Peter Reinhart’s book The Bread Baker’s Apprentice has been around for a while and has certainly made the rounds in the food blogging world.  After seeing a few of the recipes on various blogs my interest was piqued, but being a little bit of a skeptic, I told myself this book couldn’t be all that.  I had other baking books that I was sure were just as good, and do I really want to spend two, three, or more days working on a single bread recipe?

So I put it out of my mind for a while.  Then one day I came across his recipe for Light Wheat Bread, and seeing that it could be done in one day I decided what the heck, I’ll give it a try.

Just take a look at this beauty:

What can I say…

I promptly put the book at the top of my list.  Not long after purchasing it, I saw that a group of bloggers are going to work their way through the whole book one or two weeks at a time.  Sounds like great way to learn some new baking techniques and recipes – I might try to reach that goal, too.

The photos at the top and bottom are of Anadama Bread, the first recipe in the book.  It’s made with white flour with molasses and cornmeal added in – two things I am very familiar with, but haven’t ever had together in a loaf of bread.  The cornmeal is soaked overnight and put together with the rest of the ingredients the next day.  The result was a soft and tender bread with a surprisingly delicious little bit of crunch.  It was even better than I could have imagined, really.

If you have any interest in learning to make fabulous bread, go get this book.  It does live up to the hype.