The Living Section
The New York Times
Taken from an article published November 4, 1987

America Whets Its Appetite
For Hearty Country Breads

By Florence Fabricant

Americans are ready for better bread. Run-of-the-mill whole wheat bread no longer satisfies, and decent baguettes have become commonplace. The challenge now is to find rustic European-style hearth-baked loaves.

Country breads are changing the urban breadbasket as more shops sell them and more restaurants serve them. Perhaps this bread connoisseurship was inevitable. Consider the phenomenal increase in American sophistication in wine and cheese. Then, too, many Americans traveling abroad have been learning to appreciate these breads at the Paris bakery of Lionel Poilane, one of France’s premier bread bakers, or at Paris wine bars like Au Aauvignon or L’Ecluse where they are served.

Last summer André Lefort, one of the few parisian builders of bread ovens still in business, built another type of wood-fired oven for Daniel Leader, the owner of the four-year-old Bread Alone bakery in Boiceville, near Woodstock. The project which included filling the oven chamber with sand to stabilize its gently domed shape while the mortar dried, took more than three months.

In this type, while the oven is heating, flames from the firebox below can be directed into the baking chamber. The direct heat affects the way the oven bakes and, some bakers contend, adds complexity to the flavor and improves the texture of the bread. For fuel Mr. Leader uses hardwood discards from a nearby baseball bat factory. There is also a system for making steam by injecting water into the ovens while the bread is baking. Bakers use steam to help crisp the crust.

Regardless of the type of hearth oven or fuel, each bakery starts with the same simple peasant-style recipe of flour, water, salt and leavening, with the occasional addition of raisins, nuts, sesame seeds or flavorings.

Yet each variation on the basic recipe produces distinctive loaves: some dark and fragrant, some dense, some with a light but rough-textured crumb, others with a tantalizing sour flavor. These breads appeal to a variety of tastes, but have in common an honest earthiness. The flavor of the leavening agent, the blend of flour, the length of rising (slow is best) and the hand of the baker - all influence the results.

Bread Alone

A new oven being built at Bread Alone in Boiceville, N.Y., under the direction of André Lefort, center, wearing glasses.

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