The Fresh Loaf

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Potato Ale Bread - made with boozy, mash-fed starter!

hanseata's picture
hanseata

Potato Ale Bread - made with boozy, mash-fed starter!

 

In 2007, after baking my way through all my old German bread baking books and Reinhart's "The Bread Baker's Apprentice", I checked for more bread formulas in the internet.

In German foodie magazine Essen & Trinken, one reader's recipe, featuring beer - always a plus! - caught my eye and piqued my interest. The beer was not only used to hydrate and flavor the dough, but, also, cooked into a mash, to feed the starter!

At that time I had the opportunity to chat with Peter Reinhart in an online bread baking Q & A, hosted by "Fine Cooking", and asked him about the boozy, mash-fed starter. He had never heard of such a thing, either.

 

Ale cooked into a mash is later used to feed the starter

 

Not only that - there was another oddity: the recipe described stretching and folding the dough into a neat package, at 1-hour intervals. What an entirely weird concept! I was puzzled and very intrigued.

Later I found out that S & F was first mentioned in The Fresh Loaf in 2006. Reinhart's "Artisan Bread Every Day", introducing a larger audience to S & F, was published in 2009. 

A bit skeptical how this could work, I went ahead with the Englisches Kartoffelbrot mit Ale (English Potato Bread with Ale), stretching and folding the dough as per instruction, and was a bit surprised when I saw how the dough became smoother, more elastic, and really showed little gas bubbles, when I cut it to check the development.

To learn more about this tasty bread, my tweaks, and find the recipe (including a downloadable BreadStorm formula), please, follow me to my blog Brot & Bread.

 

 Moist and tasty - my bread loves beer (same as the baker :)

Comments

Edo Bread's picture
Edo Bread

Looks very tasty!

Reynard's picture
Reynard

That looks fabulous :-)

Syd's picture
Syd

It looks delicious!

hanseata's picture
hanseata

It is very tasty, indeed!

Happy Baking, 

Karin

dabrownman's picture
dabrownman

flour in the mash used to feed the starter. I guess the wee beasties can eat less when fed beer too :-)

hanseata's picture
hanseata

have something in common with the bakers? ;)

Isand66's picture
Isand66

Great looking bake Karin.  I have never used beer in the starter before, so I must give this one a try soon.  I have several bottles of beer sitting on top of my refrigerator just waiting to be soaked up in some flour and starter!

Regards,
Ian

hanseata's picture
hanseata

of using beer in a starter before I found this recipe. I have no idea where it came from, because the German user who posted the original version called it "English" potato ale bread, but didn't mention the source.

I'm sure it would work in your porridge breads, too, Ian! :)

 

 

 

Anne-Marie B's picture
Anne-Marie B

I love beer bread. Definitely giving this a try over the weekend. Thank you.

hanseata's picture
hanseata

Thanks, Anne-Marie!

pmccool's picture
pmccool

Karin, I notice that the mash proportions of flour and liquid are exactly the same as for tangzhong, or water roux.  Interesting that an 'old' bread has so many 'new' techniques. 

Paul

hanseata's picture
hanseata

I didn't know that.
When I wrote this post I checked the original recipe in Essen & Trinken again, and saw my comment in 2007, saying that it would be good to update that strange old technique .... :)

Anne-Marie B's picture
Anne-Marie B

I had to quickly take a photo before it disappeared. It is a really flavourful, moist loaf. And a great aroma while it was baking. I will keep this one. Thank you Karin.

hanseata's picture
hanseata

Your Potato Ale Bread turned out great, and I'm glad you like it!

Happy Beer Baking,

Karin