The Fresh Loaf

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And some days you should-Volkornbrot!!

Doc Tracy's picture
Doc Tracy

And some days you should-Volkornbrot!!

Ok, so I redeemed myself. After my soupy batch of about 20lbs of cinnamon oatmeal raisin dough was put to sleep in the fridge to figure out how to best go about dealing with it another day, I pulled out the soaker/starter for my volkornbrot. Threw them together with some flour and water. This is the first time making this. Also the first time working with my fresh ground flour.  Mini and I had discussed the idea this afternoon, AFTER I had already started soaking my quantity of flax seeds and rye chops. I fed the rye starter rye meal the night before. This would be called a WAG in Army or engineering terms.

So, added some flour and a bit of water until things looked the right consistency. Put the dough in the pullman pan. Boy, it felt a lot heavier than that extra 100grams of flax seed should have caused it to be.

Maybe I need a new set of scales?

Not sure if the rye meal caused my starter to go crazy or if it's the warmer temps in the cabinet of the RV but things went to rising like they were on steroids. Of course, I had done all of this at oh, 8PM the night before working, with plans to bake in the morning. I had planned to ferment for the full 8 hours like I usually do. At 11pm I could see this wasn't a good idea as it was hitting the top of the Pullman pan.

Now what? Well, not many options with rye, are there. So, I did what I do best. Flew with it. I started the oven at 250 degrees, thinking about the Horst Black Bread story. I can do this. So, I put the bread in the oven at 250 from 11 until 5am. 7 entire hours! I woke up to the heavenly smell of 100% rye baking.

I have to say, this rye was cut about 1 hour after getting out of the oven. I simply could not wait the proper 24 hours until cool. Sorry JH! And, is it every good! I think I like volkornbrot even better than my daily rye!

Spices this time were caraway, fennel and ground coriander, 1 tbsp of each for a large loaf of volkornbrot.

Comments

Mini Oven's picture
Mini Oven

Eric says I'm too tough.   I want to see today's loaf!  Please pretty please!  I know something got goofed up in the downloading.

Mini!

Doc Tracy's picture
Doc Tracy

You caught me. I'm guilty. I'm soo sorry. Never again will I try to get one by you Mini. I took a picture and didn't like the lighting at 5AM. Now the loaf is about half gone. Hubby says this is the best one left. He loves the seeds/rye meal.  Plus, my phone was charging and I didn't want to take the time to send the download to the computer.

Just got home from a 13 hour shift but tomorrow AM I think I promise to post a pic of the loaf, plus a picture of the slice I'm eating with honey and butter. I can't get over the color of this crumb. It's so incredibly dark. They've all been dark but this one is chocolate dark. No molasses, cocoa or coffee in this loaf, no siree. Just a good 6 hours in the RV oven.

Right now I'm going to have a slice of it with honey and butter and a cup of mint/valerian tea to spin down for bed. I've got to get rid of this rotten cold. Uggh.

Wish I could wake up every morning to the smell of rye bread in the oven.

ehanner's picture
ehanner

Mini, you are tough. Just like my High School English teacher who remembered the paper I wrote in 9th grade. Maybe she is just incredibly consistent. :>)

It's beautiful Tracy!

Eric

ananda's picture
ananda

Doc, I'm loving this!

But one thing: ok you cut into it straightaway...so does it look as good on the inside as it does on the outside?

I don't need to ask about the taste; I'm sure it's first class

Best wishes

Andy

Mebake's picture
Mebake

Yum! Doctor Tracy you complemented yourself well with this bake. Looking forward to see the final episode of LOAFZILLA!

Mebake

Mini Oven's picture
Mini Oven

came out very nice!  And I think I smuggled about 50g bread flour (the bottom of the sack) into it too!  I was worried it might not rise as the starter was sitting ripe in my fridge a week already. 

I had made the starter as usual, added the altus and that had a good 12 hour ferment on it before it got cooled down.  When I took it out of the fridge, all the air spaces had filled in with a golden liquid that I can only describe as beer, smelled like it too!  But... I used it anyway adding the salt right away.  The loaf still rose, albeit I lost one inch of top rise and it was about 8 hours until I baked it.  I do not have your warm temps tho.  It is surprisingly not as overly sour as I feared, that's the rye working... buffer job.   The taste is superb and moist.   I had to cut a slice off to get it into a plastic bag for the night.  (Crunchy crust for a bed time snack!  Mmmm)

Munching on one slice now with wild cranberry jam.  I would love to wake up everyday to rye baking aromas.   Get over your cold.  :)

Mini

Sedlmaierin's picture
Sedlmaierin

Beautiful loaf, Tracy! And I love your CROB post-what happened?

C

Doc Tracy's picture
Doc Tracy

I have not steeled myself yet to walk over to the house and open the fridge. I haven't had my first cup of coffee. And yes, I still owe rye bread pics. As soon as I toast up a slice I promise I'll take a pic and post it. Give me an hour or so.

Doc Tracy's picture
Doc Tracy

hanseata's picture
hanseata

Your loaf looks very nice, and you are right, cocoa and coffee (an abomination!) are not ingredients typically found in German Vollkornbrot. But Zuckerruebensirup (sugar beet syrup) - the American equivalent would be molasses, is a commonly used ingredient - I use it sparingly though, I don't like an overpowering taste of molasses.

Did you put in additional yeast that the rye dough rose so much? Vollkornbrot is usually very dense.

Please don't take it amiss, when I - as a German - mention, that "voll" (= full) is spelled with two, not one l.

Doc Tracy's picture
Doc Tracy

Thanks for the compliment! There is no additional yeast in this and other than flax it is 100% rye. I uses Mini's Favorite Rye ratio and discussed with her the aspect of adding a soaker of rye chops/flax. I fed the starter for the final build with rye meal. Starter was lightly salted and there was 1tbsp salt to prevent starch attack in the soaker. Rise time was shorter than my usual due to warmer temps. All fermentation was done directly in the pan and it rose for 3 hours. It was baked for six hours covered at 250 degrees give or take. The RV oven is not that accurate. I'm horrible with German words. French, Italian or Spanish I can sort of handle but German is almost as bad as Japanese or Russian to me. No offense taken. I should have checked my spelling with my JH book. This is sure to become our weekly bread. Interesting thing is that a few months ago my husband didn't think he liked rye bread except for with pasTrami sandwiches. He'd only tasted deli rye before.

Mini Oven's picture
Mini Oven

Believe me!  I think the next one will be 50% ... half ratio recipe with half vollkorn or berries and whatnot.  Trying for the real grain bread.  We just like seeing the heavy rye rise I guess. 

Tracy, thanks for the pictures.  There was no need to rush.  Your health comes first.  

Susan from San Diego wants to do a Pumpernickel style rye too!  The really dense stuff!

Mini

Doc Tracy's picture
Doc Tracy

You mean Susan wants to bake rye bricks.What, is she building a house? Or maybe she needs some good chew toys for big strong dogs? My agility club might enjoy those for all those hyperactive border collies.

This bread is tender and delicious with honey or cream cheese. Hopefully it will make my cheeks rosy too.

What do you think about millet in vollkorn? What kind of berries do you have in mind?

hanseata's picture
hanseata

Doc Tracy, thanks for graciously accepting my critical comment - I really don't want to be a nit picker - and I'm happy that some German breads other than pretzels obviously made their way into the American cuisine. For my Vollkornbrot I use rye meal, rye chops and rye flour, also flaxseed and sunflower seeds.

As a child I used to hate it fiercely, I was forced to eat it every evening because my father said: "Vollkornbrot macht Wangen rot" (Vollkornbrot gives you rosy cheeks). I didn't touch it again until I was asked to bake it here for our local natural food store.

After a lot of experimenting I'm now able to produce Vollkornbrote (or Schwarzbrote, that's used interchangeably) that even I enjoy. Though "Vollkornbrot" means nothing but "whole grain bread" the term is used only for dark, dense rye breads with a coarse crumb, they don't have to be 100% rye, though.

If you like, try the "Rheinisches Schwarzbrot" that I just posted - you can leave the molasses out, if you don't like it, but it doesn't taste stongly.

Doc Tracy's picture
Doc Tracy

See, my German is so bad that I thought you were going to tell me that sentence read "Vollknorbrot will make your teeth rot". I probably should stick to Spanglish and Franglish.

hanseata's picture
hanseata

At least you're not talking in tongues, as my husband accuses me of...