20% yeasted rye with dill and onion, glazed with cornstarch
ingredients:
400gm unbleached bread flour
100gm dark rye flour
1.5 teaspoon salt
1.5 teaspoon active dry yeast (SAF brand)
1 tablespoon each of brown sugar, dill weed, and dehydrated onion flakes
333 gm very warm water (just cool enough to put a finger in and not whimper or yank it out)
procedure:
Mixed dry ingredients in kitchenaid mixer, added the very warm water, mixed on low until dough cleaned the sides of bowl, turned out on countertop, kneaded briefly, formed into ball, and plopped it into a floured, linen-lined brotform bowl to rise covered with tea towel. Worked on income tax return for 3 or 4 hours. Preheated oven with pizza stone to 450F. Turned loaf out of brotform bowl onto parchment paper on inverted cookie sheet (in lieu of a peel). Slashed loaf, spritzed with water, and slid it onto the preheated pizza stone, parchment and all. Covered with stainless bowl in lieu of playing "steam-the-oven". Set timer for 15 minutes and removed the stainless bowl when it went off. Set timer for 10 minutes and checked browning when it went off. Decided to brown 5 more minutes and set timer again. Whipped up cornstarch glaze (1.5 tablespoons cornstarch mixed in ~1/4 cup cold water, added hot water fill coffeecup, nuked in microwave until it just boiled). Pulled loaf out of oven at about the 30-minute mark and glazed the top of the hot loaf with the thickened cornstarch soup using a basting brush.
Result: Got some decent oven spring using the bowl-on-a-pizza-stone trick (at least it didn't shrink!). The glaze dried nice and shiny on top but the bottom is caked with un-appetizing white flour from the brotform. Bottom crust seems thicker than top, presumably from direct contact with preheated pizza stone. I think I need a smaller brotform bowl to try to get a taller, more spherical loaf (any excuse to buy more toys). This loaf is pretty (on top, at least), a bit dense, and tastes pretty good although the onion dominates and masks the nuttiness of the rye.
I took pictures and will try to post them later. Never played with this blogging interface before.
Comments
recipe sounds very tasty !
Anna
Soak the onions in the water and add all. It releases the sweetness of the onion flavor.I also softens the bits so they aren't crunchy in the crumb. You may want to decrease the onion amount,if you feel it was too strong.
Sounds delicious! Just in time for my corned beef sandwiches.
I finally had some success with a rye loaf!! I was amazed at the nice rise and the great oven spring. The crumb is very tender and light and the flavor is wonderful; nice crackly and chewy thin crust too. I used my large oval roasting pan with the cover on because I haven't decided whether or not to purchase a large aluminum bowl - my system worked very well. Now all I need to find is some NY Jewish deli meats, the stuff sold here in the supermarkets in SoCal is like meat flavored cardboard!! Thanks for posting the recipe!!
I don't think it matters what sort of cover you put over the the loaf in the first 15 minutes or so of baking as long as it keeps the crust from drying out too soon. As I understand it, that's the main reason for using a cover, and it substitutes for "steaming" the oven which many recommend.
It struck me as odd that this loaf had less dill odor than previous efforts with similar ingredients. Pondering, I realized I used similar volumes of dill but in this loaf I used dill weed(=leaves) where in previous efforts I used dill seed. Out of curiosity I weighed a tablespoon of dill seed and a tablespoon of dill weed(leaves). The seed weighed 5 grams and the leaves weighed 2 grams, if my scale is correct. Even if one assumes essential flavor/odor components are similar for the two forms of dill, it thus seems the seeds would be more potent volume for volume. Whether it's the difference in weight or a difference in essential odor/flavor components, bread made with similar volumes of dill seed seems to smell more like dill than bread made with dill weed. Regarding the flavor I am less sure - the remains of a comparison loaf made with dill seed that I have on hand is a bit old and contains no rye.
Clearly I need to make more bread! I think I'll try bumping up the dough weight to see if it fills that brotform bowl better. Flouring the brotform liner with rye flour instead of wheat may avoid the caked white flour I find unappetizing. Also, putting the dill, onion and sugar in to soak in the hot water as it cools seems like a good idea.