Book Review/52 Loaves
52 Loaves
One Man’s Relentless Pursuit of Truth, Meaning and the Perfect Crust
By William Alexander
Algonquin Books of Chapel Hill
Hardcover $23.95
By BILL DUNCAN
The News-Review
I love baking homemade bread from scratch and in general baking everything from scones to blueberry muffins. However, I will confess up front I don’t have the passion, obsession in the quest to bake the perfect loaf as William Alexander has in his absolutely hilarious personal memoir described in “52 Loaves.”
However, I was not surprised when I read the unique humor and writing style Alexander exhibits in the book because I had earlier reviewed his best seller, “The $64 Tomato,” another personal memoir about a backyard gardener who becomes obsessed about growing the perfect tomato. One has to wonder what his next obsession will be, because it is obvious he has several of these misadventures in mind to achieve perfection.
Alexander’s quest to bake the perfect loaf began when he tasted rustic peasant bread and, as he says, “experienced an epiphany.” He said he was raised on Wonder Bread and had never tasted bread that “wafts over you, so you are levitated, nose first, out of your chair.” He tried to duplicate the taste in his own kitchen and failed miserably. He called his failure’s doorstops.
“I simply wanted to learn to bake peasant bread and I wasn’t going to stop until I got right,” he said. His initial failure led him to a scientific approach to master the 6,000 year old art of bread making starting with understanding yeast. But he did not just reading up on this important part of the leavening process, he went to a yeast factory and followed the fermentation process to discover its role not only in leavening but also in the taste and texture of bread.
His challenge was how to get the air holes in the bread since his previous attempts turned out to be leaden blobs, even though when he had gone so far as to use a wood-fired oven. “Bread dough is 40 percent water much of which evaporates during baking,” he said. He discovered professional bakers use a device called a lame, a double-edged razor attached to a metal strip as thin as a coffee stir, to make several cuts in the dough creating a path to let the steam escape.
He became so obsessed he planted his own wheat, harvested, threshed winnowed and stone ground it. Alexander designed and made a clay bread oven from the earth in his backyard and gives the reader detailed instructions on how to build their own.
Despite immersing himself in the ancient art of what makes yeast, he discovered a secret formula from a delightful character named Charles Van Over, the author of a 1997 book, “The Best Bread Ever.” Charlie’s secret was a dough starter of flour, water, wild yeast and bacteria – sourdough, or as the French say “a levain.” Charlie shared a starter batch with instructions for the regular feeding of flour and water that must be continued to keep it alive for years or even generations. Anyone who has been given a starter for Amish friendship bread will understand that process.
It would seem Alexander had finally achieved his goal, but remember, he is obsessive in this relentless pursuit of the perfect loaf, so he takes it to the next level. “I found myself with a strong urge to bake in some place really old,” he said and chose a French abbey because “monks practically live on bread.” He made arrangements to experience this tradition at the Benedictine Abbaye Saint-Wandrille in France. Alexander was required to follow the Benedictine rule starting with Vigils at 5:30 a.m. and ending with Compline at 8:30 p.m. He wondered to himself how the monks found time to do anything but pray on their knees, but then realized they were monks and this was their job.
The author leaves the reader with recipes for bread making that don’t require going all the way to a French Abbey to follow. This is a delightfully funny book that will have the reader roaring with laughter while longing for the taste of a fresh loaf of bread. He is so descriptive that you can smell the aroma of the bread baking, concluding that “after all bread is the staff of life.”
(Bill Duncan can be reached at bduncan@nrtoday.com or by writing to P.O. Box 812, Roseburg, OR 97470.)