Struan

This is my take on Peter Reinhart's whole-grain struan. Instead of adding yeast, I made the firm starter using sourdo.com's San Francisco strain that I've been feeding nothing but home-milled wheat.

For the flour, I milled a mixture of 45% hard red wheat, 45% hard white wheat and 10% rye.



For the soaker I used 2.5 oz roasted (unsalted) sunflower seeds, plus .5 oz each of black seasame seeds, two different kinds of flax seed and two different mustard seeds. These are combined with flour and a little water, then left out overnight.




The firm starter was left out overnight to rise.


The next day, the firm starter and the soaker were worked together on a cutting board, then chopped up into a dozen pieces and mixed with the wet ingredients in my DLX. You can see it come together as I mix the preferments with oil, honey, and agave nectar. I also added in 2T of espresso-ground coffee beans that I'd finished roasting earlier in the day (Costa Rica La Legua Bourbon taken just into the beginning of second crack, for you sweetmarias.com fans), plus a teaspoon of caramel color from KA.




After the dough came together, it got a 15-minute autolyse.


Here's the final dough after another 10 minutes of hand kneading.


For the first 2 hours, I did a stretch-and-fold every half hour. Afterwards, it was left to rise for another 3 hours.


The risen dough was broken into four pieces and shaped for mini-loaves. They proofed for another 2.5 hours.



The loaves were cooked at 350 degrees for 45 minutes.  



The result is a dense, but not at all heavy, bread that is fantastic sliced thin and served with cheese and fruit.

I just pulled my Quinoa Struan out of the oven a little while ago, and I'm rather pleased with the results.

I used reinhart's multigrain struan formula and used 6ozs of cooked quinoa in the overnight soaker. I also used Heartland Mill Golden Buffalo flour, which I'm playing aroudn with. I've used "Gold 'n' White" flour before (a high-extraction flour, meaning the coarse bran sifted out of whole wheat flour), and I was pleased with it, so I ordered 25 lbs of this to see how it performed. So far so good i think. Since it called for a substantial amount of yeast to be added for the final proof, I think it rose rather quickly, and was probably ready before I made it back home. I had to reform it and considered letting it proof a second time, but I thought it might become a mess if the yeasts were given too much free reign.

I haven't tasted this loaf yet (it wasn't done cooling), but it smells great. It looks like it would be great for sandwiches or toast. I was intrigued when it called for milk in the soaker, and I wonder how that will impact the bread.

Finally had a chance to do one of Peter Reinhart's recipes, from Whole Grain Breads.  Did the multi-grain struan, since that's his signature bread.  Here's the result, lightly dusted with black sesame seeds.  Tastes as good as it looks! 

Alan 

here's the recipe I followed:

Whole grains:

            Barley

            Millet

            Quinoa

            Oat flakes

            Wheat flakes

King Arthur Whole Wheat

Saranac Pale Ale

Soy Milk

Skim Milk

Kosher Salt

Sorghum

Organic canola oil

King Arthur “New England” starter

more photos, etc., at my blog, http://alan-ohio-bread.blogspot.com