Earlier this month, I blogged about the re-engineering of a 2000-year-old loaf of Pompeiian Bread. Last weekend, I decided to try baking one of my own. I watched the openculture.com video showing Giorgio Locatelli bring his recipe theories to life, but the recipe didn’t appeal to me. Dry yeast? Gluten? These ingredients didn’t exist in ancient Pompeii.
I found a link to another recipe at www.thefreshloaf.com that satisfied both my intent to use ingredients and techniques available at the time and my desire for a tasty, well-sprung loaf. The recipe is for a Miche – a very large round loaf weighing 1.5 kg. I cut the recipe roughly in half and made a 2 lb loaf. My banneton nearly overflowed, but the resulting loaf was excellent.