The Fresh Loaf

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Peanut butter bread

sam's picture
sam

Peanut butter bread

Hello,

Lately I've been on a bit of a PB+J kick, and was wondering what it might be like to make a peanut butter bread.  Here was my attempt.  The peanut butter was 20% of the dough by weight of flour.  Also I added some honey.  The recipe was an easy one.  In grams:

White flour: 576

Water: 371

Peanut Butter: 118

Honey: 29

Sourdough Starter: 26  (125% hydration starter).

Salt: 9

1)  Mix dough and chill for a long time.

2)  Warm up to ambient temp.  Shape, proof, and bake.

 

Here's how it came out.   The smell and taste is great.   It tastes very peanut-buttery.  It screams for a jelly spread though.  The crumb is very creamy in texture.  I initially thought I might have underbaked it, but it registered 200F internally.  It is the peanut butter that makes it so creamy.  I think it will be best toasted with jelly.  Speaking of jelly, the next time around, I will add some of that too, and try to make a full PB+J bread.    Maybe with chunky peanut butter.  Hehe.   :)

Here are the pics.  Looks pretty average, and it split a little on the top, but oh well, just an experiment.

 

 

Happy baking!

 

Bread Breaddington's picture
Bread Breaddington

That looks surprisingly good. Better crumb that I would expect from peanut butter, nice crust too.

sam's picture
sam

Thanks BB,

After it had rested overnight, it did get a little more dense.   I think if I tried creamy peanut butter again, I would back off on the total amount, and/or maybe try a high-gluten white flour, to see how that might change it.   The PB I tried was your typical retail brand.

Mini Oven's picture
Mini Oven

Dried soaked fruit?  Apple chunks?  Chocolate chips?  M&M's?

Rolling the dough in chopped raw peanuts before baking?    

...with just about any kind of nut...  nut butter...  nutty goodness...   beautifully going nuts...

...substitute honey with a dead ripe banana...   

Yerffej's picture
Yerffej

M&M's ??????

Now now Mini....there is an endless supply of real food out there that could go into bread.... but M&M's?

Surely this was a momentary lapse in judgement on your part.

Have a wonderful day,

Jeff

Mini Oven's picture
Mini Oven

You're right Jeff, don't know what came over me.  "more coffee here please!"

Mini

sam's picture
sam

Thanks for the ideas, Mini!

Maybe chopped peanut M&Ms!  

:)

jcking's picture
jcking

Anyone?

Jim

Mini Oven's picture
Mini Oven

turning into little "rocks?"   

jcking's picture
jcking

Not if you peel 'em first

aytab's picture
aytab

I'm thinking French Toast with Strawberry Preserves on top!!

jaywillie's picture
jaywillie

This seems interesting and the crumb looks great. What sort of PB did you use, a brand-name version with added fat and sugar, or a more natural version with just peanuts and salt? 

I ask because I once got a PB cookie recipe from a friend, and I could never replicate it using my standard peanut butter, Adams, which is peanuts and salt. Turns out she only ever used Jif, which added lots of sugar and fat to the mix!

sam's picture
sam

Yes, it was Jif Creamy.    The list of ingredients didn't show too many things that didn't sound 'natural'.   I think it said 'diglycerides' in it, but I didn't let it bother me.  I've been consuming it my entire life, and so far I still have only 10 fingers and 10 toes.  :)

 

 


jaywillie's picture
jaywillie

It's not so much the "natural" part, that I wondered about. Jif's formula does include sugar and added oil, and that has an impact when used in baking. I'm going to try your bread and I'm going to be sure to use Jif. [That sounds like a commercial! :^) ]

jaywillie

sam's picture
sam

Right on, try it out.   I used KA Bread Flour also.   Like I said, the texture of the crumb is creamy, and it got a little denser after resting.   I think it would make an awesome french toast.   If I did it over again, I'd probably back off on the PB a bit --  to 10% or 15% of flour-weight, not 20%.   I'm interested to hear how yours comes out.   Cheers!

sam's picture
sam

Also..

Because I did a long slow cold fermentation with sourdough, there is both a sour flavor as well as the peanut butter flavor.   If you like that combination, then cool.   I may decide next time, to use a small amount of baker's yeast instead of using the sourdough.

Or you can try a levain-based method, shorter fermentation, but use a 'young' levain that hasn't yet got too sour.

PiPs's picture
PiPs

Very cool bread!

Have you Jim Lahey's Peanut butter and Jelly bread? He bakes it in a pan with jam rolled through it like those cinnamon swirl breads you see. He uses roughly 30% Jam (bakers percent) and peanut butter in the dough like you have done.

I have never made it but I am kinda inspired now!

Cheers,
Phil 

sam's picture
sam

Hi Phil,

No, I haven't seen that recipe.   Sounds cool though.   For a jelly bread, my first inclination (maybe a wrong one..) would be to simply mix it all into the dough, not roll it like a cinnamon swirl.   It would probably look funny -- a pink or purple or whichever-colored dough depending on the type of jelly used.   :)

Mini Oven's picture
Mini Oven

so I'm full of "filled with jelly" type ideas...

I think it would be interesting to make a swirl kind of bread, also maybe rolls will jam inside stacked up like monkey bread.  Spoonfuls of jelly could even be frozen and wrapped in dough.   Or something along the lines of Floyd's blueberry braid.  I like the looks of your loaf best, it is a beauty and sometimes jam can melt too fluid in the baking.  Fresh jam or even fresh mashed berries on top of sliced bread would hold the most vitamins.   I also like to thaw out berries and combine with whipped cream to top off a slice.  

I also make my own peanut-butter side swiping all the added ingredients found in purchased varieties, including emulsifiers which I'm sure play a very important role here.   (Makes me wonder if sourdough itself has an emulsifying effect and what changing to "yeast only" would do.)  I can also grate the roasted nuts into a coarse flour which might allow the peanut %  to increase without causing a heavy crumb.   Just a few thoughts...

I saw your posting of your first loaf.  Look at you now!  :)

Mini

sam's picture
sam

Thanks Mini.

Tonight I got a bunch of unsalted Planters peanuts (unfortunately all I could find were the roasted ones, not raw).  The veggie aisle had no raw peanuts in shells, no luck.   Also, I got some "organic" (fwiw) strawberry jam.  It lists just strawberries and some citric acid addition.  It was made local to my area.   So, I will try it out!   For the peanuts, I put them in my food processor chopper.  It chopped 'em up good.   I'm just going to mix it all up and see what happens.   :)    I am going to try the non-sourdough route since the jelly already has an acid addition  to it.    Bread is fun.

 

sam's picture
sam

Continuing the peanut theme, here was another one I tried today, but with chopped unsalted Planters peanuts, with strawberry jelly.  I mixed both into the dough directly, not swirled.   I estimated the hydration of the jelly at 50%, which was probably too much, since the dough was a little on the drier side.  The amount of chopped peanuts was 50% baker's percentage, and the amount of jelly was 30% baker's percentage.  The rest was white flour, attempted 68% overall hydration (was probably more like 64-65%).   I fermented it using a small amount of baker's yeast (0.2%), over a long period of time.

After these last two peanut experiments, while the breads are kinda interesting, in the end, I prefer both peanuts and jelly as they are normally used, as condiments to a bread, not integrated into the bread itself.   Still was fun though.

Some pics of the chopped-peanut jelly bread:

 

 

Cheers!