If You’re New Here, Hi 👋
I’ve had a big wave of new readers lately, so a proper intro feels overdue.
I’m Matthew, a classically trained chef and baker with over 20 years in professional kitchens, bakeries, and classrooms.
I studied French cuisine early in my career and went on to cook and bake around the world, working in Japan, Denmark, NYC, Italy, and even on Vancouver Island. I spent five years at the Four Seasons Toronto and worked alongside Chef Daniel Boulud as a sous chef (opened two restaurants under his mentorship). I’ve trained with master bakers in Germany, studied (and taught) at world-renowned baking institutions, and represented Canada multiple times at Terra Madre in Italy.
For years, I was a Baking and Pastry Arts professor at Centennial College, where I taught and coordinated the baking management program.
Today, I’m a private chef for an ultra-high-net-worth family (don’t ask, I won’t tell you 😂), while continuing to teach, write, and bake.
I run:
- A blog at matthewjamesduffy.com
- A YouTube channel with 100,000+ subscribers
- A micro bakery with my wife
- Digital baking courses on rye, baguettes, panettone, sourdough, and sourdough pizza (all the courses are linked at the bottom of this email)
- And I wrote Bread, Etc. — now a national bestseller (which still feels surreal)
Everything I do revolves around one idea:
Bake like a chef. At home.
If you’re looking to seriously level up your skills this spring, I’ll be running an Easter sale on my digital courses soon. It’s the best time to jump in.
And if you’re just here for free recipes and to get better at baking one bake at a time, you’re exactly where you should be.
Pistachio Brioche with Diplomat Cream AKA Pistachio Beesting 🐝
Alright. Here it is. I’ve had a huge number of messages about this one, so I wanted to give it the proper write-up.
The base is a 300g brioche round, rolled out and topped with pistachio caramel before baking. Once cooled, it’s sliced in half and filled generously with diplomat cream.
The combination is what makes it special.
Buttery, fermented brioche.
Nutty pistachio caramel baked into the top.
Light, silky diplomat cream inside.
It’s inspired by a classic bee sting cake, but built on brioche instead of sponge.
For the diplomat cream, I used Jeffrey Hamelman’s method as a base, and the pistachio caramel was inspired by his approach as well. The brioche itself is my formula from Bread, Etc., but you can use any brioche you trust.
This isn’t an everyday bake.
This is a showstopper, and please read the full recipe before you start, as this one is an advanced recipe.
Oat Porridge Sourdough (With Roasted Sesame & Sunflower) 🌻
This week I made an oat porridge sourdough that absolutely crushed.
The base porridge was cooked with honey, then finished with butter and roasted sesame + sunflower seeds that I blitzed in the blender so they weren’t whole. That little move makes a huge difference. You get all the flavour and richness without breaking the crumb structure.
It was nutty. Slightly sweet. Deeply toasty. Super moist. And it reminded me why I love the porridge method so much. Once you understand the base idea, the combinations are endless.
I usually run porridge at about 30–35% of total flour weight. From there, you can swap grains, sweeteners, fats, seeds, even fold in fruit or spices.
A couple of important notes if you try this:
• Cook the porridge quite dry. It should be thick and gelatinous, not loose.
• You’ll always have slightly variable porridge weight because of evaporation. That’s normal.
• Instant oats cook faster and often need less water. Regular oats take longer and may need more.
• Always cook it dry enough that it holds its shape when cooled.
The porridge needs structure before it goes into the dough.
This one isn’t on the blog yet, but I’ve included the full Excel formula below if you want to bake it exactly as I did.
👇 Download the Oat Porridge Sourdough Formula 👇
Roasted sesame Oat porridge -new.xlsx
Want a More Open Crumb? Read This.
I put together a full guide and video that breaks down some tips on how to work with high-hydration sourdough, and it’s not just about adding more water.
High hydration is really about:
• Fermentation
• Flour strength
• Mixing strategy
• Dough management
Here are a few quick tips that make a massive difference:
1. Know your flour.
Weaker flours and softer grains absorb less water. Strong bread flour can handle more. Whole grains can take even more. Hydration isn’t a fixed number — it’s flour dependent.
2. Manage fermentation first.
A high-hydration dough that’s under-fermented will feel slack and impossible to shape. Often, the issue isn’t water — it’s time and temperature.
3. Hold back water and add it later (bassinage).
Develop strength first, then slowly add reserved water. You can always add water. You can’t take it away.
4. Use wet hands and folds to build structure.
Wet dough needs gentle strength building. Regular folds during bulk fermentation make shaping much easier later.
5. Cold ferment.
A proper cold proof firms up the dough, improves flavour, and makes scoring way easier.
If you’ve ever wondered why your “high hydration” loaf spreads instead of springs — this guide will help.
This week in the micro bakery 🕺Back in the Test Kitchen
We’re finally back to developing new recipes.
After a bit of a hiatus thanks to the intense book tour (still wild to say that), I’m back in the kitchen working on the website again, and it feels really good.
This week I played around with:
• Sourdough crepes
• Buckwheat crepes
• A new bun formula
• Hoagie / bánh mì rolls
• And a soft milk bread baked in a rabbit-shaped mould for my daughters (yes, I bought a bunny bread mould and yes, it was worth it 😂)
It feels like spring testing mode is officially on.
If there are specific breads, techniques, or recipes you’d love to see on the blog or in this newsletter, hit reply and let me know.
I can’t make everything… but I genuinely love the process of developing new formulas and sharing them with you.
Your ideas actually shape what gets baked.
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Happy Baking,
MJD
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Want to learn more from me? Check out my online video resources 👇
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