Wine Bread

Around here we are awash in wine and wine-related things. There are wine auctions, wine road events, grape harvest news and more. One of the trainers at the gym is going to intern next month and the following one at a winery; going out into the various blocks of vines and taking samples, then checking for sugar levels and grapes per cluster count and recording all of the findings in a database. Sounds like fun!

Even more fun was the Bread Baking Babes bread for July. Astrid of Paulchen's Foodblog was our Babe of the month and she gave us a lovely bread to make which is flavored with sweet white wine; Rheinbrot. I didn't actually use a Riesling as the recipe required, but found a lovely white Moscato instead. The poolish did carry the fragrance of the Moscato at first, and I can detect a bit of the flavor in the finished bread, which we had with our dinner tonight. As an aproned and pantied Babe I was supposed to have made the bread and posted by July 16th, but at least I finished it in time to be with the Buddies...an honorable place to be. The bread is light and has lot of holes, is moist but not too much so, and the flour I used gave some texture as well as hearty flavor.

One of the thing I noticed when I read the posts of those who had already baked the bread was that it lent itself to variations. For my variation I used King Arthur Flour's Irish whole meal flour instead of bread flour for the roughly two cups that are added to the poolish...and I used Lien's poolish recipe, too. Mine actually sat for over 24 hours, enriched after 10 hours with another 1/3 cup bread flour mixed with 1/3 cup water. The reason was that I had planned poorly and wasn't around when the dough needed attention on Sunday if I wanted to bake it for last night's dinner. It all worked out in the end because it was chilly enough tonight to warm up the kitchen for the baking.

My only regret was that I tried to use my banneton, just as Lien had. Imagine my consternation when I went to turn the risen dough out to bake when I found that it had welded itself to the coils of the basket! Yes, I had used copious amounts of flour on the basket before adding the dough. I suspect, seeing the large holes in the finished bread, that the dough was just too wet for the basket treatment. You can see in the photo below the remains of the floured parts that had stuck...it adds an interesting texture, doesn't it?

Despite the lack of shapeliness, this lovely bread was delicious! Thank you Astrid for choosing this recipe. Although I love to sip wine as I eat bread, I never would have thought to bake a bread with wine. I also hope you will add me to the Buddy round-up. Better late than never, right?

Rheinbrot(makes one large loaf)

Sponge:
50 gram semisweet Riesling
50 gram boiled water, at room temperature
100 gram flour
50 gram of wheat sourdough at 100% hydration

Dough
250 gram flour (I used 250 grams Irish whole meal flour)
135 gram water
6 gram salt

1) Mix wine with water and add the sourdough, whisk thoroughly
.
2) Add flour and mix again.

3) The dough ferments at 2 stages:

3a) 4 hours at a temperature 30-32°C, it should grow at least twice its size, will be lumpy looking at this stage and have larger and smaller bubbles. If you stick your nose into the container, the scent will be somewhat unpleasant, it may even seem that the dough has deteriorated. Don't panic, this only means the dough is doing the right things ;o)

3b) Pour the sponge in a bowl and whisk thoroughly to remove all the gas out of it and fill it with oxygen. Cover with foil and let sit for 10-12 hours (overnight) at room temperature. Dough will rise again in half and very often shows smaller bubbles.

4) Now the sponge is ready for kneading: pour in the water and stir until smooth. Add the flour, mix well and give the autolysis a chance to do it's magic for 40-50 minutes.

5) add the salt and quickly knead the dough, if it is too sticky add a little four, but be careful not to add too much.

6) Let ferment for 2-2.5 hours. Fold twice after 1 hour and 1 1/2 hour. The dough smells fresh now, no smell of the wine.

7) Form a loaf and let proof in a basket for 1 1/2 hours (doubles in size) covered with a towel in a draft free place.

8) Preheat oven to 240°C.

9) Transfer dough to your baking sheet. Make an incision or two and let it slide on your baking stone.

10) Bake for 10 minutes with steam and without steam like 20 minutes at 200°C.

11) Let cool down for alt least half an hour before slicing the bread.

My notes: I didn't use a sourdough but a poolish:
poolish
75 g sweet white wine (I used Moscato)
75 g water
150 g bread flour
1/4 tsp dry yeast
I left this stand (covered) overnight for approx. 24 hours.
I continued with the recipe as above (except for the change of flour) and added another 1/4 tsp in the dough.