My Ugliest Bread Yet

Dr. Cow cheese is so delicious that you can eat it plain, but I prefer it accompanied.  Since I've been on kind of a roll with fresh bread lately, instead of the crackers that usually do a disservice to the swanky cheese, I decided to go all out and make fresh baguettes to go with my gourmet wheels.

I chose the My Bread recipe for stecca, but omitted the possibly sog-inducing brush of olive oil and sprinkle of salt step.  I don't like mushy bread and the idea of my hard-earned loaves soggifying like an old, hot pretzel made me cringe.  So, despite my previous missteps, I made the alteration and it proved wise: as I wound up with a beautiful, browned crust.

It wasn't all fun and games, though.  While the directions call for quartering the dough after the second rise, they don't mention that doing so will create a sticky mess that will render your tea towel unsalvageable.  Needless to say, it wasn't very easy to, further, "stretch into long tubes"; so I knew immediately that this was going to be some unattractive bread.

Yet I half expected them to magically settle into perfect loaves while cooking.  They didn't.  However, they did manage to cook perfectly, despite the unfortunate visual.

And once it was all sliced up you'd never know the intact loaves hadn't been pretty.

Next time I'll try to make two larger loaves.  Halved, these are begging to be made into garlic bread.