Rosemary Truffle Sea Salt Bread

The Tassajara Bread book was in my awareness for years before I bought it.  Every time it's name came up in conversation I would remind myself to pick up a copy...and then promptly forget.  I dabbled in bread making, but my attempts remained mediocre.

On a rare grey day in Colorado, I was wandering the aisles and rooms of the unfathomably awesome Tattered Cover Book Store in Denver.  I had spent most of the morning barricaded into a brick-walled corner by tall stacks of books, sipping my earl grey cambric and forgetting the world.  Stretching my legs, I arrived as if by supernatural force at an abandoned section of discount books.  The fabled Tassajara Bread Book stared up at me, bathed in a aura of shining light.  Trumpets blared.  Time stopped.  It was finally mine!

My reverence for this book has only grown stronger since I started baking with it by my side.  To me, it is the ideal cookbook.  The author, Edward Espe Brown, takes you under his wing, celebrating your triumphs and laughing with you at your mistakes.

This bread was one of those triumphs.  I followed Espe Brown's basic Tassajara Bread Recipe, using mostly whole grain spelt flour, adding a couple tablespoons of cracked dried rosemary and substituting black truffle sea salt for the table salt.  Before baking, I brushed the top of the loaf with olive oil, and showered it with more rosemary and truffle salt.  This is not your childhood sandwich bread that was useless but for making fluffernutters.  This loaf is seductive and sophisticated, to be eaten only in the best of company and with the best of dishes.  Consider using the leftovers (if there are any) to make a gourmet BLT: applewood smoked bacon, heirloom tomato, avocado and horseradish aioli.

  

You can find adequate reproductions of Espe Brown's quintessential bread recipe online, but really you should just buy the book. 

And finally- a shout out to Falls Church, Virginia, a place where at least two good things happened.  1) Edward Espe Brown fell in love with fresh baked bread while vacationing at his aunt's home as a child (Tassajara Bread Book Introduction, page XV).  2) I was born.