A Hearty Bread

I'm not baking bread as often as I used to. Lots of things getting in the way of it, but mostly it's because Sweetie asked me to not tempt him with warm bread quite so often...he has no resistance to bread hot from the oven but wants to continue to fit in his clothes.

Still, I have a sourdough starter and it seems a shame to waste the 'toss off' that comes with feeding it. Before I went to LA I used it to make some pizza dough, which I then froze. One day soon I'll make pizza for dinner, but for now the calories are held at bay.

I fed it again a couple of days ago and decided that it had been a long time since I've made a hearty, seedy bread. If I give half of it away then Sweetie and I can still have some and feel virtuous at the same time. After doing a half-feeding of the toss off (1/2 cup each all-purpose flour and water, instead of a full cup of each), I let that sit in the fridge over night. The second day I fed the mixture with a feeding of 1 cup graham flour (Bob's Red Mill brand) and 1 cup water. It made for a soupy mixture since the last time I fed the starter I added extra water knowing that it would be well over a week before I could feed it. The reason I mention this is that I started with more hydration in the dough than usual. If you have 100% hydration starter, you won't need as much flour for the bread.

The graham flour mixture sat on the counter for about 20 hours before I started the dough and it was nice and bubbly, plus there was a great yeast fragrance, but I knew I would be adding a lot of things needing a bit of extra lift, so I whisked in 1 teaspoon active dry yeast.

In a bowl I mixed together dark rye flour, flax seed, all-purpose flour, and salt. These were added to the sourdough mixture using my stand  mixer and the dough hook, letting everything come together and finishing with some all-purpose flour to stiffen the dough a bit. Once the machine kneading finished, I did some more on a floured board. The dough was just a bit tacky, so I used my bench scraper to lift the dough up and over for kneading.

After kneading a few minutes, I flattened the dough out into an oval, then sprinkled on 1/4 cup chopped pecans and 1/4 cup of Salad Toppings, a mixture I found at Costco that contains pumpkin seeds, sunflower seeds and dried cranberries. Rolled up the dough, folded the ends over, then flattened it again to allow for the remaining 1/4 cup chopped pecans and 1/4 cup Salad Toppings to be worked in. More kneading until all was evenly distributed, then into the rising container for a few hours to rise. I like to spray the bottom and a bit up the sides of the container with spray olive oil, then turn the dough in it to coat surface of the dough with oil. Probably not necessary, but I like the dough to stay soft on the surface and that takes care of that.

After the dough doubled in bulk, I turned it out on a floured board, punched it down, used the bench scraper to cut it into three pieces, then weighed them so that they were each about 14 oz. Rolled each into a snake shape and put them, lined up, on a baking sheet. After braiding them loosely, I covered the braid with a clean tea towel and let it rise. All that was left was preheating the oven, painting the plait with beaten egg, and baking it until golden.

This makes a hearty bread. It has a fairly fine grain and is studded throughout with seeds, nuts, and the occasional cranberry piece. I served it with dinner and one guest described the variety of flavors and 'lots of musical notes', but they all work well together. This is not a sweet bread since the proportion of cranberries in the Salad Topping is small. It has lots of seeds, which is lovely, and makes great toast.

I had a couple slices today for lunch as Avocado Toasts with some smoked salmon on top. Yum!

Hearty Seedy Braid
my own creation

1 cup sourdough starter, plus about 2 tablespoons water if your starter is 100% hydration
1/2 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 cup water
1 cup graham flour
1 cup water
1 cup dark rye flour
1/2 cup flax seeds
1 cup all-purpose flour, plus additional (about another 1/2 cup or so)
1 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup chopped pecans
1/2 cup mixed sunflower seeds, pumpkin seeds and dried cranberries
1 egg, beaten

Take the 1 cup sourdough starter and put into a large bowl. In a smaller bowl whisk together the all purpose flour and the water. Whisk into the sourdough starter until well combined. Leave on counter, uncovered for 2 hours, then lightly cover and refrigerate.

The next day whisk together the graham flour and the water in a small bowl. Add it to the sourdough starter mixture and let sit, uncovered, on the counter until the next day.

The next day, whisk together the rye flour, flax seeds, all-purpose flour and salt in a medium bowl. Put the sourdough mixture into a stand mixer bowl. Attach the dough hook to the mixer. Stir about 1/3 of the flour mixture into the sourdough mixture with a wooden spoon or a spatula. Put the bowl on the mixer base and start up the dough hook on low speed. Slowly add the remainder of the flour mixture. If needed, add additional all-purpose flour as the mixer kneads the dough for at least 8 minutes. When kneaded, dough should clean the sides of the bowl and be tacky but not sticky.

Remove the dough from the dough hook and bowl onto a lightly floured board or clean work surface. Knead the dough a few turns, then flatten into a large oval or circle. Sprinkle half the pecans and half the seed mixture over the dough, roll up jelly-roll fashion and flip end up over the log. Press down to flatten the dough again, sprinkle on the remaining pecans and seed mixture, roll up again, then knead until the pecans and seeds are well distributed in the dough.

Oil lightly a rising container. Place the dough in it, then turn dough over so that all is coated with oil. Flatten the dough in the rising container, cover with a clean shower cap or with plastic wrap and set in a warm, draft-free place to double in bulk.

When dough has doubled, turn out onto a lightly floured board or work surface. Using a bench scraper, cut into three pieces (weigh if necessary to keep about the same weight), then roll each piece into a snake shape. Place the three snakes next to each other in a baking sheet, braid loosely, tuck ends under, cover with a clean tea towel and let rise until about doubled.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. When braid has almost doubled, use a pastry brush to paint the plaits with beaten egg. Bake for about 40 minutes, until golden brown. When you tap the bottom of the loaf, it should sound hollow. Cool for at least 10 minutes on a rack, then slice and serve.

BBBs Go Long

No, we're not playing football. We're baking the gorgeous long loaves of Brunkans långa.

Gorel from Grain Doe has given the Bread Baking Babes an excellent challenge this month…from scratch graham flour sourdough. It was pretty painless and produced a bread that is out-of-this-world wonderful! You can really taste the wheat flavor, it is slightly sweet, chewy, has a great crust, open crumb


and makes fantastic toast, but is perfect to eat plain, without any adornments. This recipe makes a LOT of bread…two long loaves.

I enjoyed the first loaves so much that I made a half of the recipe using a sourdough graham starter that is a combination of the regular graham starter and my own starter (see end of recipe). It was SOOO good that I baked the half recipe two more times after that with the combo graham starter. The first time I just made one loaf using the dough as it spilled out of the container after it's night in the fridge, then shaping it lightly so that it was a long loaf...but only one long loaf! Two was way too much bread for Sweetie and I to manage and it is so delicious that we found it hard to not eat it all.

The second time I made two baguette shaped loaves, cutting the single long loaf in half and pulling the edges under.

The third time I made two pans of rolls,

glazed with an egg yolk wash.

Unfortunately I think the yeast I was using was too old, so this batch wasn’t as light as the other three, but still delicious if a bit more leaden than I would have liked.

As you can see I really, really like this bread. It has a wonderful, rich wheaten flavor that is hard to resist. Thank you Gorel!

Before we get into the specifics of this great recipe, I would invite you to visit the other Bread Baking Babes to see how they fared with the long loaves. Links are to the right at the top of this blog.

I also want to remind you that you, dear reader, are invited to help the Babes pick their Anniversary challenge for February 2011! We are hoping that in November you will send in suggestions and requests for a bread that you think we should bake to celebrate another year of great Babe bread. So scour your recipe books, check those magazine piles, print outs and bookmarked blogs to find the perfect bread recipe. Details will be provided in November on where to send them. So many breads....so little time!

Since this has the the bread I've been baking, over and over, for the last few weeks, I'm finally sending this to Susan at Wild Yeast for her weekly Yeastspotting event. This is where you will find a weekly collection of bread baking delight and inspiration. Ohhh...great place to get ideas for the Anniversary challenge. She has an archive of bread links that will amaze and delight! Susan also recently posted a video for the most fascinating way to shape a baguette to make rolls that are hooked together...check out the dragon tail shaping...it's way cool.

My bad, I forgot to mention that you can be a Buddy by making this yummy bread, posting it and sending the URL, etc. to Gorel, our delightful kitchen hostess of the month. DO become a Buddy! You have until September 29th.

A little bit of backstory: Brunkan is a nick name for Brunkebergs bageri (the bakery of Brunkeberg, situated in Stockholm), and ”långa” means ”the long one”. When they bake this bread at the Brunkeberg bakery, it is more than two feet long – hence the name. This bread is from the book ”Bröd” (Bread) that Heléne Johansson published last year and which contains the most popular breads in her line.


Brunkans långa

Graham flour* sourdough:

Day 1, morning:
Mix 60g/100 ml/0,42 cups graham flour
with 120 g/120 ml/0,5 cups water.
Cover with cling film and leave at room temp.

Day 1, evening:
Add 60g/100 ml/0,42 cups graham flour and
60 g/60 ml/0,25 cups water.
Mix, cover with cling film and leave at room temp.

Day 2, morning:
Add 60g/100 ml/0,42 cups graham flour and
60 g/60 ml/0,25 cups water.
Mix. By now, the sourdough should be a little active (bubbly). If not, add a teaspoon of honey, some freshly grated apple or a teaspoon of natural yoghurt. Leave at room temp.

Day 3, morning:
Feed the sourdough with 60g/100 ml/0,42 cups graham flour and
60 g/60 ml/0,25 cups water.
Mix, cover with cling film and put in fridge.

Day 4
By now, the sourdough should be ready to use. If you don’t want to use it right away, you can keep in the fridge if you feed it as above a couple of times/week.

*Graham flour can’t be found everywhere. If you want to recreate an exact substitute, here’s what to do, according to Wikipedia:

Graham flour is not available in all countries. A fully correct substitute for it would be a mix of white flour, wheat bran, and wheat germ in the ratio found in whole wheat. Wheat comprises approximately 83% endosperm, 14.5% bran, and 2.5% germ by mass. For sifted all-purpose white flour, wheat bran, and wheat germ having densities of 125, 50, and 80 grams/cup, respectively, one cup of graham flour is approximately equivalent to 84 g (~2/3 cup) white flour, 15 g (slightly less than 1/3 cup) wheat bran, and 2.5 g (1.5 teaspoons) wheat germ.


Brunkans långa
The tall loaf of Brunkebergs bageri
2 large loaves

Ingredients
300 g / 600 g/600 ml/2,5 cups water
562 g / 1125 g/2,48 lb high-protein wheat flour (for 1 loaf: 300 g bread flour, 262 g whole wheat flour)
188 g / 375 g/13,2 oz graham sourdough (see above)
6 g / 20 g/0,7 oz fresh yeast
75 g / 150 g/5,3 oz dark muscovado sugar
13 g / 25 g/0,88 oz honey
15 g / 30 g/1 oz sea salt

Day 1
Mix all wet ingredients in a stand mixer bowl. Whisk together all the dry ingredients in another bowl. With the dough hook attached, add the dry ingredients to the wet, keeping the mixer on a low setting. Work the dough in a stand mixer for 10 minutes. Put the dough in a oiled, plastic box and put the lid on. Leave the dough for 30 minutes.

After 30 minutes: fold one side of the dough against the centre of the dough, then fold the other end inwards, finally turn the whole dough so that the bottom side is facing down. Put the plastic box with the dough in the fridge and let it rise over night.

Day 2
Set the oven temp to 250 C/480 F. Leave the baking stone in if you use one.

Pour out the dough on a floured table top and divide it lengthwise with a sharp knife. Put the dough halves on a sheet covered with parchment paper and place another parchment paper or a towel on top. I dusted them with some flour at this point.

When the oven is ready, put in the sheet or shove the parchment paper with the loaves onto the baking stone. Put a small tin with 3-4 ice cubes at the bottom of the oven. (The water releases slowly which is supposed to be better.) Lower the oven temperature to 175 C/350 F immediately after you have put in the loaves.

After 20 minutes, open the oven door and let out excess steam.

Bake for 35 minutes or until the loaves have reached an inner temp of 98 C/208 F.
Let cool on wire.


Second time: Used 1 cup plain flour sourdough starter and added the graham flour/water mixture to it. Each successive day was done just like the recipe. When I made the loaf, I measured out the starter by weight for the first thing into the bowl. There is still a lot of the starter left because I had to feed it twice more than called for…until I had time to bake again. I’ll happily make more of this delicious, versatile bread using the rest of the starter.

Note: the first ingredients listed (not in bold) are the ones I used for the sourdough graham starter (above) which I used for making one loaf. After the dough had risen overnight in a round container with lid I poured it out onto a large, floured board, gathered the ends under to shape it into a long loaf, put the loaf on a baking sheet lined with a silicon mat, sprinkled with a bit of flour, covered it with a tea towel and continued with the recipe as written. It was just as good as the first, but not any better.