Spelt & Corn Bread. A dry affair, to say the least.
The idea seemed a good one, in my mind at least. The nuttiness of spelt, combined with the sweetness of corn. Never tried anything like it before, so it was a complete shot in the dark. I missed spectacularly, and yet, I have hit the mark at the same time. Weird ey?
Since I have never baked a corn bread before, I used a recipe from FloyM, and altered it to my liking/ingredients available. Here's what I did.
300 grams corn flour
700 grams whole wheat spelt flour
18 gr salt
40 gr sugar
15 gr instant yeast
4 deciliter water
2 deciliters (butter)milk
40 gr sunflower oil
1) I combined 2 dl of water with the corn flour, and let it sit for an hour.
2) Then I combined the rest of the dry ingredients, combined them with the corn mixture, and added the rest of the liquids.
3) I gently combined the ingredients (4 mins) and kneeded for about 6 to 8 minutes.
4) Rest and rise until doubled in size.
5) Knock back gently, shape 2 loafs. Rize in loaf tin until almost doubled in size.
Backed in an oven. Starting temp van 230C, after adding breads and a cup of water on the bottom, turned down the temp to 210C. Baking for about 45 - 50 mins, until core reached 95c.
Result aesthetics:
Not bad looking, but not really enviting either. 'Meh' was the first word that came to mind.
Verdict:
So the result was palatable. It was inteded as a bread for day to day use. Nothing special. And it wasn't. The flavor was alright. The feel in the mouth was very bad. Much to flaky/grainy. The crum itself wasn't dry - absense of fluids - but it felt really dry. However. However.
By accident I used the bread to make some grilledcheese toast for in a french union soup I made. The bread turned out to be excellent for tosties/grillend sandwiches. The corn gives it an awemsome crunch, and the addition of melting butter & cheese makes all the dryness in the mouth disappear.
Improvements:
Possibly, using just milk rather than a combination of water and (butter)milk improves palatabillety
Possibly, adding butter rather then oil improves palatabillety.
Possibly, soaking the corn in more liquid.
Comments
Bet it would make some great stuffing for fowl as well. The fun thing about bread is trying new things just to see how they pan out - and never having to bake the same bread twice as a result:-) Well done and
Happy baking
hear hear!
What corn flour did you use?
Just a regular corn meal, rated 'fine'.
Since you're using meal, not flour, I recommend scalding, instead of a routine soak, so the bread will be less grainy.
So, dare I ask what the difference between meal and flour is? I honestly don't know, and I always like to learn something! Thank you!
Firstly, flour is of a finer granulation than meal. (I am not referring to cornstarch.) Secondly, in the U.S., most corn flour is made from the floury, opaque part of the endosperm of dent corn. Meal is made from the flinty, vitreous part of dent corn, which has more protein.
Well, this is a good start to my day! Thank you for your explanation!
and... more liquids. Splash more buttermilk? Bet it's good with french toast, too.
You could also try soaking the spelt at the same time as the corn but separately. Knead it a little to build up the gluten then combine with the soaked corn. Did the corn seem dry when you added it? Toss the egg into the corn as well for the soak and make it a sloppy mixture, it will firm up soon enough.
Try a little nutmeg into the bread, For that amount of flour, almost half a teaspoon for starters. Wait until it is baked and cooled and tasted before adding more. It should be delicate and not overpowering.
Might also want to experiment with chopped pickled peppers. Or chilli threads.
Or toss in some creamed corn. (make it yourself and wash the ear starch into the mixture, heat and add as a roux.)
These are awesome suggestions! Especially the chilli ones: I think I'll try a corn bread variant using chilli.
I almost never use egg in my baking, apart from pattisserie that is. Not sure why I almost never put it in my bread dough (haha), maybe I need to do it more often!