Baguette, or French for Bread

Don’t even think of baking a baguette if you haven’t got a masonry oven at your disposal.

Unless you’re as stubborn as I am and want to try it anyway.

In which case you should read this post, because I’ve discovered an easy and foolproof way of baking delicious baguettes, even in an electric oven.

Two weeks ago, I had the privilege of baking baguettes in a masonry oven. The oven hadn’t been used in the past 25 years or so, but it was in a perfect condition to provide me with the most perfect bread ever.

Only, I was a perfect analphabet with masonry ovens!

My first attempt resulted in a charred baguette in less than 5 minutes in the oven.

My second attempt resulted in a pale loaf although it had been 40 minutes in the oven. Still, it looked and tasted awesome, resembling nothing you can bake in a normal oven.

And then the weekend was over, and I had to return to my own kitchen and my electric oven. Maybe next time, I’ll learn to master that old masonry oven where my grandmother used to bake her bread for about four decades..

In the meantime, I’ve now learned to bake decent baguettes even in my electric oven. You just need to make a few special arrangements.

If you have a pizza stone, use it. If you’re like me and don’t possess one, use a normal oven tray but heat it in the oven for about 10 minutes so that it’s piping hot when you place your baguettes on top of it! That way, the baguettes keep their form and the oven spring is spectacular.

This recipe is based on Sébastien Boudet’s recipe. It’s baked with pre-ferment, so that the baguette doesn’t taste like yeast nor like sourdough starter (nothing wrong with the latter but somehow it doesn’t fit to baguette, in my opinion), and with an excellent crust and inner structure.

Here’s what you need to make two long baguettes or three shorter ones:

Pre-ferment:

• 500ml cold water


• 500ml all-purpose flour (do try replacing about 1/5 of the flour by rye flour, for an extra tasty baguette)


• 1g yeast


• 1tsp stiff sourdough starter

For the final dough:

• all of the pre-ferment


• about 300ml all-purpose flour


• 14g salt (about 2 tsp)

Combine water, starter, and yeast in a baking bowl. Stir, then add the flour and stir until you get a dough almost like a thick pancake batter. Cover with a damp kitchen towel and let stand for about 12 hours in room temperature.

Next day, the pre-ferment should be bubbling nicely and smell…delicious! If not, something went wrong (too cold? too much draft?) and you have to start over. (This never happened to me, so it’s very unlikely it will happen to you, either!)

Now, add the salt and the rest of the flour. Knead for about 10 minutes, or until you get a smooth and elastic dough. Cover it with a damp kitchen towel and let ferment for about 8-10 hours more (I do this overnight). In the morning, the dough will have at least doubled in size. Now it’s time to set your oven to 300C and start shaping your baguettes. (In case you’re baking in a masonry oven, you have to start heating the oven a couple of hours earlier, of course!)

Pour the dough onto a floured baking surface. Beat the air out, then divide the dough into three parts, and let them rest for about 5-10 minutes. Now, place the pizza stone or your oven tray in the oven so that it will be ready to receive your baguettes.

Then roll each part out into a rectangle as long as you want your baguette to be, and roll it into a tight roll, a bit like when you’re making cinnamon rolls! This is of course not the only way to shape a baguette, but that’s the one that works the best for a beginner as myself: it's the easy way to get an evenly-shaped baguette that holds its form!

Bake your baguettes on the pre-heated oven tray in 275C for about 20 minutes, or until well baked but not burned.

Let cool on a rack and serve with lots of salty butter or good olive oil!

And start planning how to get a masonry oven of your own ;)

Vanilla Almond Pancakes

As far as pancakes are concerned, I used to have a strategy: whenever I was craving for them, I would send my little sister to ask our Dad to bake some - and he would never refuse. Had I asked directly, the answer would have been no, most of the time. (My sister was really thin as a kid, so I guess my parents were just over happy that she would spontaneously want to eat something...)

For about three years now, I've tried a new dairy-and-egg-free pancake recipe every now and then, and failed miserably every single time. They'd be sticky, impossible to fry; they'd taste like soy or some other unpleasant ingredient; their consistency would be like rubber; well, you get the picture.

Until Santa brought me a new vegan cookbook, the Vegan Love Story. A very recommendable book indeed! It features a pancake recipe that immediately caught my attention: no dairy-free-milks nor egg-substitutes needed, just basically water and flour. Simple and ingenious! I substituted part of the flour by almond flour, and the result was the best-ever vegan pancakes that even my son adored.

To make enough pancakes for 1 hungry or 2 moderately hungry breakfast eaters:

• 50g almond meal


• 125g flour


• 2 tsp sugar


• 8g vanilla sugar


• a pinch of salt


• 3/4 tsp baking powder


• 150ml water


• 1 Tbsp sunflower oil, plus some more for the frying

Combine all dry ingredients in a bowl. Add water and oil and beat energetically until you have a smooth batter. Let the batter stand for about 10 minutes - just enough time to make some coffee ;)

Fry your pancakes over a medium heat until both sides are golden brown. Make sure that they are well cooked from the inside as well - if not, reduce the heat.

Serve with your favourite accompaniment - I opened a jar of home-made wild raspberry jam for the occasion!

P.S. Who would invent a method to make even the first pancake turn out perfect?! Mine didn't, as you can see from the pic... it never does...

Bacon and Eggs, Vegan Style

When I was a kid, we used to have porridge for breakfast every single morning, except for Sundays, when we got bacon and eggs: one fried egg and two slices of bacon per person. It felt so special!

Maybe that nice memory of those special breakfast moments was the reason I was sure I'd never be able to become a vegetarian - I thought I just loved bacon too much.

But I was wrong - I haven't even thought of bacon for many years now. Until a couple of weeks ago a friend made breakfast pancakes with bacon - and I got an idea: why not use Liquid Smoke to create "bacon" out of thin aubergine slices?

Today I finally tried out that idea, and it worked much better than I'd never imagine! It looks like bacon, it smells like bacon, it tastes like bacon. But it ain't bacon ;)

I also tried to make "scrambled eggs" out of silken tofu and turmeric. It turned out really good as well - apart from the soy taste, of which I'm not a big fan.. (I know, at some point I'll get used to it.)

For 4 people you need:

• 1 large aubergine, cut in thin slices lengthwise


• 1/2 cup olive oil


• 2 Tbsp soy sauce


• Liquid Smoke to taste (I used 1/3 tsp)


• salt and pepper to taste


• 400g silken tofu


• 100g smoked firm tofu, cut in small cubes


• 1 Tbsp olive oil


• 1/2 tsp turmeric


• salt and pepper to taste


• a handful of fresh parsley

Set your oven to 250C. Place the aubergine slices on a baking tray. Combine olive oil, soy sauce, liquid smoke, salt, and pepper in a bowl. Brush the aubergine slices with the oil mixture and bake in the oven until they start to get some colour. Be careful - they burn quite easily!

For the "eggs", use your hands to squeeze the silken tofu until its texture resembles scrambled eggs. Add the turmeric and stir with a wooden spoon until well combined. Then, heat the oil in a heavy pan. Fry the smoked tofu cubes until golden brown, or 2-3 minutes, then add the silken tofu, and fry until all of the silken tofu is hot. Sprinkle generously with salt, pepper and parsley - and serve right away with the "bacon"!

Day 6: Panettone

My first contact with panettone was back in 1996 when I was interrailing in southern Europe during the Christmas holidays. In Italy, I bought a huge panettone to take home with me and tied it to my tiny backpack, to the amusement of many co-travelers. But it certainly was worth the trouble!

Ever since, I’ve been a regular user of those mouth-watering Italian Christmas cakes. About two years ago, I realized that it would theoretically be possible to bake one at home, but I still didn’t dare trying it myself. “It’s just too complicated, it’s better to buy one”, advised even the owners of an Italian restaurant back in Germany.

I decided that this year it was time to make my own perfect panettone. Not a "fake one" like I’ baked before - sweet bread with the same flavours as panettone – but a real one.

And judging by everything else but the taste, I’ve managed it this time. (I’ll only be able to taste my panettone tomorrow, but I’ll let you know how it was as soon as we’ve had breakfast!)

The recipe I used is based on this Italian recipe. My Italian is far from being perfect, and I understood roughly half of what I read. I even tried Google translating it into Finnish – which only resulted in the best laugh I’ve had in a long, long time. (It seems that the machine translation has only developed in quantity, not in quality since the time I was studying :) )

This is what you need for 1 big panettone (about 1300g) or two small ones (about 650g):

For the first dough:

• 60g very stiff sourdough starter, refreshed three times with the same flour you’re going to use for your panettone


• 1g fresh yeast, dissolved in 90ml water


• 75g sugar


• 70g egg yolks


• 240g flour (I used a mixture of Italian flour type 00 and all-purpose flour)


• 85g butter

 

For the second dough:

• all of the first dough


• 40ml water


• 80g egg yolks


• 2 Tbsp sugar


• 2 Tbsp orange syrup (from the homemade candied orange peel)


• aromatic butter - made with 90g butter, melted the previous day together with 1 Tbsp honey, 1 vanilla pod, and the grated zest of 1 organic lemon and 1 organic orange, then stored in a cool place


• 120g raisins


• 60g homemade dried orange peels, in small cubes


• 2g salt (4 if using unsalted butter)


• about 200g flour (the original recipe said 60g, but I needed a lot more)

First of all, you need to make sure your sourdough starter is ready for the job! Refresh it on the first day three times, first at about 7AM, then at noon, and still at 4PM or so. Use the same flour as you are going to use for the panettone – special panettone flour seems to be available, but not here, so I used a mixture of all-purpose flour and Italian flour type 00. Make sure that your starter at least doubles in size between the feedings. The original recipe said it should triple – mine the most certainly didn’t; then again, I couldn’t control the temperature – it should have been 28-30C, and even in the warmest and most draft free spot in my kitchen, the temperature must not have been more than 25C. The starter should also be stiffer than usual - for 100g of starter, I used 100g flour and 40ml of water for the first feeding, then 100g flour and 70-80ml of water for the second and the third one.

During the first day, prepare the candied orange peels (use this recipe, only cut the peels into small cubes, instead of long stripes) and the aromatic butter for the second dough.

At about 7 or 8 PM, prepare the first dough. Combine all ingredients of the first dough in a baking bowl and knead about 10-15 minutes (I don’t have any kitchen machine, so I knead by hand). Then cover the dough with a damp kitchen towel and place in a warm and draft free place and let ferment overnight.

In the morning, check that the dough has at least doubled in volume. (If it hasn’t, too bad – my guess is that you’ll have to start all over again!) Mine had, so I proceeded to the second dough.



Add all the ingredients of the second dough into the first dough (remember to remove the vanilla pod from the aromatic butter!) and knead again about 10-15 minutes. Let the dough rest about 1 hour in a warmish place (about 25C). In the meantime, prepare your panettone papers: I didn’t have any, so I looked for instructions for making my own. This is what I used to make mine, and it worked well! Thank you, Chef in disguise!

Then place the panettone in the panettone paper. Cover with a damp kitchen towel and proof until doubled in size, again in a warmish and draft free place. This took about 8 hours.

Heat the oven to 190C and bake the panettone about 10 minutes, then reduce the temperature to 160C or so, and bake until well baked. Panettone tends to burn on top, so keep an extra parchment paper on hand – if needed, just wet it and cover the panettone with it.

Take the panettone out and let cool enough that you can touch it without burning.

Now comes the weirdest part: one way or another, you should be able to hang your panettone upside down for the next 12 hours or so. The best way to do this is to wash well 2 knitting needles for each panettone, push them through it and place on top of a bowl (or on top of four glasses turned upside down, like I did). Be careful if using metal needles like I did: they get very hot!



Some recipes said you could eat your panettone right away, others instructed to wait a couple of days. Well, I don’t care, I the most certainly will try the first one tomorrow!

Sweet dreams :)

7.12: And here's the final product:



 

Day 1: Stollen

When baking for a day still quite far away in the future, it’s important to make sure that what you’re baking will still be good on the D-day.

So what could be a better candidate than a Christmas cake that was traditionally baked in Germany around the Christmas time - and eaten until Easter? This Christmas wonder is called Stollen - and that's what I decided to start with.

Most Stollen recipes involve a lot of yeast. I’m not a big fan of yeast, and I prefer baking with sourdough starter instead. So I tried to bake my Stollen with sourdough starter, with only a tiny bit of yeast as a guarantee it would ferment properly (maybe it’s the low temperature in my house, but my starter hasn’t worked perfectly lately).

It’s impossible to say whether the recipe I’ll share withyou is a good one. I will only be able to tell in about two week's time - that's how long it takes for this cake to develop its taste fully. But judging by the taste of the dough and the smell of the Stollen, I’m very optimistic!

For two smallish Stollen (a bit less than 450g each) you need:

• 120g sourdough starter, refreshed about 6-8 hours before with milk


• about 2g fresh yeast


• 100ml milk


• 2 Tbsp rum


• 1 egg


• 80g butter, melted


• grated zest of 1 organic lemon


• 50g sugar


• a pinch of salt


• a pinch of cardamom


• a pinch of cinnamon


• 140g sultanas


• 3 Tbsp candied lemon peel


• 40g ground almond


• 250g all-purpose flour

• plus about 70g melted butter and 4 tsp confectioner’s sugar on top

This is how you make it:

Combine lukewarm milk and yeast in a baking bowl. Add starter, egg, melted butter, sugar, salt (if using non-salted butter, consider using two pinches), lemon peel, and rum. Then add almond, sultanas, candied lemon peel, cinnamon, cardamom, and lastly, the flour. Knead until the dough is smooth, about 5 minutes, and add more flour if needed. Cover with a damp kitchen towel and let ferment in a draft-free place overnight.

In the morning, punch the dough on a baking surface and divide in two. Take one part and using your hands, form a rectangle. Fold the rectangle in the middle to form a Stollen, and place it on a baking tray covered with a parchment paper. Repeat with the second half of the dough. Make sure that no sultanas are on the surface - if there are, push them gently inside the Stollen; sultanas tend to burn very easily! Proof about one hour. Preheat the oven to 180 C and bake the cakes until they are golden brown on top and also well baked inside.

Once out of the oven, brush each Stollen with about 35g melted butter and sprinkle 2 tsp confectioner’s sugar on each. Let cool completely. Then wrap the cakes into a tin foil, place in a plastic bag and store in a cool place (not the fridge, though, it’s too cold and humid) for at least two weeks.

I’ll try to wait two weeks before tasting my first Stollen. I’ll keep you posted about the results!

P.S. Obviously, this recipe was no consolation for the kids - so we had some mousse au chocolat as a dessert instead! But hope they'll have better luck tomorrow.

Pastéis de 4114 km de Belém

All my friends know how good I am at keeping secrets. Not very good, I’m afraid. In fact, I suck at it! So no way I’d be able to keep the recipe of almost perfect pastéis as a secret for two centuries… even two days would have been tough!

So here you have it, the not-so-secret recipe of mine. It's quite complex, though, so please ask if you've got any problems at any point!

It is mandatory that the puff pastry be homemade. But don’t worry, I suck at making puff pastry almost as badly as at keeping secrets. And yet I managed to do it – for this purpose, the dough just doesn’t have to be perfect (like, say, for croissants, which I’ve failed miserably every time I’ve tried to make them so far). Any attempt you make will be good enough for pastéis!

I used 1/3 whole-grain wheat and 2/3 all-purpose flour, but for a more traditional result, use only all-purpose. Not everyone is a fan of whole-grain like myself! And not everyone has as good flour as I have, and even I am tragically running out of it. (Time to visit Germany to get some more?!)

For about 30 pastéis you need:

For the dough:

• 400g flour


• 225ml warm water


• 200g butter


• (1/4 tsp salt but only if using unsalted butter)

For the filling:

• 12-14 egg yolks (reserve the whites to use for some other purpose)


• 200g sugar


• 4 Tbps cornstarch


• 1,2 liters heavy cream


• zest of one organic lemon, cut in long stripes


• one vanilla pod

First, make the filling. Combine all ingredients in a saucepan. Bring slowly to the boil, stirring constantly. This tends to burn really easily, so don’t even think of leaving the custard, even for two seconds! Let cool completely and make the dough in the meantime.

To make the dough, place the flour in a baking bowl. Make a hole in the middle, pour in the warm water, and work the dough with your hands until it’s smooth. Always start with a bit less water and add more if needed. It should be firm and smooth at the same time.

Now roll the dough out to a rectangle a bit smaller than an A4 paper. Smear half of the dough with softened butter. Fold the unbuttered half over the buttered one. Now, turn the dough 90 degrees and roll it into a long rectangle. Fold in three parts and let rest in the fridge for about 10 minutes. Repeat this rolling-out-and-folding-in-three still twice. Don’t worry if some butter comes out – just make sure to use enough flour so that the dough doesn’t glue to the baking surface!

After the last fold, let the dough rest in the fridge some 10 minutes and roll it out into a rectangle as thin as you can. Then, roll the dough in just as when you’re making cinnamon rolls.

Now comes the hard part: cut the rolled-in dough into pieces of about 1,5cm thick and place each in a buttered pastéis form or a muffin form. Take the form into your hands and with your thumbs, work the dough gently so that it in the end covers the sides of the form as well. (This might sound complicated, still hanging there?) It’s important to find the right amount of dough: it should be very thin but not break. Once you’ve done a couple of them, you’ll find the ideal amount of dough!

Then return to your filling. Remove lemon zests and vanilla pod (which you can use 2-3 times) from the custard. Fill the dough-covered forms with the custard. Bake in a pre-heated oven (250C) for about 10 minutes or until your pastéis get brown spots but don’t burn (which happens very easily, so don’t leave them unattended in the oven!). I’ve been told that the real pastéis get baked in 400C, but even 300C was way too much for my oven and my pastéis. Remember to place an extra tray on the bottom of your oven to catch any extra butter that might drip during the baking.

Serve your pastéis warm or cold, with or without some cinnamon on top!

P.S. Of course,  you can use ready-made puff pastry – but it just won’t be the same…

P.P.S. Needless to say, the distance between my new home and  Rua de Belém, 84-92 is 4114 km!

 

A Must in Lisbon: Pastéis de Belém

If a wanna-be vegan with a severe case of lactose intolerance arrives in Lisbon and rushes immediately to Pastéis de Belém to eat half a dozen of little custard pastries, either that person must have some issues – or those pastries are just divine. Not denying completely the first possibility, I’d say the second option is closer to the truth. Actually, pastéis de Belém have been nominated the 15th most delicious thing in the world!

Pastéis de Belém have been baked with the same secret recipe ever since they were invented in 1837. They are sold exclusively at the iconic coffee shop bearing the same name. The whole establishment in an incomparable experience. When entering the building, you’d say you’re in a Turkish bath: the walls are covered with azulejos, typical Portuguese oriental-looking decorative tile works. The omnipresent smell of pastéis reveals that this is a totally different thing.

When you first look around, you think the place is full. Then you see a passage leading to the next room, which is full as well and which leads to yet another one – until there’s one with tables available. (I’ve been wondering how many rooms they actually have? Is there an end?)

Then you sit down – and might be lucky and get served right away. But more often than not, the waiter attending you is older than your grandfather and might not notice or hear you at all in the beginning. Sooner or later, he’ll choose to ask what you’d like to have – and I strongly recommend you ask for at least two pastéis, if not meia duzia of them, and a coffee. And a whole duzia to take with you, of course!

All this taken into account, it’s actually amazing that pastéis hadn't sooner become the target of my culinary obsession. Maybe I just thought it would be impossible to make anything comparable. Even the Portuguese fail miserably with their pastéis de natas – a version of pastéis that shouldn’t even be mentioned in the same sentence with those of Belém.

But then I started thinking. And reading. And thinking some more. What makes those of Belém so superior to any other pastéis? It’s the filling, of course, so fluffy and tasty and not overly sweet. “Like flan gone to heaven,” said a friend of mine. But even more it’s the dough: it’s not any ordinary puff pastry they use. It’s got very fine layers, and it’s crispy and oh so tasty!

After having thought enough, I made an experience. (My first experience was actually before having read anything, and it was a terrible disaster.) And it worked. Oh, my, God. It worked. I’m not saying I re-invented the pastéis de Belém, but still. The result was clearly better than all the natas I’ve had so far. The best review came from my son: “Mum, these taste almost like those of Belém!”

And the recipe? Oh, no! I’m not going to reveal it! My intention is to keep it a family secret for at least two centuries. I can already imagine secret family meetings behind closed doors where the recipe will be passed to the next generation. So no, there’s not going to be a recipe after all!

Sourdough Bagels

A bit more than one year ago, I started baking bagels with the recipe from “New York – les recettes culte”. Everyone loved them, and still do. They are everything you’d expect for good bagels to be – delicious and chewy!

Then I got curious: would it be possible to bake perfect bagels without yeast, using only levain instead? And, as usual, the answer is yes! No yeast needed, unless you want the fermentation go faster. (Then just add ½ tsp dry yeast or so.) I used 50% whole grain, 50% all-purpose flour, which I found a perfect compromise between health and pleasure ;) It’s possible to use 100% whole grain, but, well, one would have to get used to it first.

A very significant advantage of this recipe is that the dough doesn’t need to ferment twice – convenient for a lazy baker like myself!

Here’s what you need to make 10 mouth-watering bagels:

• 300g whole-grain wheat or spelt flour


• 325g all-purpose wheat flour


• 325g water


• 150g sourdough starter


• 10g salt


• 2 Tbsp olive oil


• 2 Tbsp agave syrup (or other liquid sugar)


• 1 Tbsp gluten

And for the poaching:

• 3 liters water


• 1 Tbsp salt


• 1 Tbsp potato starch


• 1,5 Tbsp agave syrup (or other liquid sugar)

And some sesame and/or poppy seeds to decorate

This is how to do it:

Mix all ingredients in a baking bowl. Knead until you get a smooth but strong, chewing-gum-like dough – that takes about 10 minutes, at least if kneading by hand like I do.

Let the dough (and your poor hands!) get 10 minutes of rest before going to the next step!

Now divide the dough into 10 parts, each weighing about 110g. Form a smooth ball out of each, then make a hole in the middle. This, by the way, is the unorthodox way of making a bagel: actually, you should roll each piece in a long snake-like-form, then close the ends to form a circle. I’ve tried that method as well, but for me it just doesn’t work!

Place the bagels-to-be on a baking tray covered with a baking sheet. Dust them with a bit of flour, cover with a cling film and let ferment in room temperature for about 4 hours or in the fridge overnight.

Then it’s time to turn your oven on (225 C) and boil the poaching water in a large saucepan. Mix the starch with 100ml of cold water and add it to the poaching water, mixing with a spiral whisk so that the starch doesn’t go clumpy! Then add salt and syrup. Poach your bagels for about 30 seconds from both sides, remove with a skimmer, and place back on the oven tray.

Sprinkle with seeds – my favourite ones are black and white sesame seeds and poppy seeds.

Bake your bagels until they are golden brown, or about 20-25 minutes. Let cool on a rack before serving them!

P.S. Note that the amount of water you need for the dough depends on the flour you use: my whole-grain flour is very “thirsty”, that is: it needs more water. So I'd advise you to start the dough with a bit less water and add more if needed.

Orange Drink, Swedish Style

On normal days, I only serve water at the mealtimes – and between. But there are special days, and for those, one needs special drinks as well. This fresh and not too sweet orange drink definitely is one of my favourites! The idea comes from Flickorna Lundgren, the most unique coffee shop experience I’ve had the pleasure to have!

I drastically reduced the amount of sugar, though, and left the additional citric acid away. Citric acid is used to improve the taste and make the drink last longer – but if it already tastes perfect and is consumed within 3-4 days anyway, why use it? ;)

What you need for about 1 liter:

• 1kg organic oranges (this time, I used blood oranges)


• 500g sugar


• 500ml water

First, boil water and dissolve sugar in it. Let cool. Wash the oranges and remove their zest with a potato peeler. Squeeze the juice of the oranges. Set the zest, juice, and water-sugar-mixture in a bowl and cover. Place in a cool place and let stand for 1-2 days.

In the meantime, make sure no one in your family throws away your drink-to-be! Wouldn’t be the first time ;)

Then, run the drink through a sieve to remove the zests. Bottle the syrup and keep chilled. To serve, use 1 part orange drink, 2-3 parts water. Or how about a glass of prosecco with a splash of orange taste?

Finnish Rye Bread

It looks greenish and disgusting, feels like concrete in your hands and stinks like something you just might want to feed to your worst enemy. But here’s the miracle: when you bake it, it turns out to be one of most delicious breads in the world. And also the healthiest. Ladies and gentlemen, may I introduce to you – the Finnish rye bread!

As you might have guessed, I bake my rye bread with sourdough starter, without any additional yeast. My starter is based on all-purpose wheat flour, but about 12 hours before I want to make the rye bread dough, I take 60g of the starter, place in a clean jar, and refresh with 60g water and 60g rye flour. That way, there is only a tiny little bit wheat in the final bread (less than 5%). I’ve also tried to maintain a rye-only-starter, but it has always turned bad after a couple of days…

This is what you need for one loaf:

• 150g sourdough starter, refreshed 10-12 hours before


• 350g fresh water


• 450g rye flour – whole-grain, if possible


• 10g salt

Combine 300g water and the flour in a baking bowl. Stir with a fork until all the flour is moist. Add the rest of water if needed. (Some flours are thirstier than others ;) ) Let stand for about 20 to 40 minutes. Then add the starter and salt. Knead for about 10-15 minutes, or until you can no more – unless you’re using a machine, in which case 10 minutes should be enough.

Cover the dough with a damp kitchen towel and let ferment at room temperature for about 6-8 hours. Then fold the dough a couple of times and place in a floured proofing basket. Let ferment 1-2 hours more. Preheat your oven to 250 C and bake the loaf about 10 minutes, then reduce the temperature to 225 C (or even 200 C) and bake until thoroughly cooked, or some 30 minutes more.

Let cool - and eat with lots of butter ;) This bread keeps very well, at least one week.

P.S. If you don’t have a proofing basket yet, do buy one! Before I had one, I never managed my breads to grow so beautifully…

 

 

 

 

Pretzels, Medieval Style

If you ask about any German what’s their best recipe for making pretzels at home, they would look at you as if you were from outer space and say, “I never BAKE them myself, I BUY them!” And that makes sense: every bakery here in Germany has delicious fresh pretzels all day round. It’s like Finns and the Carelian pasties – why bother baking them yourself when you can buy them everywhere?

But here’s the thing: in four months or so, I’ll be living in a country where the only pretzels to be found are sold at Lidl (and from what I’ve heard, they come directly from… China! Please let this be an urban legend!!), or at some exclusive bakery at a ridiculous price. So I thought, it’s time I learn to bake my own.

The first pretzels are said to be baked in 610 AD (according to Wikipedia). Back then, there was no white flour nor commercial yeast available, so I thought it would make sense to try with 100% whole-grain and sourdough starter. I added just a little bit of yeast to speed up the fermentation – but maybe this wouldn’t be even necessary. As a base for my recipe, I used this one from Plötzlblog. But as you can see, mine is quite different…

The problem for us home-bakers is that in bakeries pretzels are immersed into lye solution before being baked in the oven. Now I’m not a big fan of such dangerous experiments in a kitchen - especially with young kids around. But luckily, there’s another way: to use a baking soda soak instead. And hurray, it works! My first result didn’t convince the kids yet (“MUM!!! Go to the bakery and get some REAL ones!”), but the second attempt did. So I’m more than happy to share this recipe with you!

For 6 pretzels you need:

• 140g sourdough starter


• 170ml water


• 300g whole-grain wheat flour


• 0,5g dry yeast


• 10g gluten (for a chewier texture)


• 6g salt


• 10g sugar


• 20g butter (or vegan margarine)

For the soak:

• 3 Tbsp baking soda


• 1 liter water

To garnish:

• 2 tsp or so pretzel salt

Combine all ingredients in a baking bowl and knead the dough for about 15 minutes (I do it by hand, you can use a kitchen machine if you have one), until nice and firm. If you notice that there’s too little water, add some more, but not too much: this dough should be firm, a bit like chewing gum ;)

Let the dough ferment in a warmish place about 30 minutes. Then knead again for 1-2 minutes, divide the dough into 6 equal-sized parts (mine were about 110g each) and wait a few minutes before working them into long thin sticks that are thicker in the middle. If the consistency of your dough is right, you don’t even need flour on the working surface. When all are done, shape them into pretzels. Mine started to look more or less ok after the fourth one or so…!

Place your pretzels on a baking tray covered with a baking sheet. Cover with a cling film and a place in a cool place (fridge, cellar, balcony) – about 7-10 degrees would be ideal. Let ferment over night. (For a quicker fermentation, let ferment in room temperature for 4-5 hours.)

In the morning, set your oven to 225 C. Bring 1 liter of water to the boil. Add the baking soda – it frizzles a lot at first! Then soak your pretzels one by one in the boiling soda soak, about 30 seconds each. Place the soaked ones on the baking tray. When all are done, use a razor blade to make a long cut in the middle of the thick part, sprinkle salt on your pretzels, and bake them in the oven until beautifully brown, or about 15-20 minutes.

Serve with butter and coffee – or beer, depending on what time of the day it is!

Martin's Rolls

Here in Germany, Martin’s Day is a big thing! All schools and kindergartens have their own Martin’s celebrations, with kids walking outside in the dark with lanterns, singing special songs for the occasion. I find it so sweet! Furthermore, the procession is followed by a gathering around a bonfire, with warm drinks and either pretzels or sweet rolls shared with everyone.

This year, I’m baking sweet rolls to bring to my girls’ kindergarten. The idea is to share, so I shaped my rolls in a way that they’re easy to break in two. I baked them with two different fillings: one with pecan nuts, sugar, and cinnamon, the other with vanilla sugar, lemon zest, and ground almond.

And, needless to say, I made the dough using exclusively my sourdough starter. Fermenting of rich sweet dough with only a starter takes quite a long time, though; so if you’re in a hurry, add about ½ tsp of instant dry yeast to the dough to speed up the process. Mine fermented 11 hours and I felt it wasn’t quite ready to be baked yet. I should have left it in a warmer place… (Sour)dough doesn’t like cold!

For a vegan version, use vegan margarine instead of butter, and a non-dairy milk for the dough and washing.

For about 30 rolls you need:

• 800 g flour (I used spelt, a mixture of types 630 and 1050)


• 350 ml milk or water


• 300g sourdough starter, refreshed 3-4 hours before (but make sure the starter has doubled in volume, if not, wait until it is)


• 160g sugar


• 10g salt


• 2 tsp cardamom


• 200g butter (or margarine), melted

And for the filling:

• 50g melted butter


• sugar, cinnamon, crushed pecan nuts, pearl sugar


• OR vanilla sugar, grated lemon zest, ground almond, almond flakes

In a baking bowl, combine all dry ingredients together. (If you’re using instant dry yeast, throw it in as well). Then add sourdough starter and milk and knead until a firm dough has formed, or some 7-10 minutes. Then add butter and knead until it’s absorbed in the dough. Cover with a damp baking towel and let ferment overnight, about 12 hours. (If you’re using yeast as well, the ferment time is shorter.)

On a baking surface covered with flour, work the dough until all bubbles are gone. Divide in two. Roll half of the dough out, cover first with melted butter, then add rest of the topping. Now roll the dough from both sides back in until both rolls meet in the middle. Cut into 3cm wide pieces, place on an oven pan covered with a baking sheet, cover with a baking towel, and let ferment 45-60 minutes. Bake the other half of the dough in a same way. In the meantime, preheat the oven to 225 C. Before baking, wash the rolls with either a mixture of egg yolk and a tiny bit of water, or milk (or soy milk), and decorate with pearl sugar or almond flakes.

Bake the rolls until they are well baked, or about 15-18 minutes. Let cool a bit - and share with someone! Happy Martin’s Day everyone ;)

Braided Loaf with Vanilla, Lemon, and Cardamom

My grandmother taught me how to braid loaves. She used to make a big loaf and give me a bit of the dough so I could make my own miniature loaf. I knew how to braid three, four, and five-strain braids. I had totally forgotten just how delicious these braided loaves were until we moved to Germany and tasted Zopfbrot (as the Germans call a sweet braided loaf) at a friend’s place.

Zopfbrot you can buy at the baker’s normally has milk in it, so it’s a no-go for anyone with lactose issues. But I’ve come up with my own braided loaf recipe that I find even better than anything you can buy! The secret ingredient of my loaf is - of course - sourdough starter (see my previous post about creating your own starter). It makes the loaf very moist and tastier than the ones baked with commercial yeast. It also makes it keep longer. Using sourdough also makes baking more easy-going - you don't need to worry about the right temperature of the liquid or about the right order to add the ingredients.

And no, it does not taste sour at all! Just remember to refresh your starter about 3-4 hours before making the dough. But make sure your starter has doubled in volume - if not, wait until it has. Mine doubles in 3-4 hours, but that depends on many factors, such as the temperature in your kitchen!

Another secret are the spices I use in my loaf: a mixture of vanilla, lemon, and cardamom. I find it a winning combination - but feel free to use any other spices of your liking. You can also add sultanas in the dough (a handful or two).

Unfortunately I had also forgotten how to braid.. But I quickly learned it again -  there are excellent instructions on this subject in books like Professional Baking or on the Internet.

For one loaf you need:

• 350g flour


• 65g sugar


• 1 egg


• 150 water or milk


• 120g sourdough (refreshed 3-4 hours before)


• 1 tsp cardamom


• 3 tsp vanilla sugar


• grated zest of 1 small lemon (organic)


• 5g salt


• 75g melted butter

Combine all ingredients in a baking bowl, except for the butter. Knead until the dough has gained a bubblegum-like consistency, or about 10 minutes. Add the butter and knead about two more minutes, or until it has been absorbed in the dough.

Cover the bowl with a damp kitchen towel and let ferment 8-12 hours.

On a baking surface covered with flour, knead the dough until bubbles have disappeared. Divide the dough in 3 (or 4, or 5) equal-sized parts and braid. (In the loaf featuring in the picture, I added a smaller braid on top of the main one.)

Transfer on a baking pan, cover with a kitchen towel, and let ferment 1-2 hours. Wash with egg yolk, decorate with almond flakes or pearl sugar, and bake in a preheated oven (200 C) until well-baked, or about 45 minutes.

Cool on a rack and serve sliced, either plain or with butter and/or jam.

This loaf keeps very well, at least one week. Or in theory it does :)

Scones with Plum Compote

Scones are an element sine qua non for a brunch, at least if you ask me! They are salty and sweet at the same time, so you can eat them either with butter and cheese or with honey, marmalade - or with this easy plum compote with a hint of cinnamon. They can be baked with any flour of your liking - I prefer a mixture of rolled oats and spelt. I’ve tried a vegan version of scones as well - I just left the egg out and replaced butter with margarine and milk with spelt milk (a bit more than in the original recipe, to compensate for the egg). The structure was great, but the taste was a bit compromised. Maybe you’d want to add some dried fruit - raisins, cranberries, sour cherries - to make them tastier!

For about 10 scones, you need

• 100g butter (or margarine)


• 300g flour (rolled oats, spelt, wheat..)


• 50g sugar (or more, if you like it sweeter)


• 50ml milk (or soy milk)


• 1 egg (for a vegan version, leave out)


• 1,5 tsp baking powder


• 0,5 tsp salt

First, preheat your oven to 225 degrees Celsius. Cut butter into small cubes and place in a baking bowl. Measure all dry ingredients together and pour onto the butter. Work with your fingertips until fine and crumbly, then add egg and milk and work into a dough. It’s a bit on the liquid side, but don’t add too much flour, or they’ll get dry! Divide the dough into 10 pieces (about 40g each) and, with your hands, form round cakes. Use some extra flour in doing this if the dough is too liquid. Bake in the oven for some 15 minutes, or until nicely brown. Let the cool a bit before serving as a part of brunch - or for afternoon tea.

For the plum compote, cut 400g ripe plums into small cubes, set in a pan with 100g sugar and one cinnamon stick and cook until plums are thoroughly cooked. Take the cinnamon stick out and serve either warm or cold.

Sunday's a Brunch Day

Today was Parliamentary elections day here in Germany. As foreigners, we were not allowed to vote, but why not use this special day as an excuse for having a bit fancier brunch? So this morning we enjoyed freshly baked bread and scones, sweet whole-grain pancakes, cheeses, veggies, fruit, coffee, and Mimosas. Brunch is by far my favourite meal - you can serve it practically any time, and there’s nothing you couldn’t serve as a part of it - it’s a total carte blanche! I love having a lot of variety - warm stuff, cold stuff, something sweet, something salty, something crunchy, something fresh.. And of course, great coffee!

During the following week, I’ll be posting my best brunch recipes - maybe next Sunday, you’ll be serving some of them yourself! So stay tuned…

I like to start my brunch with a fresh drink, so today I’m sharing the recipes of my two preferred brunch drinks with you: the classic Mimosa, and pineapple juice with fresh mint.

For the Mimosa, you’ll need

• the juice of ½ orange per serving


• about 6cl of your favourite champagne or bubbling wine per serving

For the pineapple mint juice, you’ll need (for about 6 servings)

• 1 pineapple


• 20g fresh mint


• 300ml water


• possibly some sugar or agave syrup

The night before, remember to put all ingredients in the fridge and to fill your ice-cube maker! For the Mimosa, squeeze oranges, divide the juice into glasses, and fill the rest with champagne. Serve immediately!

For the pineapple mint juice, peel the pineapple and cut it into cubes. Wash the mint. Combine pineapple cubes, mint, water - and sugar or agave syrup if you prefer it a bit sweeter - in your mixer and pulse. (It will be a bit foamy, that’s ok!) Serve with ice cubes.

Easy Whole-grain Cookies

Yesterday I had afternoon tea at a friend’s place. She a great baker, and this time she had made some pear muffins. I realized that all of those delicious things she bakes have something nicely rustic about them - and I found out why: she only uses whole-grain spelt flour she’s milled herself! (It seems to be very common here in Germany for people to have a small grain mill at home.)

Now I was curious - would it really work with something I’d normally never bake with whole-grain? So I took a basic cookie recipe, you know the one with butter, sugar, salt, and flour, and started baking, with 100% whole-grain wheat. And it did work -  so well that I ended up eating half of the batch in one go.. I'll definitely try more whole-grain baking in the future, and maybe even get one of those grain mills so I could always bake with fresh flour!

For 10 cookies, you’ll need:

• 100g butter (for a vegan version, use vegan margarine)


• 150g whole-grain wheat (or spelt) flour


• 40g muscovado sugar (if you want it sweet, feel free to use more)


• a pinch of salt


• 2 Tbsp cold water


• + some extra sugar/cinnamon and sugar/vanilla sugar

Make the dough: In a baking bowl, cut the butter/margarine in small cubes. In another bowl, combine flour, sugar, and salt, then pour over butter cubes. Work with your fingertips until the mixture resembles fine breadcrumbs. Then add the water, stir, and let the dough rest for some 20 minutes in your fridge - unless you’re in a hurry.

Work the dough into a long, round “log”, about 9cm long and 5cm wide. Using a good knife, cut the log into 9 round cookies. Take an apple corer and cut a small hole in each cookie - the “holes” can be used to make one more cookie! (Goes without saying -  you can also skip the whole hole part, and just have 9 hole-less cookies instead.) Sprinkle some sugar (or cinnamon and sugar, or vanilla sugar) on top, and bake in 200 Celsius for some 15 minutes. I like mine really well done, but they get bitter if they burn even the tiniest bit, so I need to spend the last couple of minutes glued to my oven to get it perfect!

Let your cookies cool on a rack and serve with your favourite warm drink. I prefer to eat them when they’re still a bit warm - what about you?

P.S. My next post will be something salty again.. so stay tuned!

Sweet Italian Fruit Bread

When I was on my first Inter-rail in Christmas holidays back in 1996, I travelled light, only with a 30 liter backpack or so. (Ok, most of my stuff didn’t fit in, but luckily my bf had a slightly bigger bag that could fit in the rest! How convenient.. ) So, it was quite impossible to do any kind of shopping, there just wasn’t any room left for any new treasures - except for a huge Panettone, which I hung to my backpack. It must’ve looked quite funny, the Panettone being almost the size of my bag..!

So you get the picture - I kind of like Panettone. The disadvantage is that you only get it around Christmas time - which, luckily! extends nowadays from early October until the end of January, at least. And the other downside is that it’s very difficult to bake at home. The owners of a local Italian restaurant told me they’d never even want to try such an impossible thing themselves. All the recipes I’ve seen are so complex and time-consuming I’ve decided to give them a try in some quite distant future.

Last time I was in Italy I happened to buy a book called Croissant e biscotti, written by an Italian baking celebrity Luca Montersino. I found an interesting recipe for a sourdough-based chocolate and nut bread that, unfortunately, didn’t work at all (by all means, do try it - the picture looks great!) - but that gave me an idea: why not try the same method, only replacing chocolate and nuts with sultanas, candied lemon and oranges, almonds, lemon zest, and vanilla? After a partial disaster, the second loaf turned out perfect! It would be pretentious to call the result Panettone, so I call it Sweet Italian Fruit Bread instead - until I coin a better name for it. (Suggestions are welcome!)

So here’s how you proceed to get a loaf of it:

Beat together 3 eggs and 130g sugar until fluffy, then add 250g sourdough starter and wheat flour each, 6g salt, 5g fresh yeast, zest of 1/2 lemon, 2 tsp vanilla sugar, 100g candied orange, candied lemon, sultanas, and chopped almonds each, and combine well together. Then add 125g melted butter, stir well, and let ferment for some 8-10 hours in a warm place (25-30 degrees). Transfer into a proofing basket, let ferment another hour or two. Bake in 225 degrees for 10 minutes or so, lower the temperature to 190 degrees, and bake until well done, about 45 minutes. Let it cool on a rack and decorate with some confectioners’ sugar.

This bread is great for Italian-style sweet breakfast - any time of the year! Hope you'll enjoy it as much as I do...

Lemon Poppy Seed Muffins

I’ve been a fan and a regular baker of muffins ever since a cousin of mine served Bright Day Banana Muffins for breakfast once I was visiting her back in the 90’s. I’ve tried many, many different kinds of muffins after that, but nothing seemed to be of any serious challenge to these legendary Bright Day Banana Muffins, until... Recently, I discovered this recipe for Lemon Poppy Seed Muffins in a cookbook called “New York - les recettes culte” (yes, do buy the book, it's worth every cent! and no, I don't get paid to say so!). There’s something almost otherworldly in the ingenious combination of tastes and structures here.

For 12 muffins you’ll need (and don’t even consider making just half of the dough to make 6 muffins, you sooooo will regret it!):

Dry ingredients:

• 320g wheat flour


• 3 Tbsp poppy seeds


• ½ tsp salt (if you use salted butter, a bit less is needed)


• 3 tsp baking powder

Liquid ingredients:

• zest of 1 lemon


• 150g sugar


• 125g melted butter (or margarine for dairy-free)


• 2 eggs


• 3 Tbsp lemon juice


• 20cl natural yoghurt (or soy yoghurt for dairy-free)

Fruit:

• 100g peeled and grated apple


• 100g peeled pear, cut into small cubes

Icing:

• 125g confectioners’ sugar


• 2 Tbsp lemon juice

Oh, how I love to bake muffins! The procedure is always the same: combine dry ingredients in a baking bowl. In another one, mix together the liquid ones. Then pour the liquid ones onto the dry ones, and stir until well combined. Then add fruit and stir again. Pour the batter into a muffin pan and bake in a preheated (190 Celsius) oven for some 25 minutes. Take the muffins out of the pan, let them cool a little bit and then brush with the icing (another technique is to dip them upside down in the icing - for me it didn’t work, it was just a mess..). Oh, and for the icing you just need to combine sugar & juice - if it’s too stiff, and a bit more juice, and if it’s too liquid, add a bit more sugar! Decorate with poppy seeds and serve with your favourite coffee or tea!

PS. I've started to replace the apple by pear, so I use 200g pear instead. And when buying poppy seeds, do make sure that the expiry date is a long time ahead; otherwise the seeds might have an unpleasant rancid taste!