The third chapter will hold a lot of local interest as it is devoted to the High Renaissance period of artisanal bread we are currently enjoying here in the Bay Area. Chad Robertson of Tartine Bakery is featured, of course, as well as Kathleen and Ed Weber of Della Fattoria and Mike Zabowski of The Bejkr, currently found at farmers' markets in Sonoma County. Throughout the chapter, Fromartz weaves in the story about the time Alice Waters asked him to bake the bread for a fundraising dinner she was doing at Bob Woodward’s house in Georgetown and includes a recipe for Pain de Campagne in the end.

There are a total of nine recipes in In Search of the Perfect Loaf, at least one for each chapter of the book, many of which are pages long and quite involved. Don’t let this deter you, for it has more to do with the intricacies of describing how to make bread than with the difficulty of the task. In fact, of all the recipes, Fromartz only lists two as difficult (a Levain Baguette and Roggenweizenbrot, a notoriously fickle rye bread from Germany.) Five of the other breads are labeled moderate and two flat breads (Emmer Flat Bread and Socca Americain) are considered easy. So there really is something here for everyone.

The recipe ingredients are listed by weight, as it should be. It is really much easier and, even more importantly, much more accurate, to weigh ingredients when baking. A simple digital kitchen scale is not hard to find for about $20 these days and their slim profile means they can easily be stashed in a cupboard. Fromartz chooses to list his weights in grams as he is very influenced by professional and European bakers. Again, many kitchen scales can toggle between ounces and grams, so this shouldn’t be too much of an issue.

In addition to the information-packed chapters and recipes, there’s an index and glossary as well as an extensive notes section which sites many sources for the history, science, and techniques discussed. The hardcover book is illustrated with several black and white photographs of beautiful loaves of bread, bakers and their ovens, and wheat fields and millstones.

Samuel FromartzSamuel Fromartz

Samuel Fromartz Explores the World of Bread in his New Book "In Search of the Perfect Loaf: A Home Baker’s Odyssey"