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Russian Black Bread
Apr. 8th, 2016 09:58 pmI gave up making bread for Lent, and vowed that when I got back to it I'd be a bit more adventurous than 'vague attempts at recreating pampasbrød.' First up was black bread, which I remember really liking once upon a time. I found a recipe that was the right combination of well-reviewed and relatively simple on allrecipes.com; I made it with a few modifications and would make a few more next time, so here's what I've got for the non-breadmaker people out there:
1½ c water
2 Tbsp cider vinegar1
2½ cups bread flour2
1 cup rye flour
1 tsp salt
2 Tbsp margarine or oil
2 Tbsp dark corn syrup3
1 Tbsp brown sugar3
3 Tbsp unsweetened cocoa powder4
1 tsp instant coffee granules
1 Tbsp caraway seed5
1/4 tsp fennel seed
2 tsp active dry yeast6
1I used 1 Tbsp, as I feared the acid might make the yeast unhappy, but it had no noticeable effect and I'd do the full amount next time.
2I used 1½ c strong white flour and 1 c wholemeal flour
3I would use treacle/molasses for both of these, but didn't have any in the house so used brown sugar this time.
4Would make it 2 Tbsp next time – the bread was tasty but very noticeably chocolatey.
5Caraway is pretty much the only flavour I can't stand, so I omitted this entirely and bumped up the fennel, grinding it a little for better dispersion
6Someone in the comments on the original site said 1-and-a-bit tsp was plenty of yeast so I went with that, and they were right.
Warm your water to body temperature and dissolve 2 Tbsp of treacle/molasses in it, then pour into mixing bowl and add yeast. Once yeast is mixed well and starting to foam, add 1½ c strong white bread flour and mix thoroughly. Wrap in a plastic bag and leave somewhere warmish for about an hour, or until it has the texture of melted marshmallow when stirred.
Mix in remaining wheat flour and rye flour, mixing till smooth. Then add remaining ingredients, including the third Tbsp of treacle. Stir until well mixed. This will give you a dough that is too wet to knead, so stir it a good deal to activate the gluten, then cover again and put somewhere warm for another hour or so.
Once it has doubled in size, tip into a floured bread tin and let rise until it fills the tin, while heating oven to 425°F. Bake for about an hour. Remove it and, once the tin is cool, empty loaf onto a cooling rack and let stand for at least 30 minutes before slicing and serving.
I ate half the loaf in one day, so ... it's pretty good.
1½ c water
2 Tbsp cider vinegar1
2½ cups bread flour2
1 cup rye flour
1 tsp salt
2 Tbsp margarine or oil
2 Tbsp dark corn syrup3
1 Tbsp brown sugar3
3 Tbsp unsweetened cocoa powder4
1 tsp instant coffee granules
1 Tbsp caraway seed5
1/4 tsp fennel seed
2 tsp active dry yeast6
1I used 1 Tbsp, as I feared the acid might make the yeast unhappy, but it had no noticeable effect and I'd do the full amount next time.
2I used 1½ c strong white flour and 1 c wholemeal flour
3I would use treacle/molasses for both of these, but didn't have any in the house so used brown sugar this time.
4Would make it 2 Tbsp next time – the bread was tasty but very noticeably chocolatey.
5Caraway is pretty much the only flavour I can't stand, so I omitted this entirely and bumped up the fennel, grinding it a little for better dispersion
6Someone in the comments on the original site said 1-and-a-bit tsp was plenty of yeast so I went with that, and they were right.
Warm your water to body temperature and dissolve 2 Tbsp of treacle/molasses in it, then pour into mixing bowl and add yeast. Once yeast is mixed well and starting to foam, add 1½ c strong white bread flour and mix thoroughly. Wrap in a plastic bag and leave somewhere warmish for about an hour, or until it has the texture of melted marshmallow when stirred.
Mix in remaining wheat flour and rye flour, mixing till smooth. Then add remaining ingredients, including the third Tbsp of treacle. Stir until well mixed. This will give you a dough that is too wet to knead, so stir it a good deal to activate the gluten, then cover again and put somewhere warm for another hour or so.
Once it has doubled in size, tip into a floured bread tin and let rise until it fills the tin, while heating oven to 425°F. Bake for about an hour. Remove it and, once the tin is cool, empty loaf onto a cooling rack and let stand for at least 30 minutes before slicing and serving.
I ate half the loaf in one day, so ... it's pretty good.
