Vienna Bread

With all the emphasis on French and Italian rustic breads these days, it is easy to overlook the fact that the real center of the bread and pastry universe for hundreds of years was Vienna. Most of the great French breads that we love today, including baguettes, croissants, and even puff pastry, came to France a couple hundred years ago via the Austro-Hungarian empire, where they found a hungry audience willing to support these Austrian (which included Polish) bakers. Nowadays, the main distinction in American (and even European) bakeries between French, Italian, and Vienna breads, is the presence of a few enrichments in the latter. A little added sugar and malt causes the crust to brown faster, and a small amount of butter or shortening tenderizes the dough by coating and “shortening” the gluten strands. The shape, as with all culturally based bread, is determined by the baker based on function, but we usually think of Vienna bread as typically twelve inches long and weighing one pound. It is often scored down the middle to make a nice “ear,” but does not have quite as hard a crust nor as open a crumb as French bread. This dough makes exceptional pistolets (torpedo rolls), similar to the hoagie rolls made from the Italian bread on page 172, and it can be baked in loaf pans for excellent sandwich loaves. One of the best applications for this dough is to make Dutch crunch bread, as discussed on page 264.