Flour Water Salt Yeast summary

Given the title of Forkish’s book, you might think that there were four basic ingredients to making bread. Well, technically yes, but in fact there are two more elements to consider that don’t need to go on your shopping list. They are time and temperature.

Flour, water, salt, yeast, time, and temperature can combine in an infinite variety of ways, to produce an infinitely subtle variety of breads. With experience, you’ll be able to manipulate these elements to get perfectly baked bread that has whatever variations you want in taste and texture.

Ken’s Artisan Bakery is the proud owner of a 1,200-square-foot open kitchen, an Italian oven weighing 15,000 pounds, a cool room known as the retarder where mixes can ferment at a particular temperature, and all the professional kit he needs. For his pizzas, he has a wood-fired oven that reaches temperatures of more than 1,000°F (538°C).

How in the world can you compete with that in your home kitchen?

Have you been eagerly awaiting that famously trendy term sourdough starter? Well, here we go… sort of. It’s time to talk about yeast.

First of all, do remember: there’s absolutely nothing wrong with commercial yeast – in fact, it’s a vital ingredient of most of Forkish’s recipes. But some of the fun in home baking comes from creating your own yeast culture. And for that, all you need is flour, water, and that crucial extra element, time.

There are infinitely many subtle ways to adapt the breadmaking process by shifting the ratios of flour, water, salt, yeast, time, and temperature – as well as by using different mixes of flour, and developing the yeast in different ways.

But there’s a common core to all the methods – not a recipe, so much as a blueprint. And this is it: the outline of the process you should pretty much always follow.

Step 3. Folding.

Several times while the dough is resting, give it some extra strength by folding it. Like before, reach your hand in and fold the mix over on itself. Then invert it so it’s shaped like a ball.

Making a levain culture might sound like a lot of work, and there’s no denying that it requires care and attention, strung out over multiple days. But once you get into the routine, it’s a process that’s nice and simple to keep going, with minimal effort required each day.

Plus, you can think of it as an investment for great bread stretching way into the future. Forkish’s levain culture dates all the way back to 1999.

There’s a scientific aspect to baking, especially for an obsessive like Forkish. But it’s never just a numbers game.

In other words, while you do have to stick to the correct ratios of ingredients, and the methods outlined above, baking also gives you the chance to indulge your creativity and find your own signature style.

It’s possible that you’ve committed to using a whole kilo of flour, but will struggle to get through the two entire loaves that’ll produce. But don’t panic – you can use the dough to make other stuff, too.

And not just any other stuff – stuff as delicious as pizza and focaccia. So let’s take a look at the method needed for that.