31.1 Quick breads

Quick breads are for days when there is no time, or no equipment, for a yeast bread. All the recipe needs from its leavener is a fast rise in the oven; baking powder or baking soda gives it. Mixing takes only a few minutes and is easy to do by hand.

Batters and soft doughs

Every quick bread starts as one of two mixtures:

• A pourable batter is runny enough to pour straight into a prepared pan. A drop batter is thicker. It will not pour, but it is soft enough to drop from a spoon. Both count as batters.
• A soft dough is firm enough to roll flat and stamp into shapes. Biscuit dough is the example. It is handled gently, and it has to be stiffer than a muffin batter.

Three ways to mix

The amount of fat and sugar in the recipe decides how it is mixed.

The three quick-bread mixing methods compared.

The muffin method in a bakeshop goes like this.

• Sift the dry ingredients onto parchment and tip them back into the bowl.
• In a second bowl, combine the liquids along with the fat, which here is oil or melted butter.
• Pour the liquids into the dry ingredients and stir only until no dry flour is left.
  ▶ Watch
• Fill the pans and bake straight away; the batter should not stand.

The biscuit method works the fat in solid.

• Weigh everything first. see chapter 5: Four steps
• Sift the dry ingredients into a bowl.
• Work in the butter with the mixer's paddle, a pastry blender or your hands, and stop while there are still bits of butter about the size of a pea; those bits make the biscuit flaky. see chapter 3: Mixers
  ▶ Watch
• Add the liquids and mix just until a soft dough forms.

Then knead, but only a little.

• On the bench, press into the dough with the heel of your hand.
  ▶ Watch
• Fold it over with your fingers.
• Give it a quarter turn counter-clockwise.
• Do this three or four more times.
• Roll the dough out about 1 inch thick and cut the shapes you want.
  ▶ Watch

That little bit of kneading changes the result. Kneaded biscuit dough rises higher and bakes flakier. Dough that is not kneaded spreads more and comes out closer to cake. Knead too much, though, and the biscuits turn hard.

Cutting biscuits

• Handle the dough as little as possible. Work it only until it will be flaky; more makes it tough.
  ▶ Watch
• Press the cutter straight down and lift it. Never twist it.
  ▶ Watch
• Cut each shape right next to the last one. Scraps have to be worked again, and reworked dough is tough.
  ▶ Watch
• Turn the cut biscuits upside down on the pan. They rise better that way.
• For a crust all the way round, space them ½ to 1 inch apart on a sheet pan lined with parchment. For soft sides, set them touching.

The creaming method for quick breads

Richer muffins and some biscuits are mixed by creaming, the way many cakes are.

• Put the fat and sugar in the mixer bowl with the paddle. Spices for muffins, or milk powder for biscuits, go in at the same time.
  ▶ Watch
• Cream them. For muffins, beat until the mix is pale, light and fluffy. For biscuits, stop as soon as it comes together, because extra beating changes their texture.
  ▶ Watch
• Add the eggs a little at a time. After each one, scrape down the bowl, bottom and sides, so everything mixes evenly.
  ▶ Watch
• Sift the dry ingredients onto parchment, and stir the liquids together in their own container.
  ▶ Watch
• Add the two by turns. Begin with a quarter of the dry ingredients, then a third of the liquid, and keep going until both are used. Scrape the bowl between additions.
  ▶ Watch
• When the mixture is smooth, pan muffin batter and bake it. Biscuit dough goes onto a floured surface to be rolled out.

Storing the ingredients and the bread

Foods are sorted by how easily bacteria grow in them. Flour, plain bread and powdered eggs are not potentially hazardous. Fresh eggs and milk are potentially hazardous, and so are pastries filled with cream, cheese or meat. see chapter 2: Potentially hazardous foods

Flour and other dry goods go in a dry storeroom.

• The ideal room temperature is 10–15°C (50–59°F).
• The room is cool and dry.
• It is sealed against rodents.
• Shelves sit at least 15 cm (6 in.) off the floor.
  ▶ Watch
• The oldest stock is used first.

Watch baked bread for mold. It shows as bluish-green, hair-like growth, and it grows on bread kept somewhere warm, dark and a little damp.