Corn bread

The storm is upon us as I try to write this post before losing power.  Hurricane Sandy is set to touch down in a few hours but already the wind is howling and the water is starting to rise over the docks on Long Island.

I baked this rye bread yesterday in preparation for possibly not having any bread or water for a while. Fortunately it came out as good as I could hope with the addition of a corn slurry added which added some nice moisture to the overall bread.

I built up a yeast water starter using white rye and pumpernickel flour in two builds and also used some of my existing AP sourdough starter as well.

Directions for Yeast Water Levain

Yeast Water Starter Build 1

40 grams White Rye Flour (KAF)

40 grams Pumpernickel Flour (KAF)

80 grams Yeast Water Starter

Mix the flour and Yeast Water in a bowl until thoroughly combined.  Cover the bowl and let it sit at room temperature for around 4 hours.  The starter should almost double when ready to proceed to build 2.

Build 2

Add ingredients below to starter from above and mix until incorporated.  Cover with plastic wrap and let sit at room temperature for 4 hours.

100 grams Pumpernickel Flour

100 grams Yeast Water Starter

Main Dough Ingredients

345 grams Rye Starter from above

80 grams AP Sourdough Levain Refreshed (65% Hydration)

305 grams First Clear Flour (KAF)

75 grams Potato Flour (Bob's Red Mill)

100 grams Pumpernickel Flour (KAF)

85 grams Corn Flour (Bob's Red Mill)

50 grams Rye Chops

141 grams Corn Slurry (1 small can of corn put in food processor for about 30 seconds, water drained before processing)

22 grams Pistachio Oil (You can sub Olive Oil or Vegetable Oil or any nut oil)

18 grams Seas Salt or Table Salt

350 grams Water at Room Temperature

Procedure

Mix the starters (levains) with the water to break them up in your mixer or by hand.  Next mix the flours, and rye chops with the starters in your mixer or by hand for 1 minute. Let it rest covered in your bowl for 20-30  minutes.   Next  add the oil, salt, and the corn slurry mix for 4 minute to incorporate all the ingredients. I mixed on speed #1 for 3 minutes and speed #2 for 1 minutes.   The dough should have come together in a ball and will be pretty sticky from the high percentage of rye flour.

Next take the dough out of the bowl and place it an oiled bowl or container.  Do a stretch and fold and rest the dough for 30 minutes.  After the rest do another stretch and fold and cover the dough and let it rest for 30 minutes.  Do one more stretch and fold and let it sit at room temperature covered for 2 hours.  After 2 hours you can put the dough into the refrigerator for 24 hours or up to 2 days before baking.  Feel free to do some additional S & F's if you feel it is necessary.  I baked the bread about 24 hours later.

The next day (or when ready to bake) let the dough sit out at room temperature for 2  hours.

Next, form the dough into your desired shape and put them in floured bannetons, bowls or on a baking sheet and let them rise covered for 2 hours or until they pass the poke test.  I used my baker's couche to let the batards rise.  Just make sure to not let them over-rise.  Note this dough is going to be very sticky so resist the urge to use too much flour just use enough to prevent sticking.

Score the loaves as desired and prepare your oven for baking with steam.

Set your oven for 500 degrees F. at least 30 minutes before ready to bake.  When ready to bake place the loaves into your on  your oven stone with steam and lower the temperature immediately to 450 degrees.    When both loaves are golden brown and reached an internal temperature of 200 degrees F. you can remove them from the oven.

Let the loaves cool down for at least an 3 hours or so before eating as desired.

This bread was inspired by a post at Wild Yeast Blog (and also my inner frugality and curiosity) about incorporating old bread into the dough. The idea is also based on the bread-making wisdom that old bread will improve bread flavour and its keeping quality.

I love the idea that instead of throwing stale bread away, I can make the use out of it. The piece that was destined for the bin or compost could potentially improve the bread flavour and texture. It is a fabulous idea.

I had a small piece of sourdough corn bread left over from two weeks ago that I have put them aside in the fridge. I chopped it into one-inch pieces and process them in food processor to get the breadcrumb (it was about 90 grams, or 10% of total flour weight).

The bread has a wonderful aroma, and it is even more so when toasted. The bread is quite sweet even though there is only 5% of honey in it. I guess the high amount of corn in the recipe also contributse to the natural sweetness of the loaf. I totally love this bread for its flavour and aroma. It is seriously yummy bread. It's nice on its own and even better with butter.

I also stenciled hearts into the loaves, just to get into the spirit of Valentine's Day:P.

For more details and pictures, you can follow the link below:

http://youcandoitathome.blogspot.com/2011/02/sourdough-corn-bread-with-old-bread.html

Sue

http://youcandoitathome.blogspot.com

Hey All,

Just wanted to share with you my bake from last night.  I made this bread using white corn flour, freshly milled jasmine brown rice, and millet.  I may have overhydrated, but I think it turned out nicely.  Enjoy!

Tim

Ingredients:

700g AP

100g Jasmine Brown Rice (freshly milled)

100g Millet (freshly milled)

100g White Corn Flour

188g SD starter @ 60% hydr

700g Water

20g Kosher Salt

1/2 tsp ADY

1900g Total Dough Yield

Directions:

6:35pm - Mix all ingredients in large mixing bowl well, cover and let rest for 25 mins.

7:00pm - Knead for 30 seconds using wet hands and french fold kneading method in mixing bowl ala Richard Bertinet.  Cover let rest.

7:30pm - Turn dough.

8:00pm - Turn dough.

9:25p - Divide and shape into 2 boules.  Just do 2 letter folds, place in floured linen lined banneton and let proof for 1 hr.  Arrange baking stones on 2 levels along with steam pan.  Preheat to 500F.

10:00 - Turn dough out onto floured peel, place in oven directly on stone.  When all loaves are in, place 1 1/2 cups water in steam pan, close door.  Bake 15 mins at 450F with steam.  Rotate between stones, bake for 30 minutes at 425F.  Loaves are done when internal temp reaches 210F.  Cool completely before cutting.

Submitted to Yeastspotting on 5/6/10

One of my goals in learning how to make bread was to be able to recreate a bread I ate as a child called tzitzel.   As I understand it, tzitzel mean caraway in Yiddish, and tzitzel is a rye bread with caraway and covered with cornmeal.   So far, despite many attempts and many different formulas, I have not come very close to recreating this memory bread.   Perhaps one can never recreate memory bread.    In any cases, my searches on this site, with its many rye bakers, led me to Greenstein's Secret of a Jewish Baker.   I have tried making his Jewish Rye (p. 136) a couple of times, and not very successfully given beginner's errors.   I have also made Jewish Corn Bread (p. 155) actually a rye bread with caraway wrapped in cornmeal, several times,  and despite many  beginner's errors, this bread is delicious enough to make me (almost) forget about some elusive memory of tzitzel.   The problem with Jewish Corn Bread, at least as I make it, is that while I can get it to taste good, I can't for the life of me get it to look good.   The instructions call for the following:  "[after kneading] Transfer the dough to a prepared clean wet bowl...pat the dough down and cover with a film of water....Allow the dough to rise until doubled in volume, 45 to 60 minutes."   This is the only rise for this bread.   And within minutes after it's done rising it goes straight into the oven.   I suspect that this treatment is what causes it to taste so great, and what makes it so addictive (to me anyhow).   However, it's a bloody mess when it comes out of the water, practically unshapeable, soggy in parts and so on.   And to make matters worse, I'm not 100% sure that his instructions mean to immerse it in water - although that's how I've read it.    Does he mean immerse the dough, or does he just mean spill water over it until it's thoroughly wet.    Also Greenstein gives all his measurements by volume, some approximately, and I just cook it that way, but my results have been pretty consistent, and pretty consistently ugly. 

I'll wait until tomorrow to post crumb photos.   I've learned on this site, that one must wait, wait, wait to cut into rye!

And the crumb...