A Recipe for Rye Bread

The more I make bread, the more I am convinced of the importance of the kitchen being in the best situation in the house. When we designed & constructed our house, I was determined that the kitchen ought have a view & be on the front of the house. Now that its six-fifteen of a summertime morning & Im up early, kneading bread, since weve run for for out again, Im peculiarly amused to be appearing out over a sun-soaked landscape to the away mountains. Every time you make bread youre assured a good ten minutes of contemplation as you knead it, the mechanical rhythmic action frees the brain to wander or exchange offvery therapeutic. Having a view thrown in as well is just an added bonus.

I havent all of the time made bread. It is a comparatively past development. Making jam was the premier breakthrough into self-sufficiency, then came the daytime when our localized supplier of rye bread, who made a loaf that (miracle of miracles), all the children would eat, resolved to exchange recipes & use caraway in itinstant rejection by the whole family.

Wed given up the corn bread to attempt & aid my sons allergies & establish it helped most of us, so apart from the occasional indulgence of fluffy lily-white bread, I needed to stay off it. There was no alternative; I would have to take the leap into bread making. The primary cause that Id resisted was that it seemed to take so long. First the mixing & kneading, then the rising, then knocking down & forming loaves, a 2nd rising & at last the baking. Who might keep track of all that in the disordered life of a three-child family?

So eventually I take the plunge, turn to my mate Nigel (Slater, not namedropping but he & Nigella (Lawson) are ever-present in my kitchen, in script format of course) & find a foolproof recipe for a lily-white loaf, simpler to start off with lily-white I think. Well the premier attempt developed a reasonable, whenever huge, loaf, although my son still remembers that it was a bit doughy in the middle. Second try, I got 2 beautiful ideal loaves & I was on a roll.

Now to find a recipe for rye bread. It appears that 100% rye is normally made by the bitter dough formula & I couldnt watch my fellowship going for that, so adjust for a half & half rye/whole-wheat recipe triumph. Ok, my son the meal connoisseur complained it was a bit too sweet, so next time round I reduced the total of honey, but this recipe has been our staple dieting ever so so since, & I am today truly ensconced in my kitchen, appearing at the view, each else day, although I endeavor to keep the provide layer with the ever so so maximizing demand.

Any way, at last to the recipe:

500g rye flour
450g whole-wheat flour plus more for kneading
50g banal flour
1 tablespoon salt
1 10g sachet of instant yeast
1 tablespoon honey
3 tablespoons oil
670 ml milk
125 ml water

Warm the milk to lukewarm. Mix the flours & salt in a oversized bowl. Make a well in the center & put in the yeast, then honey, then oil, pour on the warmed milk & water & mix. When it gets doughy turn out on to a well floured surface (it will be highly sticky) & knead for ten minutes. You will want to keep adding flour as you knead. It is finer for it to be too sticky than too dry you might all of the time enlarge more flour, but too dry will make a dry, stiff loaf. After ten minutes, put it back into the bowl with a synthetic purse over it & go away in a warmish spot for 2 hours or so. Then knock down, firmly pressing out the air, but not over kneading, then shape into 2 or three loaves on a baking sheet, blanket once more & go away to rise for different hour. Then bake for thirty minutes at 190C till they audio hollow when you tap on the bottom of the loaf. Cool on a cable rack

So how do I keep track of the bread making, in between school runs, mealtimes & the rest? Well I dont always. There are times when I optimistically start the bread off, go away it to rise & four hours later remember about it, knock it down, blank out to exchange on the oven so it has had an additional daytime or so in rising time by the time it gets cooked. It does appear to be really forgiving although whatever you do to it, you do normally get bread out at the end, it might not all of the time be the ideal loaf, but then assortment is the spice of life after all. There was one time it hadnt rather finished preparing by the time I had to do the school run, so I called for my husband to take it out in ten minutes.. By the time I got back we had a really useful weapon against intruders. We didnt consume that oneI conveive it was ryvita for lunch!

Good luck with yours.

Copyright 2005 Kit Heathcock