Fougasse

Updated: Jul 21, 2020

I woke up today with sore forearms. Ready to bake. Little did I know, but we were going to bake in both classes today. Bread and bread galore! We made an assorment of doughs in Pastry class and a few intriguing recipes in Cuisine class. The most exciting thing today was the Fougasses - a Foccacia bread that we made with Tomato Confit and Bacon. It smelled amazing even before it was baked. When Chef Cyril put it in the oven, I definitely heard my stomach grumble. It was a very efficient class and I'm finally able to do the Pe'trissage steps. Practice does help. It especially helps when you do it for 6 hours a day. In Cuisine class, Chef Samuel taught us how to make a tomato sandwhich bread. The trick to square bread is to spray the sides with oil, use a loaf tin and to bake them with a tray on top to prevent rising beyond the tin. Each loaf went to the blast chiller and returned for slicing and toasting with olive oil on the stove. We topped each with sweated/softened onions and anchovies.

I learned a cool trick with the onions. Make a chimney out of wax paper to allow some of the moisture out of the onions. This way they will dry when they're done. The chimney is a round piece of wax paper that is the size of the pot with a whole int he center to let steam out.

Overall, today was a success in the kitchen. I hope I can keep practicing my knife skills because, as it turns out, I'm not as smooth as I expected.

Since I was feeling athletic today, I walked back home again with Erica and Victoria. Day 2 healthy!

It's very cold in the apartment and very windy outside. All I feel like doing is snuggling in my bed with a cozy blanket!

Favorites of the Day:

Fougasses

400g Flour T55

8g Salt

50g Fermented Dough

25g Olive Oil

200g Water

7g Live Yeast

100g Crisped bacon cubes

25g Tomato Confit

Mix and create an O on the counter with dry ingredients and yeast. Break the fermented dough into chunks in the center. Pour the water into center. Using your hands, break the dough apart in the water and slowly combine with the surrounding dry ingredients. Using the Pe’trissage steps, mix the bread. When the dough seems smooth, combine with Olive oil and do the Pe’trissage steps again. Add the bacon and tomato on top of the dough ball. Roughly chop the tomato and bacon with the dough scraper. You can use any ingredients to mix into the dough. Repeat the Pe’trissage steps. The dough is now ready to rest at room temperature (30 minutes and punch). If the dough is sticky when you set it to rest, you can wait 20 minutes, punch, and repeat.

Split the dough into 4 parts. Form balls with the dough. Press it out, fold into thirds. Place the fold down and roll the dough into any shape you prefer.

In class we made a long rounded rectangle shape and a teardrop shape. We then decorated the breads with slits that we spread apart. Brush with Olive Oil and drop coarse Fleur de Sel or salt on top. After a quick 20 minutes rest, we bake at 240 degrees Celsius with steam for 17 minutes.

For Steam, you an spray the sides of the oven with water or place a mold of boiling water for half the bake time.

Notes:

Use 120g of Bacon raw to make 100g crisped

Use cold bacon to render the fat

Makes 4 pieces of bread.

Caillette D’Avignon

100g Caul Fat

55g Pork Fat

200g Pork Belly

200g Pork Shoulder

60g Pork Liver

70g Blanched Spinach or Swiss Chard

6g Salt

1g Pepper

Chop the meats into a small, even dice. For the liver, run your knife through quickly until the liver is broken down. The pork fat can be slightly larger. Using the scraper, press the liver through a metal sieve to remove the nerves. scrape the liver and add to the other meats. Season the meat. Press out the water from the spinach and chop roughly.

Mix all together and form balls of 100g. wrap each one in a pice of caul fat. It’s ok if you overlap since it will dissolve in the oven. Place the meatballs tightly next to each other and bake at 160 degrees Celsius for 35 minutes.

Note: