Tag Archives: overnight

July 5th, 2019

Summer evening bread

Category Weeknight baking Tags: boiled sourdough, Butter, overnight, Wheat, yeast 38 Responses

Already with the first recipe for my new “work day breads” there was the wish for recipes with some sourdough. Using a sourdough with a long, cold fermentation can cause problems with both the increasing acidity and the increasing enzyme activity. This can result in a weaker gluten network and a bread with less volume but with very chewy crumb.

There are two strategies to cope with this. The first one is using only a small amount of a very active sourdough. The second one is bowling the sourdough to inactivate microorganisms and enzymes. At the same time the starch gelatinise and binds water, which helps to enhance shelf life of the bread. This second strategy I choose for the summer evening bread.

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June 9th, 2019

Scharwaie

Category Bread, Overnight, regional breads Tags: Caraway seeds, Cream, flatbread, overnight, Rye, Salt, Wheat, wood fired oven No Responses

When I heard the term “Scharwaie” the first time, I had to asked my badish host to repeat the word. Spoken with Baden accent it sounds similar to “sha – wai”. Even a second repletion didn’t help me. Finally Iasked to write the word down, as my brain struggled to get the letters on the right places. The Term “waie” means flat bread or cake while “Schar” is thought to come from scrabbing left over dough pieces together after forming the regular bread. It is a traditional flat bread that is baked in Baden, a region in the south west of Germany. And as I am a collector of traditional bread I was hooked.

Back home I had to wait for another baking day at the wood fire community oven in our museum. But as I knew that our leftover dough pieces would not enough to feed the whole crowd, I prepared a dough just for this case. It is a dough with 80% wheat and 20% rye which rises over night in the fridge. In combination with some added sourdough, this creates a delicious flavour. Backed for a short time at high temperature, the bread is soft and fluffy and so delicious.

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May 31st, 2019

Röggchen

Category Bread, Overnight Tags: Buttermilk, only with yeast, overnight, Rye, Wheat 18 Responses

Last weekend I felt a hunger for rustic rolls with a good portion of rye. As the weekend was crowded with appointments, I opted once again for my favourite schema for easy sunday morning rolls: Proofing the dough over night. Forming, proofing and baking is something I can normally fit into our sunday morning routine easily. And having still warm rolls for breakfast is something, we love, too.

For the form I opted for simple but pretty pattern made by a roll stamp. This time I decided to press it down through nearly the whole roll which resulted in a beautiful flower-like looking roll. And so the rolls fulfil all my criteria for good weekend rolls: easy to make and delicious! Is there anything else to wish for?

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May 26th, 2019

Pause Bread

Category Bread, Weeknight baking Tags: Coconut oil, flaxseeds, only with yeast, overnight, pumpkin seeds, Sesame, sun flower seeds, Wheat 54 Responses

Last weekend, a reader asked if I had an idea for baking a bread on a busy week night. She had a clear idea of what ingredients she would like in her bread: white flour plus a tiny bit of whole grain mixed with a lot of seeds. And I had a very clear idea on how to make a bread out of this.

As the she needed a bread which ferments over a whole night and day, I decided to make a straight dough. The long fermentation yields enough flavour. And I decided to add the seeds without soaking, too. But before anyone is now worried about the bread going dry: I added enough water for the seeds to soak during fermenting without withdrawing to much from the dough.

I used the recipe directly on this very busy weekend. Normally I would postpone baking to a calmer day, but so it worked like a charm. A great bread for busy days!

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March 11th, 2019

Buttermilk Braid

Category Bread, hand kneaded, Overnight Tags: Buttermilk, Cream, Hand kneaded, only with yeast, overnight, Water roux 20 Responses

It was such a stormy Sunday! The sun was glimpsing through the clouds now and then, but the whole time trees were bending under the power of wind. It was the right weekend to stay home and bake bread.

And so I bake a delicious braid. But as we have a tiny bit of stormy days in our life, too, with a lot of appointments eating up time, there was no time for a preferment. And as I wasn’t baking in my own kitchen, I had no kitchen machine to take up kneading either. These were the facts I had to build my recipe around.

At the end, I opted for buttermilk and a long, cold proof to enhance flavour. And I decided to bake the Braid in Swiss Style, which means: no sugar in the dough. Without sugar, it is much easier to knead the dough to middle gluten development as sugar tends to inhibit gluten development.

My plan worked as well as I could hope for, and the next day I started my morning with some freshly baked bread. Is there a better start in a chaotic week?

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January 26th, 2019

Emmer Baguette

Category Bread, Overnight Tags: bean flour, Emmer, overnight, wheat free 4 Responses

Having a cold means for me today, that I had to stayed warmly tugged under a blanket on the sofa instead of baking bread in a wood fired oven. To avoid getting to grumpy about that fact I decided to look back on past baking adventures:

For Christmas eve I promised to bring some baguette. And as I felt adventurous I decided to try the Emmer Baguette I was thinking about since I baked the emmer ciabatta last autumn. The white emmer flour which I used lays somewhere between Type 812 and 1050. So it has still a good portion of bran. To enhance the gluten network I opted for enzyme active bean flour – just like I did for the spelt einkorn baguette. And it worked surprisingly well, leaving me with a dough which was easily shaped to a baguette. It hold it shape very well during proofing and had a gorgeous oven spring. The crumb was not as open as I wished for – I guess it is due to the weaker gluten network of emmer compared to wheat or spelt. But the flavour makes us forget about this very fast, as it is at the same time creamy and nutty. So they are a delicious addition to the baguette family on the blog.

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September 23rd, 2018

Pumpkin Seed Rolls with Einkorn

Category Overnight, Rolls Tags: Einkorn, overnight, Potatoes, pumpkin seeds 11 Responses

After some really hot days weather has turned and its finally “real autumn”. And on this cold and rainy Sunday morning I am very glad that I can sit in front of my oven and see how the Pumpkin Seed rolls rise in the heat. And I feel a bit sorry for all people who have to run through the pouring rain in order to get fresh rolls for breakfast.

My Pumpkin Seed Rolls follow once again my favourite formula: a slow overnight dough which is just cut into squares the next morning. A part of whole grain flour is also some I like to add to these kind of rolls, as it adds a deepness to the flavour. In this case, the flavour is especially delicious. The nutty flavour of Einkorn and pumpkin seeds works well together to give these rolls its specific aroma.

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September 16th, 2018

Emmer Ciabatta

Category Bread Tags: Emmer, overnight, wheat free 10 Responses

When I was shopping flour in our local mill I discovered a white emmer flour and I couldn’t resist. It was to tempting and I had already the idea of a pure Emmer Ciabatta in my mind.

The “white flour” of the ancient grains can be varying in their “whiteness” as there is no norm to classify it. My flour turned out to be a darker shade of “white”, so I guess it will equal something between a Type 812 and a Type 1050.

Kneading dough with ancient grain flour needs more attentiveness, as their gluten networks is more fragile and easy to over-knead compared to spelt. So testing gluten development during the kneading is a must here. The window pane test will help to judge this.

The flavour of this bread is great: deep, complex and irresistible nutty but without the slight bitterness of whole grain bread. And I’m already thinking of what to bake next with the other half of the flour bag…

Emmer-Ciabatta

yields 4 Ciabatta

Autolysis

500g white Emmerflour
350g Water

Dough

Autolysis
4g Psyllium hulls
50g Sourdough from the fridge (100% Hydration)
25g olive oil
10g Salt
5g fresh yeast

2. Water addition

90g Water

Mix flour and water and let it rest for 60 min at least.

Now add the remaining ingredients of the dough and knead for 5-8min at slow speed, adding the water in small increments while kneading. At the emd, the gluten network should be very well developed and the dough should be sticky.

If possible, place the dough in a square container, as this makes it later more easy to cut the dough into squares. Ferment for 3 hours, folding every 30min, then place the dough in the fridge for at least 16 hours. After that time span dough should be bubbly. If not, increase the fermentation period a bit.

Heat the oven with baking stone to 250°C

Flour the countertop and carefully turn the dough on it. Divide the dough with a dough scrapper into four pieces. Gently stretch the dough pieces to the typical ciabatta shape.

Lay on a couche (floured), cover with a second cloth and proof for 50 min.

Bake on the preheated stone for 35 min with steam.

July 1st, 2018

Pizza Dough with sweet Starter

Category main courses, Overnight, Tartes & Quiches Tags: olive oil, overnight, Pizza, Sweet starter 26 Responses

I already baked Pizza in a lot of variants. And as I like to test new recipes, today I present you a variant with firm dough and sweet starter.

The use of an rather firm dough has – especially when you bake in a wood fired oven – the advantage of easy handling. To archive a bubbly crust requires a well proofed preshaped doug. As I learned from a pizzaiolo the dough balls are in perfect condition, if you turn them and there is a lot of small and middle sized bubbles at their bottom. Big bubbles aka “holes” are not so good as they tend to make the dough base uneven. Forming the dough base is very easy if the dough balls are well proofed, too, because the gluten network is relaxed at this point.

Due to the sweet starter and a long cold fermentation in the fridge, the flavour is complex with subtle notes of lactic acid. It adds a deepness to the pizza flavour which makes it to a favourite of mine!

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June 9th, 2018

Whole Grain Spelt Bagel

Category hand kneaded, Overnight, Rolls Tags: Hand kneaded, only with yeast, overnight, Spelt, wheat free 15 Responses

Inspiration is a strange thing. In case of this whole grain bagel it came to me in form of an advertisement “to-go products” at the side of an supermarket. “Bagels” I told my beloved one while musings “are a good idea”. Back home I stumbled across a back of whole spelt flour and the different ideas melted together to one recipe.

As I baked them not in my own kitchen, I simplified the recipe as much as possible: hand kneaded dough and a long resting period in the fridge make sure, that they can be baked with no fancy equipment or preferment at hand.A spoonful sourdough can help to further improve flavour, but it is not mandatory. As the whole grain flour needs more water then white flour, the recipe has a higher hydration then the normal bagel recipe. Together with the overnight fermentation in the fridge this ensures that the bran can soak up all water needed. This helps to keep the crumb chewy and to enhance the bagel shelf life. But anyway – after two days all of the bagels were already eaten as they tasted so good…

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