APOLLONIA POILANE: In the 1930s, Saint-Germain-des-Prés,
where our first bakery is located,
was an area with artists and craftsmen.
And it was known to be this very Bohemian, philosophical
neighborhood.
My grandfather started baking and exchanging bread for arts.
The artists came to the bakery, would
have a loaf of bread painted, and then eat the bread.
This bartering has become a tradition that's ongoing.
The back room of our bakery is clad
with the paintings, the drawings, some photography,
and even some ceramics of those works.
My father carried on the tradition.
He met Salvador Dalí in the late '60s, and he used to say that
my father was his favorite living Frenchman.
One day, Salvador Dalí asked my father to make a whole bedroom
made out of bread.
So my father made a bed, he made the chandelier.
And since that time, in the back room of rue de Cherche-Midi,
we've had a bread chandelier brighten up the room.
I think for Poilane, the art and bread link
has always been something that has fed our sour dough.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
At the bakery, we have some bakers
that are absolute artists and who
know how to craft the most intricate decorations.
These are things we do daily at the bakery,
and it has become a tradition and part of our identity.
We bake decorated loaves for every occasion.
And if you come in the bakery on a typical day,
you will have a bread that will reflect what time of the year
we were at.
I put on my gray jacket, and the reason I put this on
is because this jacket was given by my father
when I was 14 years old.
He taught me how to make these little bread decorations.
In this chapter, I will teach you
how to use bread dough as an art medium
to create bread decorations, whether you
use them for a special occasion or, say, placeholders
for a dinner.
The bread decorations I have in front of me
can be very simple--
a leaf or a little heart.
You also have some more elaborate ones,
like these little wheat ears, the roses, the little birds,
or some more intricate ones, like letters.
The dough we're using here is fortified dough.
It's a piece of dough to which you add flour to the point
that you're not able to mix more into it.
This way, it doesn't grow in the oven.
Once baked, it will look like this decorated loaf
or like these decorations.
It won't move because the glutens would otherwise
make the decorations blow up.
So you can take your piece of your dough
that you've left aside and add some flour until it
becomes resistant to more.
Use your rolling pin and roll it out.
You will want to do some doughs very thin.
They're almost sheet of paper like or like a leaf.
Some a little thicker will allow you
to have a good base to add some more decorations on them.
And yet, some thicker ones will help
you create thicker decorations, like little wheat ears.
To make these decorations, you need a good and sharp knife,
water, and a little brush to keep the dough hydrated.
This is very much key.
You need to keep it hydrated in order for it not to crust.
A rolling pin, and then these little circles
will just allow you to have a more regular shape.
You could even use the screw cap of a water bottle.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
We're going to start with the simplest
decoration-- the leaves.
Now for this one, we're going to use the thinnest dough.
And make this a little smaller so I can work it more easily.
And here, what I'm going to do is just simply cut through
to create the leaf.
Very simple.
The trick with this is that anything you do
and where you're sort of tucking in the dough
and trying to hide it will reveal a baking.
So any mistake you make here will show once it's baked.
And this is the difficulty of it.
Here, to cut the center, you can use the sharp side
of the knife using it very thinly
and having a very thin touch or the back of the knife.
I'm going to use the back of the knife
because it's really about marking the leaf's veins.
And in fact, the vein at the tip of the leaf
is usually thinner, so I'm going to use the thinner part.
Press it down so that it marks down the dough,
and that's enough.
And then if you want to carry on doing the veins of the leaf,
you can create your own design.
There's no perfect way of doing it.
It really is your inspiration.
And you could either bake it on nothing at all
or bake it on a piece of bread.
But the most important part is that when you're done,
you just water it out so that it doesn't crust.
The crusting will leave an unfinished feeling to it,
and that's what you want to try and avoid.
The water will also stick to a wooden plank.
So once you've done it, give it a final form,
and then make sure you don't have
to move it in a way that will destruct your decoration.
So that's the easiest, one of the simplest decorations, ones
that you can actually do with your kids.
That's a great way of getting them accustomed to the dough.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
If you want to use your dough as a base,
use a little thicker dough.
It can be about double the previous dough, something
that just feels like it could hold something on it.
I'm going to do a heart as the base
for the rose we're going to do thereafter.
Sharp tools are always better.
So if you have a tool that is of metal,
it usually is more effective than plastic.
Now here, what I want to show is that as soon
as you get to a dough that's a little thicker,
you want to make holes to it so that it doesn't blow up
in the baking.
I've reinforced this dough with flour.
It shouldn't grow all that much, but there's always a little air
pocket that does the work.
So if I'm going to use the other side on top,
I'm going to just poke a few little holes
so that any air pockets will deflate as we're baking.
So I have this as a base.
And then a child may decorate some of it,
just to get themselves familiar with the dough.
This is really about a quick touch-up
in texture and no more.
You can use a pen.
You can use any types of homemade tools.
But once you're done with your decoration,
don't forget to add some water to keep it moist.
If your dough tends to dry, it's not worth going further.
Do not make any decorations which you
feel have dried up too much.
It just won't look nice.
So I have my little base here.
So I'm going to make the little roses.
The roses are some of the more delicate decorations to make.
I'm going to use the thinnest dough,
and I'm going to use little circles.
And I'm going to cut out a few.
The idea is you want to have at least half a dozen
that you can play around with.
And prepare them ahead of time because it just
makes your life easier.
I start with just wettening the center.
In a rose, you have the very center, the rosebud.
So to do this, I start with one little round,
and I fold it on itself to create the little rose heart
in center.
It's just very delicate and simple.
Very thin, but it makes a difference.
Then you're going to add the petals.
Now to add the petals, hold your rose heart
in one hand, wet each petal, and start building your flower.
Now here, you add it from the center.
When you're doing this, think about the way
you want your rose.
Do you want it to be very open, or do you
want it to be very closed?
Is it a morning rose, or is it one
that's been in the sun all day?
And start adding the little leaves.
The water serves as a way to stick,
but also as a way for the dough not to dry.
So it's just about slightly humidifying it and building
your flower.
There's no perfect order.
Nature does a beautiful job and does create some asymmetries.
You can even do a competition of how many petals you can make
and how big.
But as it gets bigger, the base is going to be larger.
And so, bear that in mind.
I'm going to stop here.
I have a rose that's a small little open flower.
What might happen is the dough might get a little slippery
if you put too much water, or it might get a little sticky
if it's not enough.
Don't be deterred.
You can even start it over again.
The main thing here is on the bottom,
you want to make sure that it's nice and flat.
So you can use some scissors.
It will squeeze out the dough a little bit.
But now, I have a clean bottom to hold the dough.
You can even go as far as creating a little slot
to ensure that it holds the dough together.
So here, you are just putting the dough
on the center of your little heart base.
Then you can add your leaves.
If it needs a little bit of water on the bottom,
that's a good moment to put it on.
You can have one leaf here.
And I'll put the other leaf there.
Now while this is delicate, you will
need to move it at some point.
So grab your knife.
And a good test is if you can hold it up,
even if it's just a couple of seconds.
If it holds in your hand enough time to put onto the bread,
then it will likely stay for the entirety of the bake.
So we have our little flower.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
And now we're going to move on to the little wheat chaffs.
You need to have a thicker dough.
Just roll a little circular cylinder here.
And then you can use your scissors.
We're going to cut one little ear, another little grain.
And use the center of the little grain
to move on to the next one.
To make this easier, you may decide
to do at first a much thicker wheat ear,
and that's absolutely fine.
It'll help you design the nicer ones thereafter.
Now I have my little ear.
You can use your knife to take out
a little bit of the thickness to make your life easier.
And just roll very delicately the bottom
because these little grains are holding
very lightly on the side.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
The last thing I'm going to show you is how to make letters.
So I have my banner here, and I'm
going to lodge the different letters.
To make the letters, I use the slightly thicker dough,
the dough you would typically use for a base.
And roll it underneath your fingers
so that it's perfectly rounded.
And this will become your ink.
So we can start drawing letters.
Here, it's just about drawing the letters
with a thread of dough.
And to finish it off, use your knife.
You do need to think ahead of how long your word will
be because once the letters are positioned,
you will not be able to move them all that much.
You may even decide between one or two letters
to add a little bit of water to ensure that it sticks.
Leave space on the side so that then you can take out the sides
and have a banner.
These decorations can be baked as is on a baking sheet using
parchment paper.
And you can use them thereafter as just little pieces.
You can also put them on the loaf.
If you're baking my wheat sourdough loaf,
as you remove the lid, put a little bit of water
on the place you're going to glue the decoration on,
and that's the moment that you're going to do it.
But if you do so, don't forget to not score the bread.
Because the scoring will impact the way
the loaf grows and therefore the way your decoration will hold.
These decorations, although edible,
really should not be eaten.
There's nothing wrong about it.
It's just reinforced dough with flour.
It's just really not that tasty.
These bread decorations can be used for any occasions.
When I was a child, my parents had bread decorations
done for every single birthday.
I made bread frames for my friends or little placeholders
for a special occasion.
I encourage you to experiment and turn your loaf of bread
into a work of art.
[MUSIC PLAYING]