Salla's Sunflower Bread

After one month of packing, one week of traveling, and one month of unpacking I’m finally more or less installed to my new home.

Before even starting unpacking, though, I started baking bread. So the first morning in our new home, we already had sourdough bread for breakfast!

I’ve baked a lot of different breads now: Finnish rye bread, spelt bread, a French country-side loaf with 10% rye and 90% all-purpose flour. But today, I baked four loaves of the most delicious bread I’ve baked so far here in Finland!

I came up with this recipe thanks to my friend Salla who loved my rye bread but suggested I could add sunflower seeds to it. At the same time, I thought of adding a bit of spelt for a richer taste and a softer result. And it worked amazingly well! The bread has a crunchy crust, a very soft inside, a nice nutty taste – and the best thing is: the sunflower seeds on top get roasted, so they add an indescribably rich flavour to the whole experience.

This is a basic 1-2-3 recipe, but I write the measures down anyway, just in case!

For two nice small loaves you need:

• 200g sourdough starter


• 400g water


• 200g whole-grain spelt flour


• 400g whole-grain rye flour


• 12g sea salt


• a generous handful of sunflower seeds for the dough, another one for the topping

In a baking bowl, combine starter, water, and the flours. Let stand 20-40 minutes. Then add salt and knead about 10 minutes, or until you just can’t anymore. Add a handful of sunflower seeds and knead one minute more.

Cover the bowl with a moist kitchen towel and let ferment 5-10 hours at room temperature (my dough normally ferments overnight). Then knead the dough quickly again, and form it into two equal-sized balls. Transfer the dough balls into floured proofing baskets. Cover with a kitchen towel and let ferment about one hour.

Heat your oven to 250C. Now you have to be quick: transfer both loaves on a baking tray, brush them with water, cut “sun rays” on top (like in the round bread in this picture) and sprinkle generously with sunflower seeds. Place a cup filled with water on the baking tray for a better crust.

Bake the loaves at 250C for 10 minutes or so, and then reduce the temperature to 200C and bake until well done but not burned, or about 35 minutes more.

Enjoy with butter or good olive oil!

P.S. My camera is still missing - probably in one of those still unpacked boxes - so my N9's camera will have to do for now!