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Posts Tagged ‘sourdough fruit loaf’

Sourdough Fruit Loaf and Black Salt Kamut Bread

Posted in Recipes, tagged , , , on November 30, 2011| 51 Comments »

I’ve been experimenting with some variations on my salt-crusted bread recipe.

Firstly, a black salt and Kamut loaf, made by substituting wholemeal Kamut flour for the 00 flour in my original recipe:

  • 200g active sourdough starter ( 166% hydration, ie. fed at a ratio of one cup water to one cup flour)
  • 350g bakers/bread flour
  • 175g semola rimacinata di grano duro (remilled semolina flour)
  • 175g wholemeal Kamut flour
  • 375g water
  • 15g extra virgin olive oil
  • 12g fine sea salt
  • 10g brown sugar
  • Black Salt, for the pan

I followed the same methodology as used in my original salt-crusted loaves, sprinkling crushed black salt inside the tin in place of the Maldon.  It gave the loaf a beautiful speckled crust…

The bread was dense with a slightly cakey crumb and a subtle nutty flavour…

Secondly, I raided Pete’s muesli supplies to create this sourdough fruit loaf…

  • 200g active sourdough starter ( 166% hydration, ie. fed at a ratio of one cup water to one cup flour)
  • 700g bakers/bread flour
  • 375g water
  • 15g extra virgin olive oil
  • 12g fine sea salt
  • 10g brown sugar
  • 600g mixed dried fruit and nuts

I omitted the salt crust this time.  There was enough dough for one large tinned loaf and a smaller freeform one.  I baked them at a slightly lower temperature (200C with fan) to prevent the fruit from burning, and as a result the loaf in the tin needed a slightly longer baking time.  The little loaf burnt anyway, but the gerry-rigged pullman tin seemed to protect the crust of the larger loaf as it baked.

The fruit and nut mix included roasted skinned hazelnuts, sunflower seeds, pepitas (shelled pumpkin seeds), golden raisins, chopped dried figs, cranberries, dried blueberries and currants.  These were all added during the initial mixing, and imbued the dough with a soft purplish tinge…

Pete and I adored this bread. We had trouble eating anything else all weekend!

PS. As I mentioned in the previous post, if you’d like to try these recipes with a 100% hydration starter, reduce the added flour weight by 25g and increase the water to 400g.  If my maths is correct, that should work!

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In My Kitchen, March 2011

Posted in In My Kitchen, tagged , , , , , , on March 17, 2011| 34 Comments »

In my kitchen…

…is a bag of Syrian za’atar.  The gentleman in the Arabic nut and spice store convinced me that it was better than the Jordanian product I normally buy, and I couldn’t resist the artistic presentation – reminiscent of the coloured sand in glass bottles that were all the rage when I was a child…

In my kitchen…

…is a bottle of Canadian maple syrup, a gift from our friends Kevin and Carol who were over there for a holiday a couple of months ago…

In my kitchen…

…are three loaves of sourdough fruit bread, made to a new formula I’ve been playing with – a variation on the one I made last year.

The dough has 500g of fruit to the 1kg of flour (800g flour/100g rye/100g spelt) and contains a mixture of dried cranberries, Turkish figs, sultanas, currants, golden raisins and the wonderful candied peel I found at Harkola last Christmas…

The peel gives the bread a festive fruit cake touch, although I didn’t make my own like Heidi does…

In my kitchen…

…is a plate of greens from the garden, including basil, Italian parsley, purslane and sorrel..

In my kitchen…

…is proof positive that my friend Marty loves me!  He spent six months sourcing this kopi luwak as a surprise for me.  The coffee beans are a rare delicacy – eaten and then shat out by civet cats, whose digestive processes ferment the beans (which come out whole), resulting in an incredibly smooth and mellow coffee…

I took a handful to Manny, the world’s best barista, and he ground  the beans and made them up for us to taste.  It was a sublime and perfect way to spend an easy afternoon…

. . . . .

Tell me, what’s happening in your kitchen this month?

If you’d like to do an In My Kitchen post on your own blog, please feel free  to use this format, and to leave a comment here linking back to your post.  We’d all love to see what’s happening in your kitchen every month too!

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Sourdough Fruit Loaf

Posted in Recipes, tagged , , , , on August 27, 2010| 31 Comments »

I’ve been experimenting with sourdough fruit loaves, and came up with this rather pleasing combination. It’s slightly spicy, slightly sweet and quite addictive!

For my sourdough baking friends, the formula is listed below, but in more general terms, I adapted my standard recipe as follows:

1. The all white bakers’ flour was replaced with a mix of bakers’ flour to organic wholemeal spelt to organic rye in a ratio of 4:2:1 (600g bakers, 300g spelt, 150g rye).

2. A teaspoon each of honey and ground mixed spice was added to the dough.

3. Approximately half the flour weight in walnuts and mixed dried fruit was worked in at the initial kneading.

I didn’t soak the rye or spelt, but will try doing that next time to see if it alters the texture of the bread at all.  These loaves tend to brown very quickly in the oven, so need to be monitored carefully to avoid burning.

As you can probably guess, we’re having lots of fruit toast for breakfast this week!

Sourdough Fruit Loaf (makes three 850g loaves)

  • 300g sourdough starter (166% hydration)
  • 550g water
  • 75g extra virgin olive oil
  • 600g bakers’ flour
  • 300g organic wholemeal spelt flour
  • 150g organic rye flour
  • 1 teaspoon honey
  • 1 teaspoon mixed spice
  • 16g salt
  • 100g walnut halves
  • 100g raisins
  • 200g dried cranberries
  • 200g Turkish figs, chopped

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