Multigrain bread ala America's Test Kitchen

http://redsilvia.typepad.com/knitblog/files/multigrain_bread.pdf

Search for my post on multigrain bread

http://www.thefreshloaf.com/node/20163/great-whole-grain-cereal-loaf

Here and out on the web. Even though popular, it is not uncommon to read reports of failing to get the same fluffy results of ATK(but seeing is believing).

Thread here, including video of the episode(link in second post):

http://www.thefreshloaf.com/node/17309/troubleshooting-quothot-cerealquot-multigrain-bread

I'll confess, I got a rather dense loaf. For me personally, there seems to be a tipping point for how many add ins(total), before my loaves go from fluffy to dense. I get quite fluffy loaves when adding not to much of a few total add ins. But the total amount of all the add ins here seems to push beyond my limits of ability and patience to properly delelop the gluten for a fluffy loaf.

I have made this loaf and it is, indeed, very sticky. Don't try and get rid of the stickiness with flour-you will end up with a dry ,dense loaf. Because the stickiness is produced from the cereal starches, you have to handle it like a rye-slightly wet or oiled hands and a little flour on the table. I keep a small bowl of water nearby and dip my hand in periodically,shake it off/touch a towel and then continue handling the dough. If your hand is too wet, you will just be adding to the stickiness. The difference between this and rye is that this loaf develops good,stretchy gluten. I haven't had that experience with rye-unless it's a lower percentage of rye flour.

This dough responds very well to stretch and folds, also. Use the method of doing the stretch and fold in the bowl with the help of a dampened/oiled bowl scraper and hand. Shaping was interesting but do-able. I prep my pans with oil and oatmeal for the bottom and just sprinkled some pumpkin seeds on top.

The key to a fluffy loaf in a bread with lots of additives or seeds is to develop the gluten! I thought it needed more intense mixing than a plain loaf. I use a stand mixer and that helped a lot. I also pre-cooked my cereal slightly so that it was not hard bits. The recipe that I tweaked (see link above to other thread) also demonstrated that you must have enough harder,chewier bits to seem intentional. If there are too few, people think it was a mistake.I decided I didn't like the chewy bits and next time will use just rolled grains.Baker's choice!

I use a combination of any flaked (rolled) grains.They all look like rolled oats. Rolled wheat,oats,spelt,kamut,triticale,rye-whatever you can find. This is what a lot of the stickiness in the dough comes from so make sure you read my comments above. Do NOT use the crisped flakes (like corn flakes)!

When I made this bread from the original recipe, I decided it either needs to have more bits of chewy whole grain or none (and do more flaked grains).The original recipe left me feeling that the chewy bits were so few as to seem an accidental texutre. Since I was trying to make it appealing to people who don't like whole grain-I went with NO bits and all rolled grains. I'm very happy I did-all the advantages and no disagreeable lumps for those who don't like any texture to their bread. Sneaky baker!

Here is a link-look at mainly the left column.

http://www.healthysupplies.co.uk/muesli-flakes.html

I just had a slice of my Multigrain for breakfast. Quite delicious!

Here's a recipe for a multi grain bread made in Newcastle upon Tyne - It came out of the oven at 1700hrs UK time on 9th April and my wife and I are going to eat it later tonight with a Turkish salad - Yum yum!!! Five Grain Bread – 4 x 400g Loaves

Ingredients – Total weight = 1.950 Kg /480g = 4 Loaves

Soaker

71g Rye Flakes                        71g Flaxseeds                        62g Sunflower Seeds

62g Oats                                   9g Salt                                    335g Water

Starter

268g White Flour                     174g Water                            5g Salt    

.3g Fermipan Yeast

Final Dough

626g VS White Flour                9g Salt                                    7g Fermipan Yeast

250g Water                                                                             

Method                               

Day 1

Soaker - Put all the ingredients into a bowl add water and mix; cover with cling-film.  Leave at room temperature (about 20˚C) for 12-16 hours.

Starter - Mix flour, water, yeast and salt in a bowl big enough to allow the mixture to double in size.  Cover with cling-film and leave to develop for 12-16 hours at room temperature prior to final mixing.

Day 2

Mixing

Place all the ingredients in the final dough in a mixer bowl and process for 8-10 minutes, until the dough is tacky, leaving the sides of the mixing bowl, but not too sticky that it cannot be handled.  Adjust with small amounts of extra flour or water to achieve this consistency!  Aim for 25/27˚C

Bulk Fermentation

Smear a small amount of olive oil around a large bowl (the dough will double in size) and add dough to it; cover with cling-film and leave for about 2 hours, or until the dough has doubled in size.

Scaling/Shaping

After the dough has doubled in size, take the dough from the bowl and divide it into 480g pieces.  Degas these pieces and leave to rest for 10 minutes – Reshape then put these into bannetons.  Cover the bannetons and leave to double in size.  Turn out the bannetons onto silicone sheets and slash the dough with a razor.

Baking

Pre-heat the oven to 240/225˚C(Gas Deck/Electric convection). Create steam in oven if possible, then immediately put in the bread and bake for about 20-25 minutes – turning the temperature down to 215/200˚C after 10 minutes, until the bread sounds hollow when knocked on the bottom and the internal temperature is 95˚C. It is a good idea to turn the oven off and leave the breads in for another ten minutes to dry out a little, so they keep a nice firm crust. 

Cooling

Put baked breads on a wire rack until cooled.

I hope somebody enjoys this,

Brian