L'hirondelle French Fresh Yeast 12 x 42g Blocks

made great croissants and loaves with this

I’ve tried dried yeast. It works. However fresh yeast makes bread with different taste and texture.It’s way more than I need so I freeze the remainder. It freezes really well and still works months later.The photo was a 1.5lb loaf made with 8g of the yeast but I think that’s a bit too much as it almost hit the lid of the bread maker. The bread was amazing and made the most delicious toast.I placed another order of this yeast for my mum last week and she was using 5g of yeast for a 700g loaf and it came out fine so it’s a case of finding what works for you I suppose. I’m not going back to powdered yeast. A single order of this yeast could potentially make 100 loaves of bread. That works out at about 12p of yeast for each loaf. Worth every penny.The yeast arrives well packed in a bubble wrap envelope with an ice pack.

This fresh yeast arrived very quickly after it was ordered which is important in keeping it fresh. It is neatly packed in a small box. The box has twelve x 42gm individually wrapped cubes of fresh yeast and the package contains a small freezer pack to try and maintain a low temperature for the journey, and this is particularly important in warm and hot weather. My pack had to travel to Northern Ireland and I must say it travelled very well. The ice pack, although thawed, was still very cool and it served the purpose well.Although I have been baking bread in many shapes, forms and types over many years now, and progressed to bread scoring, I have never ever used fresh yeast. Mostly what put me off in my early days of baking bread, were all the tales stating that it didn't keep and had to be used quickly, and the fact that it was often sold in 1kg and 500gm blocks. This was not possible for me when I was making only 1 or 2 loaves week. I never lost the curosity though and would have loved a small amount just to try it out, because I had read so much about the wonderful smell etc. I understand that some larger supermarkets where fresh bread was baked daily sometimes willingly gave you a small amount if you asked, but it seems this all stopped with the advent of Covid. I always used fast acting dried yeast granules, yet when my supply was running out I always was looking for something new to try, and I would always come back to yearning to try fresh yeast. That is when I discovered this fresh yeast which seemed to me to be a contender. This brand is also available in larger blocks but there is only a little difference in price for the individually wrapped 42gm blocks. I read every customer review here on AmazonUK and was greatly encouraged to find that although it has a very short use-by date, that it can be frozen very sucessfully. I also learned that a loaf that only requires 400gms of flour, just needs 14gms of this fresh yeast to have a very sucessful rise, and I have proved this to be true. 14gms is exactly a third of each block in the pack and it cuts very easily with a very sharp knife. It is sort of like cutting soft fudge and it may "flake off "little bits, but if you cut carefully this is really negligible. This is a good reason to buy this pack of 12x42gm blocks, as it would be a nightmare to try to measure out 14gm pieces off a larger block. You can just carefully cut each cube into 3 using just your eye to guage it. Extreme precision not required! I did this as quickly but carefully as possible, and wrapped each piece in aluminium foil, placed them in a small airtight plastic tub and stored them in the freezer. This way I have enough individual pieces of yeast to make 36 loaves of bread that use 400gms of flour in the recipe.Thawing is very quick and easy. NOTE: When taken out of the freezer it will thaw to a liquid so I suggest that you do the following: immediately put the frozen portion of yeast into a small jug or bowl for proving and add about 75 to 100mls/gms of lukewarm to warmish water, and stir it around a bit. Remember to subtract this amount of water from your total recipe liquid. It disolves very quickly. To this add about a tablespoon of sugar and stir and a TEAspoon of flour to give the yeast something more to feed on. This is very easy and again not needing to be totally precise. It will become automatic after you have done it once or twice. Then wait about 15 or 20 minutes for a froth to form on top. This way you know your yeast is working. If it is cold where you are baking give it longer or set your small bowl near or on a radiator or in your hot press. Then just add the frothy mixture to the top of all your other measured out ingredients and knead in using you usual method. There is no shame in letting a breadmaker do this job for you using a dough-only programme, or letting the machine do a complete programme right through from beginning to ending with a baked loaf. I have used both these methods for the purposes of this review and I will add photos of bread using each method. I have cut into the middle of the breadmaker version so you can distinguish it by the little notch at the bottom where the paddle was. The other I made last night using the dough programme, then knocked back the dough, reshaped and tightened it in and let it rise in a clay Schlemmertopf pot, in which I then baked it.My 400gms of flour was made up of 250gms of strong white bread flour and 150gms of freshly ground wheat grains. (Farmer in the family.) Irish wheat grains are notably lower in gluten and are not really suitable for breadmaking so I added about just under a tablespoon of Vital wheat Gluten (available on Amazon) to improve it. This would not be necessary with strong brown bread flour.SO:400gms flour + (OPTIONAL)1 tablespoon Malt extract+ 1 generous teaspoon salt+ 20mls(tablespoon) of vegetable oil or butter if preferred + 1 teaspoon to one tableapoon sugar to your own preference + approx 255-260 mls of water, (I use 100mls kefir+ 160mls water) and add in the yeast mixture. And that is it.(To explain the seeded look, I chose to mist and gently roll my risen dough in Sundlower seeds before baking.)Proceed with the recipe either using the breadmaker method or the dough only method and bake seperately in an oven in a covered casserole, at 200°C for around 55 minutes and then check if browned to your liking. Suggest 185°C-190°C if baking in an open bread pan for 40 -55 minutes but check before the end time to see if you are happy.Why all this detail? Well I gave this yeast (and myself) quite the challenge using freshly ground wheat and I was delighted with the outcome. Performance was excellent. The rise the texture and crumb were all very pleasing and the taste possibly somewhat better than the dried, quick acting yeast. I enjoyed using this yeast and will continue to use it. The smell of the fresh yeast is quite unusual, a bit (beer-y) but pleasant, but not detectable in the finished loaf. It is very easy to use and I enjoyed the feeling of using yeast in a traditional way. Made me feel very French! I recommend if you are into bread making that you give it a try.

The product arrived well packed with an ice pack to keep it as cool as possible in the post. The yeast worked well for the bread I was making but the best before date was only 7 days after delivery. As a home cook I could not use all 12 blocks of yeast in the 7 days. It appears, from internet searches, that fresh yeast can be frozen and so the remaining blocks are in the freezer and time will tell whether it will work as well when defrosted.

It fully met my expectations in its activity and produced a variety of good tasting bread. I had frozen some for later use and have now tried some. On thawing it has a squeezy texture which has not affected activity or bread flavour. A good product

I am not keen on dry yeast for baking the texture and taste never the same as with fresh yeast. I sometimes buy fresh yeast from the Eastern European shop. I thought when I was browsing and saw this I'd give it a shot, reviews seemed fine,the small block is ideal for what I used to buy back home. I froze them and when I use one I leave it in the fridge overnight covered and use it the next day. Happy with the outcome! Would gladly buy again.

I like this product and recommendThanks

Works perfectly well but I prefer my local bakery yeast