Look at how far we've come. We've learned to watch the dough, not the clock. We've worked on shaping and scoring. We've handled wet dough and figured out how to manage it without panicking. We've built our first preferments and seen what a poolish can do. Now we're going to take everything you've learned and build on it. This week we're baking the pretzel loaf. Two tracks. Same loaf. Yeasted with a poolish if you don't have an active starter, or sourdough if you do. Same hydration, same flour weight, same bath, same bake. Just two different ways to get the dough started. Here's what we're adding to your toolkit this week. The alkaline bath. Most home bakers have never used one. It's the step that turns a regular loaf into a pretzel loaf. Three things happen in that bath, and once you understand the why, you'll never look at a pretzel the same way again. Scoring an alkalized crust. The bath seals the surface tight, which means your score has to do real work. We'll get into where to place it and how deep to go. Reading the bake. The five-minute butter rule. What success looks like when you cut into the crumb. The three most common mistakes and how to fix them before they happen. Here's the thing about doing this together that you can't replicate baking alone in your kitchen. When you bake on your own, you only see your loaf. You don't know if your bulk fermentation went too long or too short until you've cut into it. You don't know what underproofed looks like at hour four versus hour six. You don't know if your bath was strong enough until the loaf comes out pale and you're not sure why. In a bake-along, you're seeing dozens of doughs at every stage at the same time. Someone's hours ahead of you. Someone's hours behind. Someone's about to make the same mistake you almost made yesterday, and you can warn them. Someone else figured something out you didn't, and now you know it too. You get exposed to bread you might never have tried on your own. The pretzel loaf is a perfect example. How many of you would've boiled a bread dough in alkaline water if you weren't doing it as a community? Probably not many. But you'll do it this Saturday, and your kitchen's going to smell like something it's never smelled before.

This is my first time trying to make sourdough bread. I followed the instruction for overnight and by the time I woke this morning it had already peaked and fail. I fed it a 1:1:1, 60g starter, 60g flour; 60g water at 7:20 this morning and it is 11:30 and it has not risen any. Not sure if I did something wrong.

Stiff Starter Squad…. Chime in please!!! I’m trying to remember who all uses a stiff starter. I’m tagging who I can remember. If you know a Stiff Starter Squad Member that has NOT been tagged please tag them below. @Donna Angelo @Sandy Chong @Tracy Havlik @Patt Stanaway @Ann Snow @Jen Dolan @Jill Hart If you’re on this list and not using a stiff starter please let me know Thanks EVERYONE!!

I was ready to call it quits SEVERAL times with this one. From beginning to end, literally. After all the trouble I faced, I stared down already shaped loaves that looked flat and dead. I had come too far to give up at this point so I scored it (should’ve done it deeper but I was scared to) and popped it into the oven. She isn’t perfect but she persevered. Somewhat proud of my first baguette. Overall this failure felt like a small success. I didn’t include the picture of the other one because it was shaped like an amoeba. But anyways, Here are all of my goof ups: 1.) AP Flour (oops I did it again) 2.) Dough ripped on last coil (probably because of the first goof up) 3.) No Baking Stone 4.) No Parchment Paper 5.) Put oven at 500° and put a painted bread loaf dish filled with water in there (Alexa play Fire by the Ohio Players) while nothing caught on fire the paint did burn and emit fumes and smoke but I did replace the dish with a regular one 6.) Was afraid of what happened at no.5 so I baked my baguette on 475° the entire time 7.) Couldn’t keep my eyes off the bread so I ended up cleaning the kitchen AFTERWARDS instead of while it was baking. Went to sleep late. The bread was still hot when I took these photos so forgive the less than fancy setup.

We’ve had a lot of new bakers join us in the last few weeks, so I want to take a minute and show you around one of the most important tools we have inside this community. The Recipe Pantry. 🔗 https://pantry.bakinggreatbread.com If you haven’t been there yet, this is where every recipe I teach lives. Over 130 of them right now, and we’re adding more every week. It’s free for all of you, and it’s free for anyone you want to share it with. (𝙅𝙪𝙨𝙩 𝙡𝙞𝙠𝙚 𝙩𝙝𝙚 𝙗𝙧𝙚𝙖𝙙 𝙬𝙚 𝙗𝙖𝙠𝙚 𝙝𝙚𝙧𝙚, 𝙩𝙝𝙚 𝙍𝙚𝙘𝙞𝙥𝙚 𝙋𝙖𝙣𝙩𝙧𝙮 𝙞𝙨 𝙝𝙤𝙢𝙚𝙢𝙖𝙙𝙚, 𝙄 𝙗𝙪𝙞𝙡𝙩 𝙞𝙩 𝙢𝙮𝙨𝙚𝙡𝙛, 𝙣𝙤𝙩 𝙨𝙤𝙢𝙚𝙩𝙝𝙞𝙣𝙜 𝙤𝙛𝙛 𝙩𝙝𝙚 𝘼𝙥𝙥 𝙎𝙩𝙤𝙧𝙚, 𝙨𝙤 𝙗𝙚 𝙜𝙚𝙣𝙩𝙡𝙚, 𝙖𝙣𝙙 𝙞𝙛 𝙮𝙤𝙪 𝙨𝙚𝙚 𝙨𝙤𝙢𝙚𝙩𝙝𝙞𝙣𝙜 𝙤𝙛𝙛, 𝙨𝙖𝙮 𝙨𝙤𝙢𝙚𝙩𝙝𝙞𝙣𝙜.) 🧺 𝗛𝗲𝗿𝗲’𝘀 𝘄𝗵𝗮𝘁’𝘀 𝗶𝗻 𝘁𝗵𝗲𝗿𝗲 Every kind of bread we work on. Sourdough. Yeasted. Enriched doughs. Flatbreads. Rolls and buns. Holiday breads. Sourdough discard recipes. Quick breads. Pastries. 𝗘𝘃𝗲𝗿𝘆𝘁𝗵𝗶𝗻𝗴’𝘀 𝗼𝗿𝗴𝗮𝗻𝗶𝘇𝗲𝗱, 𝘁𝗮𝗴𝗴𝗲𝗱, 𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝘀𝗲𝗮𝗿𝗰𝗵𝗮𝗯𝗹𝗲. ⚙️ How the recipes are built 𝗘𝘃𝗲𝗿𝘆 𝗿𝗲𝗰𝗶𝗽𝗲 𝗵𝗮𝘀 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝘀𝗮𝗺𝗲 𝘀𝘁𝗿𝘂𝗰𝘁𝘂𝗿𝗲. ✔️ Dual measurements, both metric and volume on every ingredient ✔️ Full phase breakdowns ✔️ Built-in timers so you don’t have to set them on your phone ✔️ A glossary so when a recipe says “fermentolyse” or “poolish,” you tap the word and learn what it means without leaving the page ✔️ Baker’s percentages calculated automatically ✔️ A scaling tool so you can halve, double, or triple a recipe without having to do the math yourself 🧭 𝗛𝗼𝘄 𝘁𝗼 𝗺𝗼𝘃𝗲 𝗮𝗿𝗼𝘂𝗻𝗱 Anytime I share a link inside the Academy to a recipe we’re baking or talking about, you can always click the “Browse More” button at the top of that recipe page and you’ll land on the full pantry. 𝗙𝗿𝗼𝗺 𝘁𝗵𝗲𝗿𝗲 𝘆𝗼𝘂 𝗰𝗮𝗻 𝘀𝗲𝗮𝗿𝗰𝗵 𝗯𝘆: 🔎 Bread name 📂 Category🛠 Technique 📈 Difficulty 𝗪𝗵𝗮𝘁𝗲𝘃𝗲𝗿 𝘄𝗮𝘆 𝘆𝗼𝘂 𝘁𝗵𝗶𝗻𝗸 𝗮𝗯𝗼𝘂𝘁 𝗯𝗿𝗲𝗮𝗱, 𝘆𝗼𝘂 𝗰𝗮𝗻 𝗳𝗶𝗻𝗱 𝗶𝘁. 👀 Try this right now Open the Pantry. 𝗦𝗲𝗮𝗿𝗰𝗵: 👉 “sourdough” 👉 “beginner” 👉 “holiday” 👉 “discard” You’ll get a sense of how much is already in there waiting for you. 📬 New inside the Pantry: Weekly Newsletter