one good loaf

friday is rye day :: bread no. 7

Most of the sources I've looked at make rye sound so complicated: "the key to a good rye," says one "is to use several fermented pieces reserved from an earlier loaf.  Store bought will do."  What?  If I wanted to purchase a loaf of rye bread I wouldn't be baking my own.  At some point there must be a starter. 

I'm inventive in my day to day cooking, so why not try a little experimentation in the baking area as well? How hard could it be? Right? I set aside the recipes and set out on my own.

What follows is an adaption garnered from some basic recipe ingredients, incorporating the long rise method of the Bittman NYT 'no knead' article, (right sidebar) which mirrors the principals of the heretofore mentioned, Andrew Whitley.

seeded rye

step 1:  make the starter:

1 cup rye flour

1 cup water

1 tsp. yeast

1 small onion (finely diced and sauteed or microwaved util soft)

Mix all. Let stand at room temperature, overnight or 12-18 hours.

-------------------

step 2: Add to the starter:

1 cup water

2 tsp. salt

3 Tbl. olive oil

3 Tbl. molasses

1/4 cup caraway seeds

1/2 cup cornmeal

1 + 1/2 cups bread or all-purpose flour

1 + 1/2 cups rye flour

In stand mixer whisk all ingredients but the last 1/2 cup of flour.  Change wire whisk to bread hook attachment and continue adding the final half cup until incorporated.  The dough will be very wet and will not wrap itself around the bread hook as it does with other breads.

scrape out dough into greased bowl and cover with plastic.  Let stand 2 hours - overnight (or longer, or refrigerated overnight if desired).   

Bring dough back up to room temp.  Cut in half for two loaves.  Turn out onto floured surface, coating each in flour all around.

  

[bake one today; refrigerate one for tomorrow.]

Quickly form into ball and place on a lined baking sheet. Let rise 1-2 hours.  Timing is really flexible on all of this, as I followed the "practice patience" advice of the NYT article.

Pre-heat oven to 400.  Bake for 10 minutes, then reduce oven temp to 350 for remaining 15-20 minutes, or until tapping on the loaf makes the desired "hollow sound."

Let bread cool, then slice and deliver to your handsome, hardworking husband in his home office.

 

It turned out not half bad, and I'll be sure to freeze a couple of crusts of this loaf for the fermented 'starter' for the next. 

Cheers!

giving the gift of bread

 

[image courtesy of EllynAnne Geisel]

Author of The Apron Book, EllynAnne Geisel, has come up with a fantastic idea that I'm sure will be of interest to our readers/bakers: National Tie One On day.  Excerpts from her website say it best:

"On the day before Thanksgiving, EllynAnne encourages us to pause in the preparation of our own meal, wrap a loaf of bread in an apron, tuck a prayer or note of encouragement in the pocket, ... and deliver the wrapped bundle to someone in need of spiritual or physical sustenance.

... “Women clad in aprons have traditionally prepared the Thanksgiving meal,” says EllynAnne, “and it is within our historical linkage to share our bounty.”

In celebration of the event, Ms. Geisel is hosting a book give-away on her blog.  See her post for details and leave a comment to enter.

If you should choose to participate in National Tie One On day, please feel free to share any photos you may take in the our flickr pool. 

----------------

Also, check out this fun (unrelated) flickr group: tie-one-on.

 

'try something new' challenge

 

... Jesspunky, with her apple doughnuts, by random drawing.

Please send a flickr mail with your address and Melanie of Lit*chick will mail your book directly.

Thank you once again to Melanie for making this fun offer available.

-----------------------

... is closed.

I will be back in a short while to announce the winner.

bread no. 6 (another variation on 3+4)

 

I know, I know ... I'm supposed to be "trying something new" this week for the give-away theme,  and even though I am removing myself from the running for the prize, I do plan to play along thematically baking 'something new' tomorrow.

Meanwhile, the kids still need to eat, and this recipe is so wonderfully simple that I quite literally don't look at the recipe anymore.  This time, I changed it up with half rye flour instead of all the wheat and baked in one large pan instead of two.  It was lacking that hearty rye flavor so I'm going to look for a traditional seeded  rye recipe next time.

I find it interesting that, when I began thinking about baking each week I never conciously thought that we would eliminate all of the store-bought breads right away.  My family can consume big quantities, so I thought initially that we would be supplementing our meals this way.  A happy consequence of baking has been an easy shift -- I haven't bought bread in the store in weeks.  None.  

------------

Several 'one good loaf' bakers who are sharing recipes and posts on their blogs have been added to the sidebar list to the right.  Please send me a comment if I have, by chance, missed yours.

The 'something new' submissions in the group pool this week are so deliciously inspiring. 

There is still time to enter a photo for the book give-away challenge; which closes Sunday afternoon, at 4pm (EST.)

November mosaic

 

A beautiful sampling of recent baking by group members. Click red titles to link to individual photos and credits:

1. last week looks like this week and the week before  2.  pumpkin scones with cranberries  3. playing with dough 4.  spelt bread  5. Italian braid  6. corn porn 7. second rise  8. blue yonder daily bread recipe 9. 365/6 10. kneading the dough  11. daily bread 12. fougasse 13. challah bread two 14. first loaf 15. baking  16. warmth.

bread no. 5 :: classic banana nut

 

A junior baker makes the classic favorite, but no walnuts for us; it's pecans all the way.  Nine year old Helen measured and mixed and blended and spooned her way through The Joy of Cooking's Banana Bread.  All mom did was sit by to answer a question or two, and to chop the nuts with the big knife.  I also removed it from the oven because she was nervous to get to near.

 

She was pretty pleased with herself upon tasting, having learned a good lesson: baking is, most certainly, its own reward.

try something new

    

Through the generousity of Melanie, at Lit*chick, one of our group members will recieve a copy of the wonderful book, How to be a Domestic Goddess, Baking and the Art of Comfort Cooking, by Nigella Lawson. 

This will be a random drawing from participants in the following challenge: try something new. 

Whether this is your first yeasted loaf, a new recipe or technique, the challenge for this giveaway is to try something entirely different with your baking that you  haven't done before.  This will be a random drawing from all category submissions; the degree of difficulty is not a factor.

To be elligable for the give-away you must post your 'something new' bread photo to the flickr pool before 4 pm (eastern standard time) Sunday night, November 16th - in the description line tell us what part of your submission is new to you.  

A week should give us all plenty of time to bake, take a photo and upload it to the flickr pool. The winner will be announced shortly after the challenge closes.

The group is always open to new members, and there is still time to join our online baking community and take part in the challenge.  To do so, you will need to establish a (free) flickr account, and then send a 'request to join' email via the group pool page.

Thank you, Melanie, for your early and enthusiastic support and for providing such a lovely book.

 

breads no. 3 & 4 :: variations on one recipe

After watching the video lecture by Andrew Whitley, and reading his blog post, and reading a couple more articles here and there, and what Deb, from Smitten Kitchen wrote ...something just clicked with me. I believed in the notion of a long rising time and the slow fermentation to develop a richly flavorful bread.  I also believed that I could accomplish this; that, in fact -- it is simple. 

With Mr. Whitley's metric recipe in hand, I promptly began converting the measurements and have been playing with it since.

In short, what I found in this recipe is pretty much what I was seeking at the outset:  with very few, natural ingredients and using healthy olive oil as the element of fat, I could create a hearty strong bread with flexible/forgiving timing.  You do not have to stand around for 3 hours to be near the oven at the correct time.  In fact, if you use a stand mixer with bread hook attachment, this is literally a one-bowl operation from sponge to kneading.  Super simple!

Something else that I appreciate about the process is that it requires a fraction of the yeast of nearly every other recipe I've read.  That is just plain good economics.  Those little yeast packets are expensive. Imagine yielding 4 recipes from one pack rather than one! 

Now the question I'm left with is this: what to do with those canisters of milk powder and shortening I have on hand?

Though this is a two step process, it is VERY simple.  You just mix it, then go about whatever your business might be. Time does the work developing the "fermentation" of the sponge.  The next step comes together easily with so few ingredients, and the reward of the full-bodied flavor is very gratifying.

Converted to US measurements and adapted from Andrew Whitley's recipe on Word of Mouth.

The basic recipe

step 1. overnight sponge

1 tsp fresh or 1/2 tsp. dry yeast

1/2 cup whole wheat flour

1/2 cup water

Set aside and let stand at room temperature 12-16 hours.  The bubbly mass should triple in size.

 

note: The second time I made the sponge I ran out of time in the day to bake.  I simply covered and refrigerated the sponge (cold slows/halts the yeast reaction).  Bring 'starter' back up to room temp. for an hour or so before proceeding to step two. This very long developing time caused no noticeable problems with the bread. 

step 2.  the final dough

to the overnight sponge add:

2  1/4  to  2 1/2 cups flour

1 cup warm water

3 Tbl. olive oil

1 tsp salt

Mix all the ingredients into a soft, wet dough.  Knead without adding extra flour until it is silky and slightly stretchy.  (I did all kneading with my stand mixer and bread hook, but you need not - hands will work fine.)  Cover and let rise 1 hour. (I let it rise slightly more time in both trials with no adverse reactions.) Divide in two equal portions (for mini loaves) dredge in whole wheat flour to coat and hand shape into greased tins.  Allow to stand 15-30 min. until dough crowns a bit.  Bake at 400 degrees for first 10 minutes, then reduce temp. to 350 for remaining 15 minutes.  Tap top of loaves, listening for that "hollow" sound to check that it is done.

yield: two small loaves (mini tins). You could certainly try 1 large loaf and watch/adjust baking time.

---------------------------------------------------

Variation no. 1

I used 100% whole wheat flour just as the recipe called for, but I added to the recipe 1/2 cup of sunflower seeds, and 1/2 cup of flax seeds.  I love the contrast of crunchy nutty seeds mixed with soft, stretchy bread.  Hand forming into a boule gave me the 'restaurant quality' that I wanted, but the dough spread more in width than height.  I was so happy with the end result it felt like a tiny party in my kitchen.

 

 

variation no. 2

This time I substituted unbleached bread flour for 1/2 of the total flour content.  In other words, in addition to the sponge, I added 1/2 cup whole wheat and 1 cup bread flour.  (I used unbleached King Arthur Flour which apparently contains an amount of barley according to the package.)  Also added 1/2 cup oat bran.  Hand formed small loaves to fit my small bread tins. It rose wonderfully.  This may have been my kid's favorite bread to date.

 

 

It's a wonder I got any photos of this loaf at all.

Let me know if you give it a try.  For me ... this is a keeper.

----------------

Note:  Watch for our first group challenge/giveway on Friday this week.

resources :: King Arthur Flour

Shorty before we were married, my husband was one of the fine building team who helped create a new headquarters for the King Arthur Flour Company, which they appropriately call Camelot.  Paul had the distinct honor of carving the wooden wheat-shaped pendant at the focal point of the heavy timber frame, and arranging the etched glass logo illuminated inside the pendant.

We became pretty enchanted by the spirit of the place, their people, and their company mission. It was during that time that I began to become more interested in creative food preparation and in using available, natural ingredients.

My wedding band is a simple golden shaft of wheat, designed the year we were both born, brought out from the Jeweler's back room after we  looked over the shop case with indifference. It has been a sort of ongoing reminder (of course of our vows) but also of the sort of life that we set out to create for ourselves together full of wholesome, simple and vital things.

It's no surprise then that I'm a bit biased toward the King Arthur Flour line of products.  One look at their extensive web site and you too will be hooked.  They offer a wealth of information not the least of which is a series of free online illustrated, step-by-step, baking classes.  These two specifically caught my eye:

Breads from the Hearth: Baguette & Ciabatta

Alternative shaping of French Dough

Through Thursday of this week their signature flours are on sale -- 20% off -- web only.

week 2 :: cinnamon oatmeal bread

I've been thinking ahead about special holiday breads and thought a good cinnamon scented gift loaf would be nice.  The loaf was touted as such in the cookbook, however even adding extra cinnamon and raisins to the recipe this fell short of the cinnamon swoon I was expecting.

Turned out to be a fine, dense everyday bread suitable for morning toast with coffee.  Next time though I'm using more cinnamon -- the kids agree.

reciope adapted from Bernard Clayton's Complete Book of Breads

Cinnamon Oatmeal bread

1 1/2 cups rolled oats

1 1/2 cups boiling water

3 Tbl. butter

3 Tbl. honey

1 Tbl. brown sugar

2 tsp. salt

1 cup raisins

1 pkg. dry yeast

2 eggs

2 cups whole wheat flour

2 cups white flour

melted butter for brushing

granulated sugar and cinnamon for sprinkling

With whisk attachment mix together oats and water with yeast, melted butter, honey, brown sugar, salt and 1/2 the raisins. Let stand for about 15 minutes. Add eggs and 2 cups flour.  Incorporate.  Change to bread hook attachment and gradually add remaining flour until the dough forms a soft mass, pulling away from the sides of the bowl. 

Let dough rise in an oiled bowl, covered with plastic for 1 hour.  Turn dough out onto floured work surface; divide in half and form each half into a rectangle.  Roll each with pin or shape by hand into a flat 8x12 rectangle.  Brush with melted butter and sprinkle generously with sugar and cinnamon.  Add remaining raisins. 

 

Roll (jelly roll style) and tuck ends underneath, placing seam side down into two greased bread pans. Cover, and let rise about 45 min.  Bake at 375 for 30-40 min. or until tapping on crust yeilds a "hollow sound."

Let cool. Slice and enjoy.