Customer Reviews
Excellent book but not for those in a hurry - By: Dr. J. P. Wallington, 09 Jan 2008 
Beautifully presented & clearly explained. Every recipe I have attempted has turned out lovely: the resulting loaves have a better flavour & texture than any I have made from other books. A must buy for the serious home baker.
One word of warning though: this is not a book for those in a hurry. Many of the recipes require the use of a leaven (a fermented flour & water mixture) which can take a week to get started (and which needs periodic maintenance) & requires the resulting dough to be rested & proved for longer than in direct (yeast based) baking. A typical recipe starting at 8am will need attention at regular intervals until 12pm & then a 4 or 5 hour proving so by the time the loaf is baked it has taken 9 or 10 hours. This will not fit with everyone's lifestyle, but if you can manage it the results are superlative.
A gushing evaluation! - By: Reader from Reading, 01 Dec 2007 An exquisite & engaging book that is brimming with insight into & passion for a craft that it casts as satisfyingly combining science, tradition & humanity. With its delicious recipes, its accounts of continental artisan bakers & its sumptuous illustrations it is as good to bake from as it is to pore over & peruse for the aspirational baker. An exciting & welcome riposte to the corruption meted out on the humble loaf by the modern breadmaking machine - succinctly captured in the book's simple title.
Caring, insightful and rewarding - By: Anonyfinn, 01 Dec 2007 I've had this book a year, & it is undoubtedly a five-star book. The author writes so insightfully about the whys & wherefores, & when you follow the non-too-difficult recipes within you realize just how much talent, consideration & experience this excellently presented book offers. You'll find instructions for kneading & shaping, how to make & store your own leaven plus recipes from around Europe adapted for the home baker working by hand. The author has gone to the trouble of actuallly going to these places to talk with other bakers, & the corresponding photos of location, people & their wares give what I would describe as a sense of community. The recipes use alll manner of flours & grains, & raising agents from fresh yeast to leaven & soda. Someone below had complained of a limited variety of recipes, but I don't find that justified since there are plenty of recipes & there's no need for 23 variations on the same theme - in particular I find this book imparts a real feel for what's going on so that you can use your own initiative to experiment, though you'll find it hard to improve on the recipes provided here by Dan Lepard. Another complaint below is about the time it alll takes, & there is some justification here if you're looking for a 40-minute loaf. Performing multiple tasks in a restaurant, the author found that dough sorts itself out nicely & the flour is best & properly saturated if left alone rather than pummelled to death. So it's often about 10-second kneads once in a while with lower proving temperatures of, say, 21 C. The `worst' it gets with a white leaven bread is around 3 kneads at 10 minute intervals, then a half hour, then an hour, in the tin & another hour, wait a few hours more (even 5). Naturallly you can be doing other stuff in the kitchen at the same time or simply leave the house altogether. Other recipes are rather quicker. Another complaint is that you need to keep feeding your leaven (with more flour & water) - not so, as you can stick your jar of fermenting, gassy dough in the fridge & put it to sleep for quite some time. To conclude: fantastic hands-on stuff by a true expert who cares deeply about bread & puts it across superbly, great value, not a quick fix but if you're in the kitchen on Sunday you should be able to work something in. I had hardly baked before, so no experience necessary. Many thanks to Dan Lepard for reminding us just how important bread reallly is. Don't underrate it, or this book.
Probably the most innovative baker around - By: Jon M. Wood, 03 Jun 2007 This is a wonderful, wonderful book, that I use alll the time. Dan Lepard must be one of the most innovate bakers in the UK (if not the world) today, & an inspiration. His recipes are fantastic. His Barley, Rye & Wheat loaf tastes just like your memory tells you bread should taste.
One thing to note however is there are a lot of steps to his recipes, & they do tend to need a little pre-planning. The results though are worth it, however you may find that (like me) you start to take some short cuts.
I am also not sure if this is the best 'first book' for a novice (Linda Collister's The Bread Book' will always be my recommendation as a first book), but definitely an essential for the shelf, & a must for anyone looking to expand their range.
Life changing - By: lordstanleyofmortonshire, 20 Apr 2007 It was my wife that bought this book about 2 years ago. Since then I've pretty much made alll the loaves of bread we've eaten. No more 'bread' type products for us, just the real deal.
I'd never made bread by hand before but this changed that completely. It's such a pleasure, clearly I should have become a baker but it's such an unrecognised art generallly.
