Baguette - Manufacture and Styles

Manufacture and Styles

The "baguette de tradition française" is made from wheat flour, water, yeast, and common salt. It does not contain additives, but it may contain broad bean flour (max 2%), soya flour (max 0.5%), wheat malt flour (max 0.3%). Standard baguettes however may contain a certain number of additives. Depending on those used either in the original flour or in making the bread itself, a baguette (or any other French bread) may not be considered vegan or kosher.

While a regular baguette is made with a direct addition of baker's yeast, it is not unusual for artisan-style loaves to be made with a poolish, "biga" or other bread pre-ferments to increase flavor complexity and other characteristics, as well as the addition of whole wheat flour or other grains such as rye. French bread is required by law to avoid preservatives, and as a result bread goes stale in under 24 hours, thus baking baguettes is a daily occurrence, unlike sourdough bread which is baked generally once or twice a week, due to the natural preservatives in a sourdough starter.

Baguettes are closely connected to France and especially to Paris, though they are made around the world. In France, not all long loaves are baguettes; for example, a short, almost rugby ball shaped loaf is a bâtard (literally, bastard), or a "torpedo loaf" in English (its origin is variously explained, but undocumented), another tubular shaped loaf is known as a flûte (also known in the United States as a parisienne) flûtes closely resemble baguettes and weigh more or less than these, depending on the region, and a thinner loaf is called a ficelle (string). (None of these are officially defined either legally or, for instance, in major dictionaries, any more than the baguette itself.) French breads are also made in forms such as a miche, which is a large pan loaf, and a boule, literally ball in French, a large round loaf. Sandwich-sized loaves are sometimes known as demi-baguettes, tiers, or sometimes "Rudi rolls".

Baguettes, either relatively short single-serving size or cut from a longer loaf, are very often used for sandwiches (usually of the submarine sandwich type, but also panini); Baguettes are often sliced and served with pâté or cheese. As part of the traditional continental breakfast in France, slices of baguette are spread with butter and jam and dunked in bowls of coffee or hot chocolate. In the United States, French Bread loaves are sometimes split in half to make French bread pizza.

Baguettes are generally made as partially free-form loaves, with the loaf formed with a series of folding and rolling motions, raised in cloth-lined baskets or in rows on a flour-impregnated towel, called a couche, and baked either directly on the hearth of a deck oven or in special perforated pans designed to hold the shape of the baguette while allowing heat through the perforations. Generally American style "French bread" is much fatter and is not baked in deck ovens, but in convection ovens.

Outside France, baguettes are also made with other doughs; for example, the Vietnamese bánh mì uses a high proportion of rice flour, while many North American bakeries make whole wheat, multigrain, and sourdough baguettes alongside French-style loaves. In addition, even classical French-style recipes vary from place to place, with some recipes adding small amounts of milk, butter, sugar, or malt extract depending on the desired flavour and properties in the final loaf.