Since it’s been spring I’ve been back in my springtime habit of sprouting things. I get all into it and sprout anything I can get a sprout out of and then I just eat them in or on everything. They’re just wonderful. This got me thinking about sprouted grain in bread, which is something that has crossed my mind more than once in the past, but I’ve never done.

I wanted to make a sourdough bread that included white and whole wheat flours and a large portion of ground sprouted wheat berries. I looked through all my books and didn’t find exactly what I wanted, so I wrote a formula myself. This is also something I’ve never done before, and boy was it exciting. I spent about an hour and a half the other evening, with a notebook and a calculator perfecting it on paper. Oh my…it was fun. After I was done, I felt a little drained and my boyfriend asked me which class I had been doing homework for. I told him what I had been doing and he said “man, even your hobbies are like homework.” He can’t really wrap his head around the fact that I find playing with calculators to be a lot of fun. :)

I ended up using both Peter Reinhart’s Whole Wheat and Sprouted Grain Bread from WGB and Hamelman’s Five Grain Levain as guides for my formula.

To sprout: Rinse whole grains or seeds or beans and soak overnight in a mason jar or other glass container of similar shape (for about 12 hours, softer or smaller things such as sunflower seeds or lentils could go a little less and bigger or harder things such as wheat berries and garbanzos could go a little longer). Drain and cover the jar with cheesecloth or muslin or plastic with holes poked in it and secure with a rubber band. Turn jar upside down, place in a bowl and cover with a towel. Twice a day, fill up the jar with water, swirl contents and drain through the cheesecloth. Place drained jar back in the bowl, upside down. I generally do this until the tails of the sprouts are about as long as the grain itself, which can take anywhere from 1 to 4 days, depending on what I’m sprouting. I learned from WGB, though, that when using in bread making, wheat berries should only be sprouted until you see just the beginnings of the tail, so it took me about a day (or two rinsings) after soaking for my sprouts. Note: you can save the initial soaking water and it is close to what’s called Rejuvelac. It’s quite nutritious and you can use it as part of the water in the final dough.

I also used amaranth sprouts in this bread, which ended up not grinding well, so they remained whole. They’re tiny so it ended up good.

I weighed out both sprouts to equal 200 grams and then ground them in a food processor. I’m sure any combination of sprouts to equal 200 grams would work great here. edit note: If you start out with a certain amount of dried grain and sprout it, you'll end up with more than you began with because the grain absorbs water and becomes heavier. So weigh out your sprouts after they've become sprouts and then grind them. If you have leftovers all the better; mix them in with some rice or throw them in your soup or oatmeal or salad or, you know, anything.

So here’s the recipe I used, I’ll skip the page of formula that comes before the final dough part.

· 200 g high gluten flour

· 67 g bread flour

· 116 g whole wheat flour

· 113 g ground wheat berry sprouts

· 87 g amaranth sprouts

· 288 g water

· 10 g salt

· 283 g ripe starter (75% hydration, I used 93% bread flour and 7% rye flour in my final build)

1. Mix and knead. I kneaded by hand for about 8 minutes, rested for 5 then kneaded for another 30 seconds or so. The dough is sticky.

2. Bulk ferment. It took me about five hours to get it to rise by about half. I stretched and folded twice, once at one hour and another two hours later.

3. Shaping. At this point the dough was smooth and pretty great looking. It felt a little heavy, as do many of my sourdoughs at this point. I shaped it into a big batard. Proof for about three hours, or you know, until you feel it’s ready (puffy looking, bigger, finger poke indent remains). Or, I imagine retarding overnight would work nicely. In fact, I think I’ll try retarding next time.

4. Slashing and Baking. I loaded it into a 500 degree oven with steam and turned it down to 450 after about 3 minutes. It baked for 37 minutes.

This bread turned out wonderfully, I’m so happy with it. The loaf is moist and it tastes slightly sweet and very mildly sour. It has an aspect of flavor that is deeper than other sourdough breads I’ve made with large percentages of whole wheat flour. Now I could just be waxing poetics about my sprouts, but I’m going to go ahead and say that this is they’re doing. I highly recommend trying out sprouts in bread, perhaps even as part of the soaker in some other recipe. They’re so nutritious and it’s the perfect time of year.

Onion and Poppy Seed Purim Ring

Purim is a Jewish holiday celebrating the story told in the biblical Book of Esther, when the Jews living in Persia were saved from being massacred. In celebration of Purim, one is commanded to “eat, drink and be merry”, festivities are held and fun is had for all. My contribution to BBD #8 (celebration breads, hosted by susanfnp at Wild Yeast blog) is an onion and poppy seed Purim ring from Maggie Glezer’s _A Blessing of Bread_. The following is excerpted from Glezer’s book:

As for the Purim connections: The twisted ring looks like Queen Esther’s crown, and the onions and poppy seeds are not only delicious but honor this queen’s bravery and piety. Queen Esther observed the rules of kashrut in King Ahashuarus’s palace by eating only fruits, vegetables, nuts, and seeds.

Despite its extravagant looking nature this was quite easy to make. Ok, shaping was a bit tricky, but not that bad. I don’t generally make enriched breads, so this one was intense for me. It’s very rich and quite delicious. I love the flavor of safflower oil which is why I chose to use it here, but I think next time I’ll go with a more neutral oil, the intensity of the oil flavor really comes through in the end. Make sure you have enough counter space to shape this stuff. My workspace is about 20” in length and the strands of dough need to be 30” long. I didn’t take this into account beforehand and ended up doing some tough maneuvering, but it worked.

Dough:

· 7 grams(2 ¼ tsp) instant yeast

· 500 grams (3 ¾ cups) bread flour

· 170 grams (¾ cup) water

· 2 large eggs, lightly beaten, plus one for glazing

· 110 grams (½ cup) vegetable oil (* I used safflower oil)

· 8 grams (1 ½ tsp) salt

· 55 grams (¼ cup) sugar

Filling:

· 275 grams (1 ½ cups) finely chopped onions (about one onion)

· 70 grams (½ cup) poppy seeds

· 3 grams (½ tsp) salt

· 85 grams (6 tbs) melted butter

Poolish

(* This wasn’t called for in the recipe, but I think it worked out pretty well)

Use 160 grams of the flour, all of the water and ¼ teaspoon of yeast and mix until combined. Let sit at room temperature for a couple of hours until some activity is apparent in the dough. Refrigerate overnight.

Mixing the Dough

Take the poolish out of the refrigerator a couple of hours before mixing the final dough. Then mix the remaining 2 teaspoons of yeast, the salt and the sugar with the remaining 340 grams of flour in a large bowl and set aside. Mix the eggs and oil into the poolish, and then combine this mixture with the flour mixture. Stir until vaguely combined. Turn out and knead for no longer than ten minutes (* I kneaded for about 8 minutes, the dough was firm, soft and very easy to knead).

Fermenting

Put dough into an oiled container and ferment for about two hours or until doubled in bulk. Alternately you can refrigerate now until the next day. When the dough is almost done fermenting mix the filling ingredients, divide in half and set aside.

Shaping and Proofing

Line a large baking sheet with parchment paper. Divide dough in two and roll each piece to about 30” in length. Working one at a time, flatten each strand with a rolling pin to about 4” wide. Spoon half the filling along the center of each strand. Pull the long edges up over the filling and pinch them together (* Pinch well! This dough with want to split open). Turn the strand so the seam is down. Lay both strands along side each other and cross them in the middle. Twist them over each other down both ends and then bring ends around to form a ring and pinch shut. This will make a spiral circle. Carefully (* I made someone help me here) transfer to the parchment. Cover and proof for about an hour. It will rise to about one and a half times its size. Or you can retard overnight if you wish.

Baking

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Glaze the proofed dough with egg and sprinkle with poppy seeds. Bake for 45–50 minutes until well browned, turning half way through. *Prepare for butter leakage, perhaps use a sheet pan with a lip all the way around, mine spilled a little in my oven. *Don’t use steam when baking this bread, I imagine the fillings would just burst out.

*Has anyone ever noticed that when you type the word "poolish" in Microsoft Word it changes it, without telling you, to "polish" ? I've had quite a time with that...

Sourdough Bagels

bagels

bagels

Barbari (Iranian Flat Bread)

Barbari

Bread Baking Day 7 with the theme flatbreads hosted by Petra Chili und Ciabatta . Deadline: March 1st, 2008

I once lived in Southern California in and around Los Angeles where Mexican bakeries abound. I once was in love with pan dulce (sweet bread) and it was abundant. I then picked up and moved to Northern California, to Humboldt County. Here, there are no Mexican bakeries and there is one place to get good mexican food, a taco truck, and the taco truck doesn't make pan dulce.

So I decided that after maintaining my starter for almost a year now and being pretty satisfied with it, that I was confused about what I was doing. I've read so many different refreshment ratios for starters that it made me doubt my own, so I split it up to try a new one. Usually I do a 2:1:1 (starter:flour:water) to double it. By the way my starter takes on slightly different forms from time to time. For no particular reason other than I haven't developed a favorite I'll either feed it wheat flour, clear flour or bread flour.