The Fresh Loaf

A Community of Amateur Bakers and Artisan Bread Enthusiasts.

steamed cabbage in 100% whole wheat dough

jo_en's picture
jo_en

steamed cabbage in 100% whole wheat dough

Steamed cabbage adds a wonderful softness to 100% whole wheat doughs!

Try it!

1.

1/4 head of cabbage (American or Taiwan) -wash and chop into medium chunks, drain.   Steam it until pretty soft.  Cool and then process until fine in a food processor.  Squeeze out as much water as you can.  Set aside.

2.  Finely chop 2-4 green onions.

3.  Make an 85% whole wheat dough:

Mix the following together until a shaggy mass.

300 gr fresh ground whole wheat flour

255 gr water (85% hydration)

1 tsp salt

40 gr rye sour (100% hydration) and/or 3/4 tsp SAF

4. Let dough sit for 6 hours in a covered bowl at room temp. It will rise 50-80%.

5.  Mix in cabbage and green onions.  Knead in the bowl with wet hands until cabbage/gr onions are well distributed.

6.  Refrigerate (covered) overnight.  The dough will rise again.

For a quick bake, pinch small balls into a well greased mini muffin tin and bake at 375F.  You can bake right away or let dough sit at room temp for 30 min. before baking.

 

The dough has a decidedly soft texture and reheats well after being refrigerated.  The bottoms are nicely browned (due to greased muffin tiun); to get a nice color on the tops, brush with an egg yolk wash.

 

 

 

AlisonKay's picture
AlisonKay

I have never heard of this...interesting! I make 100% whole grain breads and like to soften them with a larger than normal scald, but I might give this a go. What does it do to the taste?

jo_en's picture
jo_en

Hi,

It is really nice connecting with bakers of 100% ww. If you like a mild sweet cabbage taste, then try getting the “Taiwan cabbage” at a Chinese market like Ranch 99 in CA.  Neither the cabbage nor the green onions finely chopped inhibited the  rise.  I used the cabbage commonly sold at the store but the taste was not as buttery sweet.

Be sure to steam the cabbage until soft. You might have to experiment with the water you add to the dough because of how much water you squeeze out of the cabbage.

I may not be able to upload pictures here but will put a link after my next bake.  Puréed cooked carrots give a beautiful color to whole wheat doughs made with white wheat.  Do you have a grain mill? They are really worth it if you like 100% ww.

 

AlisonKay's picture
AlisonKay

I'm a 100% wholegrain baker, but I hardly ever use wheat. It's usually spelt and rye loaves I make. I like the idea of adding carrots to my spelt, the flavours would work well. I'm in Italy, I can get Chinese cabbage here - I think it'd be a ones that have lighter, less densely packed leaves, right? 

I have not yet bought a grain mill and not sure I want to. I get flour from a very local farm and it's milled freshly there. With a small child and a small flat that seems easier at the moment!

jo_en's picture
jo_en

Hi,

Do not mix up the round cabbage with the longer "Napa" cabbage.  The 2nd one is much less starchy and is more fibrous.  Yes, the round cabbage leaves are not tightly packed.

It is so nice that you get freshly milled flour!

 

Have you posted your recipes here?

 

AlisonKay's picture
AlisonKay

I have only posted one. It always seems like a lot of work to organise! The one I got to posting is here: http://www.thefreshloaf.com/node/59309/abes-kefirleavened-100-wholegrain-spelt

jo_en's picture
jo_en

Hi,

I recently saw a youtube on gobi (cauliflower) parantha, Indian stuffed flatbread. So, yes the idea has a historical background!

I had steamed cabbage and some 100% wholewheat pita dough (SD).

I tried to make the parantha with the vegetables rolled into the dough.  I didn't want to use oil for a crispy fried flatbread.  I was trying to  get a puffed pita with veggies incorporated in the dough.

There was some puff but on the whole I did not get the desired puffed pita. Maybe the vegetable was too wet for the amount of ww dough used.  Later I used a filling of raw and finely julienned kale and finely grated raw carrot as the filling and the resulting pita puffed!

I then took the cabbage filling (finely chopped steamed cabbage, cooled, and with the water squeezed out) and just kneaded it into the dough. I wanted to get some product out of the ingredients.  The dough was  refrigerated overnight and it rose about 50%. The dough seemed too wet to roll into balls for another try at pita, so I scooped the dough into mini muffin pans and baked them at 350F until done (bottoms browned).

I liked the inside texture and crusty surface. I will work on getting the ingredients measured and a more accurate recipe recorded.  It is a nice low-cal, high fiber snack.

 

 

Angelica Nelson's picture
Angelica Nelson

Cabbage and onion are good additives to sourdough, could it be a historical recipe?  Maybe the soured cabbage was used to start the sourdough, or enhance it.  Then, to soften the rough flour, a separate mash was made and used, in the same way that people use fruit or vegetable pulp to enhance doughs.  (ie. adding applesauce to a dough makes it softer and stales slower).

Interesting, do you have any pictures of your creation?

jo_en's picture
jo_en

I have made this twice. I will try to get pictures on the next bake.

Our Crumb's picture
Our Crumb

[corrected spelling of Elsie's name]

This is a very intriguing approach to addressing the two perennial challenges of 100% whole grain bread: crumb texture and (perhaps) shelf life.  We tend not to adulterate our bread with fanciful/flavorful add-ins (cf. Elsie-iu and Ian [Isand66]), but this one has me intrigued.  We have a menagerie of dehydrated vegetables in jars in the pantry, easily pulverized to powders that serve diverse culinary purposes and experiments.  Not so sure about cabbage though...;-)

Thanks for posting this!

Tom

jo_en's picture
jo_en

If softness is a part of shelf life then the steamed Taiwan cabbage made a definite difference. The mini muffins were stored in a plastic container over 5 days and then were very nice to eat when reheated in a toaster oven.

I have used dehydrated veg in SDs but did not get a texture improvement.
I like that cabbage does not add as many calories as oil and eggs.

This is definitely a savory cabbage tasting item.