter and deep fry it until golden. Top it with chocolate sauce and serve. Dabble with your dough: "Pizza dough is one of the easiest doughs to make at home. All you need is good quality flour and yeast. You can flavour it with ingredients such as garlic flakes, chilli flakes, dried parsley and kasuri methi." Short crust pastry (Recipe courtesy baking expert Kiran Salaskar from Country Of Origin) Chef Kiran Salaskar mixes the dough for Short crust pastry  at his restaurant Country Of Origin. Pic/ Santosh Nagwekar Ingredients: 200 gm plain flour 125 gm unsalted butter (chilled and finely chopped), 2 eggs 125 gm icing sugar A pinch of sea salt Short bread cookies with various fillings and toppings can be made with a short crust pastry dough.  Pic/ Santosh Nagwekar Method: * In a food processor, mix together flour, butter, sea salt and icing sugar and churn it until it begins to resemble breadcrumbs. * Whisk the eggs and add one tablespoon of chilled water. * Add this mixture to the flour and bind all the ingredients together. * Give the dough a final knead, wrap it in a plastic wrap and refrigerate it overnight. Variations: * Short crust pastry is very versatile. Fresh pastry dough can be used to line tart and pie moulds to make shells. Fill them with chocolate ganache or slices of banana and cream to make Chocolate tart or Banoffee pie, respectively. * You can also cut it with cookie cutters and bake it to make short bread cookies. Cheesecake lovers can powder these cookies to make a crumbly base for their cake. Dabble with your dough: "Short crust pastry is an important part of the baking repertoire. It can be used for a variety of sweet and savoury dishes. You can even flavour it with ingredients such as rosemary, vanilla and walnut powder."