Fromartz - In search of the perfect loaf: a home bakers odyssey

Praise for In Search of the Perfect Loaf

In Search of the Perfect Loaf is really the best kind of reada quest for true bread enriched by research, knowledge, and pleasure. The passion Sam Fromartz brings to this journey is incredible and infectious. Fromartz is generous in sharing his baking intel, but the real recipe for delicious bread, we learn, begins long before the kitchen. This book will change the way you look at bread.

Dan Barber, co-owner/executive chef of Blue Hill and Blue Hill at Stone Barns and author of The Third Plate

In his search for the holy grail of baguettes, Sam Fromartz has beautifully captured the joys, loneliness, frustrations, and rewards of his bread-making journey. And, wonderfully for us, he shares both the life and baking lessons learned from the many amazing people he met along the way. You will want to bake from this book.

Peter Reinhart, author of The Bread Bakers Apprentice and Bread Revolution

This book makes the reader reexamine a subject truly overlooked: the culture of the baker and, in particular, of bread. Through his quixotic quest to find and learn how to make the perfect bread, Sam Fromartz brings us into the bakery and illustrates and captures the essence of what bread culture is. It is an exquisite work, written with passion and expertise. With many of the stories, Fromartz helps the reader understand the mind of the baker. He himself is truly obsessed, and this book is ideal for anyone wishing to further their knowledge of the subject of what craft or artisan baking is and ought to be. He presents, through the lives and stories of other practitioners of the craft, a future for bread that is both meaningful and dignified.

Jim Lahey, owner/founder of Sullivan Street Bakery and author of My Bread

If you love great bread, you will love this book! Inside, Sam shares his journey in search for the perfect loaf, baking with some of the most inspirational and leading bakers of our time. From Paris to Berlin to Marienthal, Kansas, we follow Sam on his quest as he shares his love for great bread and the baking secrets he learned along the way. I read this book with my favorite music in the background, in my most comfortable chair, a glass of wine in hand, and a rustic loaf of bread.

Daniel Leader, founder of Bread Alone Bakery and author of Bread Alone: Bold Fresh Loaves from Your Own Hands

Great bread is one of lifes simple pleasures, and this book captures so much of what is inspiring in the realm of bread baking right now. From California to Berlin, we meet passionate, committed bakers, and see how Sam translates their craft to the home kitchen. Bread geeks will love it, but so too will those wondering about all weve lost in our daily breadand what we might recapture.

Heidi Swanson, author of Super Natural Every Day

Fromartz is a passionate, deeply serious home baker who writes eloquently and gracefully about what it takes in skill and ingredients to produce a delicious baguette or country loaf. His account of the history and comeback of heritage wheat grains is a revelation that will send even the most gluten-phobic reader to search for breads made from them. In Search of the Perfect Loaf is a lovely booka perfect read for anyone who cares about good food.

Marion Nestle, professor of nutrition, food studies, and public health at New York University and author of Eat, Drink, Vote: An Illustrated Guide to Food Politics

Fromartz has managed to elevate the humble loaf of bread into a riveting tale of history, passion, and practical technique along with a rare glimpse into the workings of early morning bakeries from Paris to Berlin to San Francisco. You wont look at bread the same way again.

Kathleen Flinn, author of The Sharper Your Knife, the Less You Cry and Burnt Toast Makes You Sing Good

[A] fun and informative memoir [that] provides a fascinating miniature course on the techniques involved in making different varieties... baking methods used by our ancestors... and even a little history on grains and practices dating back to the Fertile Crescent.

Publishers Weekly

For Nina

In memory of two bread lovers:

Bernard Fromartz (19172004)

and

Sol Yurick (19252013)

Oh, they took something beautiful

Straightened the curves and they filled in the cracks

Til it was unrecognizable

They shined it, refined it

Until they could see their own reflection

It could only be death by perfection

Death by Perfection, by Maia Sharp and Georgia Middleman

VIKING

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First published by Viking Penguin, a member of Penguin Group (USA) LLC, 2014

Copyright 2014 by Samuel Fromartz

Penguin supports copyright. Copyright fuels creativity, encourages diverse voices, promotes free speech, and creates a vibrant culture. Thank you for buying an authorized edition of this book and for complying with copyright laws by not reproducing, scanning, or distributing any part of it in any form without permission. You are supporting writers and allowing Penguin to continue to publish books for every reader.

Excerpt from Death by Perfection, words and music by Georgia Middleman and Maia Sharp. 2008 Cal IV Songs (ASCAP) / JorgaSong (ASCAP) / et al. All rights reserved. International copyright secured. Used by permission. All rights on behalf of Cal IV Songs and JorgaSong administered by Cal IV Entertainment, LLC. Copyright 2009 Crooked Crown Music and Jorgasong. All rights for Crooked Crown

Music administered by Razor & Tie Music Publishing, LLC. All rights reserved. Reprinted by permission of Hal Leonard Corporation.

Photographs by Samuel Fromartz unless otherwise indicated.

LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING - IN - PUBLICATION DATA

Fromartz, Samuel.

In search of the perfect loaf : a home bakers odyssey / Samuel Fromartz.

pages cm

Includes bibliographical references and index.

eBook ISBN 978-0-698-17025-4

1. Bread. I. Title.

TX769.F76 2014

641.81'5dc23 2014004522

Decorative ornaments by Nick Misani

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