Whether we have baked our own homemade bread or invested in buying artisan bread, we will not want it to spoil. Freezing it correctly, when it is freshest and well protected, ensures we have reserves of bread like freshly madeas long as we do not spoil it when defrosting it.
Have you forgotten take the bread out of the freezer With enough time for it to be ready for lunch or dinner? Don’t worry, in the kitchen there is almost always a remedy for everything. There is a very simple express trick to enjoy our bread without losing almost any quality, and it won’t take us even a minute.
Defrosting a bun, roll, or tender slice of an enriched bread, such as a Swiss roll or a challah braid type, is no more mysterious than using the defrost function of your microwave or air fryer, for example. That’s what we want soft and juicy; a slice of fable-type bread directly into the toaster.
Things change when you defrost a loaf of more rustic type, a loaf of ordinary bread, a common whole wheat bread or a baguette; we want the bread to be crunchy on the outside and tender and spongy on the inside, with its bread-bread flavor. Here the microwave can ruin it in the blink of an eye.
The best trick for this is recommended to us by professional experts such as the renowned Peter Reinhart, who shares the technique in his now classic work The Baker’s Apprentice. You only need to wrap the bread with a cloth moistened with hot water and bake it at 200ºC for between 5-10 and 30 minutes, depending on the size of the piece. But we can speed up the process much more.
Moisten Take a clean cloth that does not smell like detergent or fabric softener and does not release thread or lint, and place it on the microwave turntable. Place the frozen bread on top and run the appliance at 750-800 W for 30 seconds. Open the microwave, wait a few moments so as not to burn yourself, and take out the bread, preferably with gloves or tongs.
You may have to adjust the power or times depending on the size of the bread or the composition of its ingredients, but it is easy to find the point through trial and error. The idea is that the cloth absorb moisture that will have exhaled the frozen piece of bread, making the crust crispy, but leaving the interior with the necessary juiciness so that it is not bland.
Remember that you have to consume it quicklyat the moment, and that the results will be better the higher the quality and freshness of the original bread.
The baker’s apprentice (GASTRONOMY AND COOKING)
*Some prices may have changed since the last review
Photos | rawpixel – Freepik – Coffee Danube Still Life
In DAP | Learn to treat bread well: how to care for each type so that it lasts longer and how to freeze it correctly
In DAP | My drama with wet bread from hot sandwiches and toast and the trick to easily solve it