The Easter holiday is drawing to a close, but I felt not quite done with baking before holiday was up... I was also running short on bread, so yesterday evening I mixed dough for my regular sourdough bread. Basically the kind that keeps me going throughout the week. Below is a copy of the formula.

It's one that I keep returning to because of its simplicity and because it's easy to fit into an otherwise hectic schedule. After bulk fermentation and shaping last night, the bread was proofed in the fridge overnight and baked this afternoon. Here's my most recent specimen, just pulled from the oven:

Below is another shot, of the bread and... it's offspring?? No, some jødekaker (directly translated as "Jewish cakes") that I baked this afternoon. These are common in some parts of Norway (i.e. you'll find them packed in bags of four in virtually every grocery store), and especially where I live in the south west. According to Wikipedia, these were brought to Scandinavia by Sephardic jews sometime in the 1600s. They were originally made with egg, flour, sugar and some sort of vegetable oil and the dough was kept rather dry so the cookies would keep well. Once in northern Europe, the oil was gradually replaced by butter, hence e.g. the Dutch joodse boterkoeken ("Jewish butter cookies" - please correct me if I'm wrong, any Dutch TFL'ers!). The Norwegian variety is very basic, typically made with flour, sugar, melted butter and first milk of cows. The latter, although not impossible to obtain, is usually replaced by soured milk these days. I used kefir in mine, and, although not spectacular by any means, they turned out quite alright.

Here's the mandatory crumbshot of the loaf:

I'm becoming more and more fascinated about our traditional (or "national/typically Norwegian") recipes in baking and cooking. Much of our "national cuisine" is characterised by simple, hearty and humble dishes, fit for farmers that toiled long days with intense physical labour. Food had to be preserved for a long, cold winter (which resulted in some delicious cured fish and meats), and it had to be stretched as much as possible (i.e. leftovers found good use in new dishes). In turn, many inventive and characteristic dishes were made, and each part of the country has its own take or variation on the same basic dish. I feel that learning the traditional dishes somehow offers a link back to past generations, and I find it very rewarding to enjoy this food with friends and family.

Another thing I wanted to try this Easter, was the traditional Norwegian fyrstekake, or "royal cake". According to my Google search, the recipe was introduced in Norway in the 1860s by a young apprentice at a pastry shop in Trondheim, and has since become a staple in the baking repertoire of grandmothers around the country. Sadly, most of the fyrstekake consumed these days is of the store bought variety, which tends to be rather dry and bland. I'm not sure when I last had a decent slice of fyrstekake, but it must've been years ago, and most likely at a family get-together. In other words, time is definitely ripe to get to grips with this cake and have a go at it myself.

I didn't have a recipe for the cake (though I knew it ought to be made with a buttery shortcrust and have a dense almond macaroon filling), so Google to the rescue once again. Funnily enough, one of the first hits I got, was Breadsong's blog! Apparently, Solveig Tofte, a Norwegian baker based in Minneapolis, brought two very fine specimens to a BBGA conference in Chicago in 2012. Breadsong's full write-up, including photo, linked to right here. Some further Google hunting also produced the recipe (courtesy of BBGA and Tofte): Link to recipe at BBGA.

Although it looks splendid, I must admit that I didn't follow the Tofte/BBGA recipe precisely. I already had a pâte sablée crust in the freezer, so I used that instead for my version. The sablée crust is probably a bit denser and slightly more buttery than the one in the BBGA recipe. Also, for a 22 cm diameter cake, I increased the amount of ground almonds to 230 gr., while keeping the weight of powdered sugar unchanged (i.e. 170 gr.). I used 3 egg whites to get a relatively smooth consistency of the macaroon filling. Since almond is such a key component in this cake, I would recommend grinding them yourself if you've got a suitable almond mill for the job.

Below is a photo of me getting ready to put things together: One lined tart form, strips for the top (re-rolled scraps) and the macaroon filling.

And here, the almondy, buttery goodness is ready for the oven:

Here is the finished cake, which I was quite pleased with. I think I would've liked a slightly lighter crust (some baking powder and a bit less butter would do the trick, I think), but apart from that I was very happy. A rustic sort of cake that keeps very well in the fridge.

I have always been a fan of Cyril Hitz's Focaccia.  It makes a full half sheet pan of a nice, thick focaccia.  

I like it sliced diagonally to use for sandwiches, one of the reason's I chose to bake it today.  

I also roasted a leg of lamb for tonights dinner and tomorrow's sandwiches. 

Everything was cooked in my wfo, except the cherrry pie.  I baked it in my just cleaned ovens.  No mess, I always use a pizza pan for a liner for those bubbly cherry pies.

All was delicious and the lamb roasted up nice and medium the way we like it.  It had a wonderful little smoky flavor.

The focaccia was something I decided to make this morning.  So I adjusted the poolish to fit today's cooking schedule.  It tasted wonderful even without the long overnight fermented poolish.   The oven was a little crowded with the two large roasting and baking pans.  I placed the foccacia very close to the low flames and so it had a fair bit of charring over the top crust..added just more flavor, rather like on a pizza crust.  Focaccia is a bread that bakes and taste very nice, when baked in a wfo oven, without the fire being removed.  

It was topped with olive oil, rosemary, garlic and finished with coarse sea salt.

Happy Easter!

Sylvia

After Easter extravaganza of hot cross buns, marzipans & lamb roast, it is time to at least make an effort to eat less heavy stuff. Which bread to start the new week? I remembered this recently revived post on flaxseed bread  : http://www.thefreshloaf.com/recipes/flaxseedwheatbread

Read both Dan Lepard's recipe and Floyd's version, with all the comments, once again. The bread seemed exactly what I was looking for. I adore flaxseeds and they are part of every multigrain mix in my breads, but had never used in such high proportion or as a star ingredient. The comments from many TFLers about the bread being dense made it challenging enought to give it a try. So here is how it went -

I kept the basic quantities in the recipe. I have promised my husband no seeds in bread for few more days, so I settled on brown flaxseed meal. I was not ready to use flaxseeds without any pre processing. Used 100 gms flaxseed meal and made a hot soaker with 100 gms water. Kept  it in warm oven for 4 hours. Decided for RYW levain instead of IY. Along with soaker, made a RYW levain of 50 gms WWF & 50 gms RYW. The next question was to knead or not to knead. The more I thought over it, kneading seemed to be a better way. Kneading is delegated to my BM as it kneads better than me (or so I tell it to make it feel motivated).

After 4 hours, the levain was ready. I dumped the levain, soaker, 200 gms BF, 2 tsp agave nectar, 1 tsp salt and 100 gms old refrigerated stock of RYW in BM and set it on dough cycle. I did not consider the water in soaker in my final hydration. Decided to add extra flour if needed. But did not need - the dough was beautiful as is. Soft, tacky and extremely easy to work with (ok so my BM did most of the hard work in the first half, but still it was a pleasure to watch the dough being kneaded). Checked after kneading was done to see if extra cycle was in order but it was good to rise. Did bulk ferment in BM itself. Looking at the dough after kneading was done, I was expecting a decent rise, but knowing the high amount of flaxseeds, would have been happy with anything between one and half times to double. At the end of dough cycle, it had more than doubled. Happy time.

Took out the dough and shaped roughly into a ball to give bench rest of 30 minutes. The dough was so easy that it did not need any flour or oil on work surface. The dough shaped beautifully with slightly wet hands. Put my claypot in oven to preheat at 500F. After 30 minutes, shaped the dough in a tight ball and placed in proofing basket, which was generously dusted with rice flour (didn't want to repeat my earlier blooper, but in this case it was probably excessive). Kept the dough seam side down as I didn't want to score. Another 30 minutes and the dough was ready for oven. Inverted on parchment paper, reduced oven temp to 475F and put in closed DO for 30 minutes. When I removed the cover after half an hour, I had to do a happy jig. The oven spring far exceeded my expectation. Kept for another 20 minutes uncovered at 450F. Then kept in turned off oven on rack, with door partially open for 30 minutes. Cooled overnight on wire rack. Today morning cut into a crusty and surprisingly light bread, which tastes amazing. Of course, it is not as light as white bread, but for this amount of flaxseed meal, I feel it did a great job. Thanks to Floyd & Dan Lepard for this winner. Here are pics of loaf and the crumb shot :

I've been learning and lurking on the site for about a year now and have learned so much from all of you!  Thank you!

Here are pictures of the latest bread I've made, a long fermentation wholewheat-rye sourdough.

Here is the crumb shot:

I'm really happy with this recipe which is as follows:

100 G whole wheat flour

100 G rye flour

200 G bread flour

100 G all purpose flour

105 G starter (100% hydration)

20 G salt

300 G water

I mixed and, rather than autolyse at this point, I tried some stretch & folds, but found it way too sticky....so I wet my hands several times and it was easier to do the S&F (but it was more like kneading than the usual S&F with a higher hydration dough).  I continued the S&F for about 30+ minutes, covered it with tin foil and left it on the counter (72 degrees F) for 7.5 hours and went to sleep.  The next morning I then shaped the dough and let it rise for 45 minutes.  I baked it at 450 degrees F for 20 minutes with steam throughout the entire 20 minute period (cast iron pan with a towel and water).  The crumb is very moist, as if it had been a higher hydration dough, and rather sweet-nutty tasting.  I really like the flavor of this one!  Any suggestions for improving this?