Naturally Fermented Bread by Paul Barker

Naturally Fermented Bread by Paul Barker ISBN-13: 9781631599132 Hardcover: 160 pages Publisher: Quarry Books Released: October 13th 2020

Source: ebook review copy from the publisher through NetGalley.

Book Description, Modified from Goodreads:
Learn to bake healthy, gut-friendly loaves and sweet fermented buns using wild yeasts cultivated from fruits, flowers, vegetables, and plants. To bake naturally fermented bread—fruit, vegetables, plants, or flowers are submerged in water and left for a few days to a few weeks to ferment. Yeasts living in this newly fermented water, or botanical water, will, like a sourdough starter, raise the dough more slowly than commercial fresh or dried yeast resulting in a more flavorful and gut-friendly bread.

You can use this technique to make traditional long-fermented loaves and also a range of sweet fermented buns that showcase the subtle and surprising flavors of your own botanical starters. Recipes include: Tomato and Basil Pizza Dough, Cucumber Burger Buns, Chocolate Orange Brioche, Botanical Laminated Pastry, and much more!


My Review:
Naturally Fermented Bread is a cookbook that describes how to use wild yeasts found on fruit and vegetables to make bread. The author started by describing how to culture these wild yeasts found on various fruits, vegetables, herbs, spices, and flowers. He then gave step-by-step instructions on how to make your own breads using this instead of prepackaged yeast. The breadmaking part is basic enough to help those not used to baking as well as those simply not used to working with higher hydration doughs or wild yeast cultures.

Most of the book was recipes for yeast breads and sweet buns that included tips on making that ferment (using raisins or figs or whatever) and things like how to modify the hydration levels as well as the recipe for that type of bread. Each recipe included a picture of the finished loaf. The author also included some recipes for sourdough breads. Overall, the author made naturally fermented bread making sound relatively easy and doable, and I will soon try making some bread using apples. I'd recommend this book to anyone interested in trying this process.


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