Side question: Why do people buy baguettes? Do they make sandwiches with them? How do you even make a sandwich from them? How are you meant to beat a baguette???
For some soups, a great way to serve them is to toast a thick slice of one of the uncut loaves (so you can cut it thick), then place it in the middle of a wide bowl and serve the soup on top of that. Sometimes, you put another sauce that harmonizes well with the souo on the bread, first.
Then you eat it as the soup absorbs into the bread, experiencing a combination of soggy and dry bread textures along with the flavour of the broth (and sauce, if present).
It wouldn’t work with a standard loaf of bread, as both the slices and the bread itself aren’t thick enough to keep it from quickly going fully soggy. Breaking crackers or dipping toast into soup are pale imitations (ok, dipping toast isn’t that far off, but I still prefer a good thick piece of toast).
Also, if you take a baguette and cut it into thinner slices then toast/bake those slices, you end up with a much cheaper version of those artisan crackers that are just dried pieces of baguette.
Also, look up beef wellington for one of the more extreme uses of non-standard bread.
Not pictured: baguette
How are you meant to beat a baguette???
Just punch it dude, it’s bread.
The question is how to beat with a baguette
This will truly be a dual fates.
Really a pane in the ass.
This is literally called nostupidquestions and people are saying it’s a stupid question…??? some people just didn’t experience the same things. https://xkcd.com/1053/
A big reason is different texture, with the semisphere shape the middle can be fluffy while the outside is crunchy, for baguettes it’s basically a sandwich that the whole thing fits in your mouth in one orientation, so it’s a different way to eat it.
Why are they different shapes?
Sliced bread is made in loaf pans
Sourdough is made on a flat tray in the shape of a ball so it spreads out a bit.
Baguettes are made by a long strand of dough.
Bonus answer: the reason why sourdough and the baguette have the textured crust is due to the dough being sliced with a knife prior to baking.
You cut a baguette down the middle to make a sandwich
The fact that someone have to explain this, is kinda funny
Yeah this is NoStupidQuestions so we should only have high level discourse.
Plus, being on here it’s difficult to tell if it’s a joke or general ignorance
I think OP should at least explain why they had this question. Such as being an alien from another planet, being visually impaired, grew up in remote amazon tribe, or whatever.
Not only that, baguettes go great with lots of cheeses.
They also go great with dipping in olive oil and balsamic vinegar.
Combine the two ideas and make cheesy garlic bread with them.
And soups.
Pro tip: Cut the baguette in a 45° angle.
It makes the first bite easier, and it looks better.
45° relative to what?
I see.
Instead of cutting it off at a right angle you cut it at an angle. Personally I’m French and yeah I know of the technique but I’m not the biggest fan necessarily. Works best if you’re making 2 sandwiches out of 1 baguette and fill it up first before doing the middle cut.
Yeah I get it because the other person posted an image. I was confusing the slice you make to partition the baguette with the one you use to open it up to put fillings in.
Think of a baguette as a 3 feet long sub-sandwich. Now it starts to make sense doesn’t it ?
For dipping in Soup, you fool
Because the dough was a different shape before baking.
You can beat a baguette with a golf club, a truncheon, or even another baguette.
Baguettes are delicious, use a knife if you want to do a sandwich, what’s the difficulty?
Depends if they are baked in a container or not.
ELI5: it depends on how you shape it.
You can load the dough into a metallic shape and close it with a lid, and you’ll get picture 1.
Or you can make a ball out of it and leave it be on a flat surface, and it will naturally expand to look like picture 2.
Side question: narrow shape makes baguette have a more crispy texture, which many people like. It’s also usually produced using a special kind of sourdough, which makes it have unique and rich taste. People eat it as is (just biting it from one end to another) or make small open sandwiches by cutting it in slices and putting all sorts of toppings on top of them.
I saw someone just cut it down the middle and make a long skinny sandwich with one. I didn’t even know that was legal.
Do they not have a sub shop on your planet?
I like the idea of the metric subway sandwich being a metre-longue
Try a jambon-beurre, incredibly simple, incredibly delicious.
Lol, yes, it can be done, but it needs to be packed, otherwise it will likely fall apart.
(Also it’s an ungodly abomination and there are certainly better options to do this with)
Why would you want to bake in a container vs a flat surface? Why are some types of bread one shape, and others another? Is it just tradition, or is there some practical aspect?
Baking in a rectangular shape allows you to make a space efficient bread that you can easily stack and transport.
Making bread on a flat surface allows you to minimize costs of entry (not only don’t you need the forms which are relatively cheap, you can go with simpler/cheaper ovens), and this kind of bread has a more pronounced crust, which many people like.
Also, rectangular bread is harder to leaven for a long period of time as it comes with numerous technological complications down the production line. This affects the aroma composition, making rectangular bread less attractive for those who want the traditional “bread” taste.
Baguette, as I already mentioned, has a unique crust and crumb texture defined by the shape and baking conditions. Many people like it that way.
Making bread on a flat surface allows you to minimize costs of entry (not only don’t you need the forms which are relatively cheap, you can go with simpler/cheaper ovens), and this kind of bread has a more pronounced crust, which many people like.
Crusts like this generally require a lot of steam in the oven, and steam ovens are usually much more expensive than non-steam ovens.
If you want a homemade loaf that can actually produce the type of bubbly crust you expect in certain types of European style breads, you’ll have to trap a lot of steam where you’re baking it, often by containing it in a Dutch oven.
And shaping/forming a loaf that stays tall when being baked on a flat surface takes skill, lots of practice and experience.
Crusts like this generally require a lot of steam in the oven
Fair enough!
And shaping/forming a loaf that stays tall when being baked on a flat surface takes skill, lots of practice and experience.
Or a fairly inexpensive machine that will do it for you. Of course though, there’s a special pleasure in making a truly artisan bread with your own hands. But hey, it’s not that hard if you know what you’re doing. Best to see it in action.
Whoops, didn’t realize you were talking about industrial scale. I guess that makes sense, and I would have no idea which type of bread uses cheaper equipment.
The containers can increase your breads toaster compatibility :D
But overall I guess it’s a bit like pasta: different use cases (sandwich, sides for salad or soup, as a stand alone dish / food), regions with different resources for flour, fluids, spices, … and also different kinds of utilities (metal pans weren’t easily available everywhere, all the time and they take up space) and so on.
And all these things influence how the bread tastes, looks and feels. So variety in process (container vs surface, loafs vs flat breads, handcrafted vs automatically processed, …) leads to different results with different characteristics.
E.g. I love Apulian bread. It’s a loaf with a slightly darker crust, but lighter and soft on the inside. The crust gives it a slightly bitter taste, that makes it a bit rustic (the only thing better is a freaky baked sourdough loaf).
It’s perfect for sandwiches IMHO but for french toast it’s a pain in the ass. I use pan baked toast (different density, crust and form) instead and again: perfect bread for this dish.And then just imagine eating a Döner from half a loaf of grey bread, or toast, … blasphemy!
US , EU and FR variants.
Side question: Why do people buy baguettes? Do they make sandwiches with them?
Sometimes, sometimes just eat with butter. They make good toasts too.
How do you even make a sandwich from them?
Just cut it open and put the ham and cheese inside it, not much to it really. Either cut the slice in half if I’m feeling poor or fold it in two if I’m feeling rich.
industry vs. artisan goods?
The sandwich bread is mass produced, baked in racks of loaf pans, designed to give very consistent and convenient slices for making sandwiches.
The second pic is the way many people prefer to bake a more rustic loaf. The dough is just placed on a flat sheet, so there’s much more crust, and it can just rise however it does. It’s less convenient for sandwiches.
No baguettes aren’t used for sandwiches, they’re used to serve bread with the meal. If you’re eating dinner, you don’t really want a slice of sandwich bread, you want something more convenient to hold in your hand, dip in you pasta sauce, or whatever. Plus it has a higher ratio of crust to insides, which can be nice.
No baguettes aren’t used for sandwiches
My jambon-beurre begs to differ
*Your
Tiiiiiin roof
rusted
Apparently it’s just not a thing where I am. I’ve seen them used for little hors d’oeuvre things, but not for a meal-type sandwich.
I stand corrected.
Baguettes are bomb sandwich bread. Ask France.
Or Vietnam!
Sooo French colonialism?
Correct, but with hard workers instead of French people
No baguettes aren’t used for sandwiches
I’d say that they are great for making sandwiches tho
Now I’m curious, what did you think the baguette was used for?
Where I am, they’re very often cut into rounds and served with a meal.
Decoration, apparently. Or a fashion accessory, maybe.
Bicycling with it under the arm 😁
Uh what? Guess you have never been to France?
I have not and stand corrected
I cut a mini baguette lengthwise and used it to make a Vegemite sandwich.
Don’t tell the French, I don’t want to be Rainbow Warrior’d
Now I want some Vegemite sandwich, even though I just had lunch.
It will be our secret
We use normal bread (pic 2) for sandwiches all the time. It’s been years since I’ve had industry toast (pic 1) and only in times of desperation.
Open top sandwiches with bread 2 are basically two thirds of my food pyramid.
I make my own sandwich bread, and it’s far nicer than the bought stuff. Yeast based, not sourdough but that’s fine too. I use a tin for those. They’re generally more wet - about 70% hydration. They’d be fine not in a tin but would be flatter, and would benefit from chilling.
I also make “rustic” loaves which are drier and stiffer about 60% and are firm enough to not need a pan at all.
That bread looks amazing. Respect!
No baguettes aren’t used for sandwiches
They are.
https://www.lamiecaline.com/categorie-de-produits/nos-sandwichs/
The rectangular loaf was designed for packing efficiency. Once bakeries became a thing and moving bread over distances to supply people became more and more common bakers realised that bread isnt heavy, its bulky and packing efficiency was an easy way to reduce costs
Okay, why not hexagon shaped bread?
Ease of manufacturing the bread tin. Ease of extracting the baked bread from the tin. Hexagons do not pack better than squares.
How high are you stacking your bread
Depends on how high I get first.
Because you can stack rectangles into bigger rectangles, can’t really do that with hexagons.
