I have been baking bread for a little bit now, and I recently
noticed that if I take a thin slice of the freshly baked bread
and smell it, it smells quite strongly of alcohol, tastes quite
good though.

The recipie I follow is just a regular bread recipie with flour,
water, yeast, sugar, salt oil. My rise times are about 90mins,
90mins, baking for about 45mins at 350.

Is this just normal, or am I putting in too much yeast/sugar/rising?

TIA, irax.

On Wed, 04 Feb 2004 12:00:58 -0600, Iraxl Enb >
wrote:

>I have been baking bread for a little bit now, and I recently
>noticed that if I take a thin slice of the freshly baked bread
>and smell it, it smells quite strongly of alcohol, tastes quite
>good though.
>
>The recipie I follow is just a regular bread recipie with flour,
>water, yeast, sugar, salt oil. My rise times are about 90mins,
>90mins, baking for about 45mins at 350.
>
>Is this just normal, or am I putting in too much yeast/sugar/rising?
>
>TIA, irax.

Howdy,

Everything you describe is normal except for eating "freshly baked
bread." <bg>

For just the reasons you noticed, bread tastes best after it has had
the opportunity to cool some. Of course, warm bread is wonderful, so,
bake it, cool it, and re-warm it for the very best flavor.

In France (where they have more than a bit of concern about this sort
of thing) it is unlawful to sell bread immediately after it comes out
of the oven...

HTH,

--
Kenneth

If you email... Please remove the "SPAMLESS."

"Iraxl Enb" > wrote in message
...
> I have been baking bread for a little bit now, and I recently
> noticed that if I take a thin slice of the freshly baked bread
> and smell it, it smells quite strongly of alcohol, tastes quite
> good though.
>
> The recipie I follow is just a regular bread recipie with flour,
> water, yeast, sugar, salt oil. My rise times are about 90mins,
> 90mins, baking for about 45mins at 350.
>
> Is this just normal, or am I putting in too much yeast/sugar/rising?
>
> TIA, irax.
>

The yeast engages in a fermentation process. It burns sugar and produces
carbon dioxide and alcohol as byproducts. It is the carbon dioxide that
provides the leavening. Baking the bread should cause almost all if not all
of the alcohol to evaporate. What you encountered is normal.

Fred
The Good Gourmet
http://www.thegoodgourmet.com