whole wheat baguette with sunflower and golden flax seeds. So nutty and delicious. Crispy crust and light chewy crumb.

In the past week or so, i’ve baked about a dozen loaves of bread. I was inspired to take on this challenge again from a reminiscence of some excellent artisan loaves that I baked about a decade ago while in college. I remember the process involved several doughy bricks before I was able to get to a tasty, hearty loaf. But once I had it figured out, I was all over the bulk seeds and nuts at the store, pouring through recipe books in the library and kneading my way into another, waistline expanding mass of carbs. So delicious.

Lately, my quest has been to create a decent french boulangerie styled baguette. It’s about the only kind of bread I’ll buy in the market these days save for a dark rye loaf we get occasionally at rainbow bitch that is loaded with sunflower seeds and other yummy denseness. But the final inspiration came from a $9 artisan loaf that we bought at the farmer’s market a few weeks ago. Yes, I was driven by fiscal conservation. And my love for hands on art projects.

I started, of course, with a google search for “best baguette recipe.” I figured there were probably scores of them and I needed google to help me sift through the chaff. I’m still working up to the ChewsWise award winning recipe, and I’ve ordered a kitchen scale to help in the accurate measurement of ingredients.

two of my early baguettes. good dimension but lacking in texture and flavor. nonetheless, quickly devoured.

I started with the Food Network baguette recipe. Its pretty basic and straightforward, and gave me a good grounding in what to expect from rising dough and what I could get away with, like letting it rise all day while I worked out in the barn studio and letting what’s left – after the first few loaves have been baked – rest over night in the fridge.

Tonight, while munching on the loaves in the pic at the top of this post, I mixed up a little poolish with yeast water and all purpose flour. Got to keep this dough coming daily until I tire of getting fat, then I’ll go back to steamed vegetables, soup and daily walks.

What are you making in your kitchen?