Tag Archives: Rye

January 29th, 2017

Moist Spelt

Category Bread Tags: flaxseeds, Kürbiskerne, Rye, Sesame, Sourdough, Spelt, wheat free 89 Responses

Last November a reader asked for a recipe of a moist spelt bread with high whole grain portion and different seeds. I had an idea for the bread very quickly: With a whole rye sourdough, many pumpkin seeds, some flax seeds and sesame and a good portion whole spelt flour – partly in a water roux for more moisture. But then the pysllium husk discovery happend and I changed my plan fastly. Instead of a water roux I decided to use the pysllium hulls to increase water binding. And I added some butter which makes the crumb nicely soft and helps to keep it fresh.

The result is a moist and aromatic bread. The crumb is full of pumpkin seeds and a thick crunchy crust. A bread with potential for a a favourite!

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November 15th, 2016

Röggelchen

Category regional breads, Rolls Tags: Malz, regional, regionale Brotsorten, Rye, Sourdough 20 Responses

In the cologne pubs (called “Brauhaus”) exists a dish with confuse tourists regulary. It is called “Halve Hahn” and the tourists translate this with “half rooster” and expect to get a half roasted chicken when they order it. What they get is one half of twin-roll together with old gouda cheeses, mustard and some onions. There are many theories to explain the name of the dish – one is that once upon time someone asked in the cologne dialect if he could get on half of the roll: “Ääver isch will doch bloß ne halve han” (But I want just one half).

The roll that comes with the dish is called “Röggelchen” (little rye) and is baked as twin roll. You can tell in which city the roll was baked by the way it was formed: The Röggelchen from Düsseldorf has a round shape while the Cologne one’s shape is long. Both in common is that they are made partly with rye. In this variant the rye is used to make a sourdough, which adds complex flavour notes to the rolls. Another typical characteristic is the dark, shining crust which is due to a glazing which is made with roasted starch and applied before and after baking.

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October 23rd, 2016

Oberländer Bread

Category Bread, regional breads Tags: regionale Brotsorten, Rye, Sourdough, Wheat 88 Responses

The “Oberländer” Bread is a bread with tradition and stormy history: In 1829 the city council of cologne fixed the price for bread. The Bakers did not agree and so the bakers strike started. To get bread for the city, the council ordered bread in the region upriver, the so called “Oberland”. As this region has poor soil, the bread is baked with lots of rye there. This yields a bread with long shelf life and so it could be easily transported down the rhine to cologne. The cologne inhabitants liked the bread very much and even after the strike was ended they insisted on getting their beloved “Oberländer”. And so this bread is baked in cologne until today.

The characteristic shine of the crust is due to a glaze made of starch and water. Another characteristic trait of this bread are the tree slashes across the loaf. It is a mild rye bread with a fine crumb and a long shelf life. It pairs well with both hearty and sweet. And so it is both a beautiful bread for the regionalen Bread series and a good gift for someone who just moved to cologne.

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September 30th, 2016

East Frisian Black Bread with Sunflower Seeds

Category Bread, regional breads Tags: regional, regionale Brotsorten, Rye, Schwarzmarkt, Sonnenblumenkerne, Sourdough 144 Responses

The very first suggestion I got for the post series “regional bread” was East Frisian Black Bread. As I already wrote a recipe for the magazine “Ö” I needed another variant – and decided to create a new recipe using sun flower seeds and coarse rye in a soaker. A bigger batch of sugar beet syrup makes the crumb darker and adds a subtle sweetness to the sour flavour notes from the sourdough.

It is a very aromatic black bread, and the soaker helps to create a moist crumb. Cut in slices and wrapped in paper I took it with me to the food swap “Schwarzmarkt” in cologne. A attentive reader maybe already noticed that I used the food swap to bake a big batch of different rye breads. It was a good opportunity to bake a lot of rye breads without suffering from my sensibility to rye. and to provide you, my dear reader, a new batch of rye recipes. This is for me another advantage of this great Swap.

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September 18th, 2016

Rheinisches Krustenbrot

Category Bread, regional breads Tags: regional, regionale Brotsorten, Rye, Sourdough, Wheat 43 Responses

The second bread for my regional bread collection is one I know well: a crusty bread from the rhineland, called “Rheinisches Krustenbrot”.

These crusty breads you can find in different parts of Germany and they vary in the amount of rye which is added to the dough. I know it as a mild bread with only 10% rye flour added. It is baked with seamside up which creates the typical rustic look of this bread. It has a light, fluffy crumb and – as the name suggested – a thick, crunchy crust.

I baked my version of this bread using two different sourdoughs: A rye sourdough which adds a hearty note to the flavour and which contains all of the rye in the formula, and a mild wheat sourdough which adds a joghurt like note to the taste of the bread.

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September 10th, 2016

Regensburger Kipferl

Category regional breads, Rolls Tags: [:de]Kümmel[:en]Caraway seeds[:], Öl, Pâte fermentée, regionale Brotsorten, Rye, Sourdough, Spelt, Wheat 12 Responses

Finally I can post the first recipe in the upcoming post series of “regional breads” and can tell you how I came to this idea.

It all started with an email from the Magazine “Ö”, asking if I could develop some recipes form different German regions for their September issue. Of course I could and shortly after I was whirlwinding in the kitchen, baking Eastfrisian Blackbread, Schrippen from Berlin, Cologne Röggelchen, Göppinger Briegel, Swabian Spelt bread and Bavarian Farmers Bread. At the end of the week the bread was stacking in my kitchen and some colleagues and family members would find anonymous gifts of bread or rolls 🙂 I sent the recipe together with some Gerstl to the photographer who bake the bread, too and took the pictures.

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September 3rd, 2016

Sourdough bread with 60% rye

Category Bread, Bread baking for beginners Tags: Anfänger, How to do, Rye, Sourdough, Wheat 41 Responses

I was asked more than once to publish a sourdough rye bread recipe for the “Bread baking for Beginners” post series. I hesitated as a rye bread is not so easy to handle as a wheat one and to know when a pure sourdough loaf is ready to bake needs some experience. But with the Rye bread without sourdough we had already the right starting point to step into the world of sticky rye dough – practising this bread before switching to sourdough is highly advisable.

To rise the bread with only sourdough in a reliable way, the sourdough has to be very active. If it is not so active or was in the fridge for a longer period, making a refreshment to activate the sourdough yeast the day before is a must. The rye sourdough is then build in two stages to archive a well balance flavour and a high activity. The two stages make use of the fact that lactobacteria and yeast differ in their temperature optima. The first, cooler and firmer stage is perfect for the growth of bacteria , which produce lactic acid and acetic acid. The warm and soft stage then favours the yeasts which are needed for a good oven spring.

The recipe, which I created for this post contains 60% of rye and 40% of wheat flour which makes the dough sticky but still good to handle. It is a classical german “Roggenmischbrot” (literally mixed rye bread), with a slight sour and hearty flavour. Different bread spices which are sprinkled into the bread form add a spicy note to its taste.

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June 18th, 2016

Double baked Farmers Bread

Category Bread Tags: Caraway seeds, Fenchel, Koriandersaat, Rye, Wheat 29 Responses

One of the best methods to achieve a thick, crunchy crust is to bake a bread twice: after cooling down the bread is placed in the oven for a second time for about 15 min. During that time the crust gets its extra bit of crispiness.

And this method I used for this farmers bread. It contains 15% Rye flour and the typical Bavarian bread spice mixture of caraway, fennel and coriander seeds. If you, like me, have a well stocked supply of spices then it is easy to mix the needed spices by yourself. For grinding you can use either a mortar and pestle, a food processor or a coffee mill. And if you have a grain mill which allows you to mill oily seeds, then the easiest way is to mill the seeds with some wheat berries – just remember to reduce the amount of flour accordingly to the amount of wheat you mill.

The amount of bread spice is seasoning in a discreet way without overpowering the other flavours of the bread. This makes this bread suitable for hearty cheese as well for sweet spreads like honey.

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June 12th, 2016

Kekkis Everyday Bread

Category Bread Tags: Buttermilch, Kefir, Rye, Sourdough, Spelt, Sweet starter, Wheat 11 Responses

I like recipe tweaking – especially when this happens so spontaneously like here. Duríng a nice exchange about sweet starter the questions occurred how to add the starter in a existing and trusted everyday bread recipe. I offered help and Kekki posted her formula and the wishes for the new versions. The recipe sounded very good, made with Kefir or Buttermilk, 20% rye and 80% wheat. I exchanged the wheat sourdough with sweet starter and added a long, cold autolysis for the whole grain flour. And I baked the recipe directly, as it sounded so tempting. And I was not disappointed: The bread is very flavourful, with a hearty tangy note, good crust and soft crump. A true everyday bread!

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May 15th, 2016

Light Rye Bread

Category Bread Tags: Altes Brot, Rye, Semmelbrösel, Sourdough 20 Responses

I like to bake “by order” as I can then bake bread I bake rather seldom. Pure Rye bread, for example, as I have a rather sensitive stomach who do not like the higher acidity of rye bread. And while I do not eat rye bread I still like to bake it. Its different consistency makes it a bit challenging and is a nice change in my wheat- and spelt-dough routine.

For this bread which I bake for a big birthday I choose so called “Lichtkornroggen”. This is a rye variety containing light coloured rye seeds instead of the normal grey green coloured rye. It is a modern back breeding from ancient rye varieties and yields a lighter bread then normal whole rye flour. Its flavour is milder as well and so I build the sourdough in the classical german “three stages”: The so called “Anfrischsauer” (refreshed sourdough) to activate the yeasts is then followed by the low hydrated “Grundsauer” (basic sourdough) to generate a well balanced acidity and the last step called “Vollsauer” (complete sourdough) in which the warm and soft dough is perfect for yeast and homofermenting lactobacteria and in which the sourdough develops a lot of activity. Continue reading →