Lately, I’ve been into baking breads. This is to a large part prompted by the poor standard of Dutch bread. Also, I felt like it.
Here’s the recipe I go by these days. It’s based on this recipe, but most of the ingredients have been changed and I’ve translated the measures from moon-units into something civilized people can read.
Working time: 15 minutes
Total time: 8-12 hours
What you need:
- 350 g sourdough starter
- 500 g flour
- 100 g oatmeal
- 30 cl beer
- 1 tsp salt
- 50 g sunflower seeds
- splash of cream/milk (5 cl or so)
Preparation:
- Prepare your sourdough starter. If you don’t have one, create one using this recipe. It takes a week; I propose cheating a bit by kickstarting it with a bit of yeast. I’ll assume you keep your starter fed in the fridge (see how to maintain your starter here). On the day of the bread-making, take it out in the morning, and feed it. I typically feed it 3-4 spoon-fulls of flour and a dab of water. Leave on kitchen counter for 4-6 hours. If your starter is good, it’s not terribly time-sensitive, so 3 hours also works, as does 12.
- Take out around 350 g of the starter, feed the remainder 2-3 spoon-fulls of flour and some water, and put it back in the fridge.
- Mix the starter with flour, oatmeal, beer, salt, cream and around ⅔ of the sunflower seeds in a large bowl. Just splash it all together, no reason to save any flour for the mixing, because you should really knead using water on the tabletop instead of flour (my healthier variant of oil kneading).
- Knead the dough until things seem mixed up or you get tired of it – put the dough back in the bowl.
- Cover the bowl with dirty boxers or something more hygienic and leave to rest for 1-2 hours.
- Take the dough out of the bowl, separate into two, and knead them individually. Shape into two breads and put them on an oven tray – preferably with som baking paper separating the tray from the dough, but whatever.
- Moisten the breads using water, oil (not in the recipe!), eggs or whatever you fancy. I use water for maximum healthiness. Put the remainder of the subflower seeds on top and tap them so they stick to the breads real good. Optionally, make cuts in the breads for that extra EMO feeling and it looks cool after they have been baked.
- Cover the breads and leave for 3-4 hours. I typically focus more on the second raising period than the first.
- Put the breads in the cold oven and set it to 180°C hot air for 50 minutes. Probably switch it on.
- There is no step 10!
Hot tip: instead of using regular beer (I normally use Brand because I have a case right next to the kitchen), use a LFP for a darker bread and more smokey taste.
Health tip: if you’re super into hypertension, why not triple the salt dosage? The bread will taste like shit and your blood pressure will go thru the roof!
Pro tip: for a vegan version, add 100 g of fried bacon.
Serving tip: goes well with dishes that traditionally require bread; here pictured next to a salad (also, it’s sliced – I guess that could be the elusive step 10 above):
I’m thinking of doing experiments with adding olives, sun-dried tomatoes, and chickpeas as well. Should be good (and reduces carbs). Also beets, because I’m crazy about them at this time.
