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German Yeast Bread
Put some flour (the quantity to be regulated by the size of the family) into a bowl. To one quartern allow one tea-spoonful of salt, one ounce of German yeast, and one quart of new milk. Dissolve the yeast smoothly and gradually with a little lukewarm milk or water; make a hole in the middle of the flour, and put it in; mix it with sufficient flour to make a batter; strew a little flour over the top, and allow the leaven to rise. When it is swollen and cracked, the bread should be kneaded at once, and should be done thoroughly, as on this its quality very much depends. It should be quite firm and smooth. Leave it in the bowl, make one or two slight gashes with a knife on the surface, cover it with a cloth, and, if it be winter time, leave it near the fire to rise, but not sufficiently near to make it hot. In about an hour it will have risen considerably, and be ready for making into loaves of any size that may be desired. Let them rise a minute or two after being put into the tins, and prick them lightly in one or two places with a fork, to let the steam escape. Bake in a good oven. Time to bake, about two hours for a quartern loaf. If a larger quantity of flour is used, so that all the dough cannot be baked at once, that which is left in the bowl must be kept in a moderate temperature, neither very warm nor very cold.
A plain sponge-and-dough milk bread, scaled for a Victorian household rather than a modern loaf tin. Two figures in it need translating before you start, and one timing should be ignored outright.
- A quarternA quartern of flour is a quarter of a peck, roughly 3 1/2 lb (about 1.6 kg), which bakes into the 4 lb "quartern loaf" of the period. For a single modern loaf, quarter the recipe: about 14 oz (400 g) flour, 1/4 tsp salt, 1/4 oz (7 g) fresh yeast, and a quarter of the imperial quart of milk -- about 1/2 pint (280 ml).
- German yeastThis is compressed fresh baker's yeast, sold in cakes and still available in some shops. Substitute about half the weight in active dry yeast, or roughly a third to 40 percent of it in instant. An ounce of fresh yeast to 3 1/2 lb flour works out at about 1.75 percent of the flour weight.
- New milkSimply fresh, unskimmed milk, and unpasteurised when this was written. Whole milk is the equivalent. Warm it to blood heat before mixing so it does not stall the yeast; the recipe itself asks only for lukewarm milk or water to dissolve the yeast.
- The spongeThe hole in the flour with yeast and a little milk is a sponge or "leaven". It is ready when domed, bubbly and visibly cracked across the top, usually 30 to 60 minutes at room temperature. Do not let it collapse before you mix in the rest of the flour and milk.
- The kneading is the hingeThe book is right that quality depends on it. Work the dough until it is smooth, elastic and passes a windowpane test: 10 minutes by hand, 6 to 8 in a mixer on low. Under-kneaded dough at this hydration gives a dense, close crumb that no amount of extra rising will fix.
- Ignore "a minute or two" in the tinsThe shaped loaves need a full second proof, 30 to 45 minutes, until they have risen to just above the rim and a pressed fingertip leaves a dent that fills slowly. Baking after two minutes gives a heavy loaf with a torn crust.
- A good oven, and real times"A good oven" here means a brisk one; the book gives no temperature. In a modern oven, start at 425F (220C) for 15 minutes, then drop to 375F (190C). A 1 lb loaf needs 30 to 35 minutes, a 2 lb loaf 45 to 50; the two hours quoted applies to a 4 lb quartern loaf. Bake to an internal temperature of 195-200F (90-93C).
- Holding back doughThe instruction to keep the remainder at a moderate temperature works, but the refrigerator does it better. Chilled dough will keep 12 to 24 hours; bring it back to room temperature before shaping.
- YieldThe full quartern makes one large 4 lb loaf or four ordinary 1 lb loaves.
"German yeast" was the trade name in Britain for compressed fresh yeast, pressed into cakes and sold by the ounce, much of it imported from continental distilleries and breweries before British firms took up production in the later nineteenth century. It marked a real change in home baking: earlier cooks relied on brewer's barm, an unpredictable liquid skimmed from fermenting beer, or on a leaven kept alive from bake to bake. A measurable ounce of yeast behaved the same way each week. The recipe's opening line, letting the quantity of flour be "regulated by the size of the family", and its instruction on storing surplus dough both belong to a period when bread was baked in bulk once or twice a week rather than by the loaf.