Love life loaf and be happy

Waitrose's new range of "love life" products seems a bit confused. Alongside the wholegrains and pulses, there's a selection of ready meals. One product that caught my eye was this: a wholemeal flour with 11.5% mixed seeds (millet, poppy, linseed) and some other grains. Protein is high, at 16.3%, but a lot of that is down to the seeds.

It's attractive packaging, I think, combining a homespun simplicity with sophisticated colours. So I bought some. What kind of bread does it make?


My first attempt was disastrous. I didn't take any photos and wouldn't publish them if I had. I made a basic dough, using fast action yeast and about 65% hydration, but left in the fridge overnight, which probably isn't a good idea.  The dough never really came to life and when I baked it, in a cudgel shape, it rose very unevely with a big cavity in the middle. I also underbaked it. I think I'm just not used enough to wholemeal baking.

So I tried again, substituting strong white flour for about a fifth of the flour, again using fast action yeast but with normal rising times. Here's the result. Believe me, it's a lot better, but I can't get excited about the taste. I guess it's the seeds: linseed still doesn't do it for me, and the poppy seeds aren't making a big impact. Maybe I've just got so used to the flavour that a long slow rising with old-fashioned dried yeast gives.

Waitrose do a couple of similar seedy flours, and I might try one of them, but I think it will be better to carry on adding seeds etc to my own specification.

Black peppery rye

My first go at a Dan Lepard loaf is his Black peppery rye bread. It's a bold combination of ingredients, using coffee as the liquid, and black pepper as one of the ingredients. I followed the recipe almost to the letter (using fennel seeds), the only difference being that I turned down the oven to 190 after 15 minutes. And I think I should therefore have increased the baking time to 45 or 50 minutes, as the bread's a bit underbaked and doughy.

I'm not sure I like the taste. For me there's a bit too much pepper. Lepard recommends eating this with soft cheese or smoked salmon. I've tried it with some goat's cheese, and that's ok, but still a bit too peppery. I'm not sure the coffee's actually doing anything

There's another couple of faults in my loaf. First, for some reason it's split a bit at the base. Second, the internal structure is slightly marked by the rolling process; here and there it looks a bit like a swiss roll.

But it's a pleasant even texture, and I guess it could be my basic rye bread. Without the coffee and the pepper, though.

Short and sweet

I once had to describe myself in three words for an application form for a quiz we were applying for. I chose the words short and sweet, because it's true, but also because I liked the swank of "wasting" one of my words on and. We didn't get onto the quiz.

Anyway, Dan Lepard has now used the phrase for a manual of baking, with which I hope to exploit my Great British Bake-Off enthusiasm. (The series ended last night, with a victory for sweet, sweet Jo, who pipped the original favourite, Holly. Although Jo's very nice, I like the tinge of steel and ruthlessness in Holly. She'd be a more interesting companion, if interesting is what you like.)

It's a proper cookbook too, with general, slightly theoretical advice prefacing each section (bread, cakes, biscuits ...), detailed, trustworthy-looking recipes, and a nicely rationed supply of photos (maybe one every 6 recipes). Once I get started I hope to be publishing the results here.

Seedy bread for beginners

A seedy bread that people who don't like seedy bread might like.


Seeds
10g cumin
10g linseed
10g poppy
5g sesame
all dry fried     

Flour
400g strong white flour
50g wholemeal rye flour
4g salt
5g sesame oil

300g water
4g dried yeast

It was a mild humid day: this mix rose well between 1130 and 1530. Into the oven at 1700: 15 mins at 200C then 25 at 180C. Turned out nice: a light crumb, a bit of crunch in the crust, and a slightly subtle flavour (though cumin dominates).

A better balance

Still trying to perfect the seed-heavy loaf, I think I've got a better balance with this loaf.

Seeds

20g sunflower seeds

20g poppy seeds

50g pumpkin seeds

15g sesame seeds

(all lightly toasted in a dry pan)

Flour

400g strong white flour

50g wholemeal rye flour

6g salt

2 tsp red malt flour

a splash of rapeseed oil

Liquid
300g water
pinch sugar
3g dried yeast

I used an overnight fridging, and am very pleased with the result.

Seedier still

There are probably people who object to the term "beef up" as carnivorist. Nevertheless, beefing up is what I've tried to do to the seedy bread recipe in my last entry, especially now I've got some linseeds. The experience has only convinced me that Lepard's original recipe is impossible.

Flour
250g strong white flour
100g wholemeal rye flour
50g strong wholemeal wheat flour
4g salt
about 20g sunflower oil

Seeds
50g sunflower seeds
50g pumpkin seeds
20g poppy seeds
50g linseeds

Liquid
250g water
pinch sugar
4g dried yeast
10g red malt flour

I started this on 26 July at 11:30, dry toasting the seeds and adding them to the flour, then, when it had cooled a bit, adding the liquid. Unsurprisingly, it was a stiff horrible mix, but I thought adding more water would make it worse. So after about ten minutes kneading I put in in the fridge for a long rest

On 27 July it was still pretty sluggish, so after it was back at room temperature, I kneaded it again, and left it overnight at room temperature (probably around 16C).

Yesterday it had risen, so I kneaded it again. I added a little water as the surface had inevitable dried out a bit. It still was difficult, but formed into a plausible bloomer shape. It then took about four hours to prove and finally at about 16:00 it was ready for the oven: 15 minutes at 200, then 30 at 180. And here's the partially eaten result.

It's no doubt very healthy, but it's pretty joyless. It's like the classic Cranks offering: virtuous but dull. I think I could have added more poppy seeds: it would improve the flavour. I've a feeling I don't like linseeds; a problem because I now have quite a lot of them. And for anyone with false teeth this would be a nightmare.

Heavy with seed

Based on a recipe by Dan Lepard in yesterday's Guardian magazine, I set out to create a heavy seedy bread.

The seeds
As well as pumpkin and sunflower seeds, Lepard uses linseeds, but I didn't have any of those. He also uses 100g of each, which strikes me as madness, so I used:
40 g pumpkin seeds
40 g sunflower seeds
20 g sesame seeds
10 g poppy seeds

His brilliant suggestion is to toast the seeds. He used an oven; I used a dry frying pan in batches, until the seeds were slightly browned.

Liquid

Meanwhile I was activating 4g of dried yeast in 250g of water with a tiny pinch of sugar. These days I mix any malt flour in with this water - it tends to clump in the bag, and this ensures the clumps are dispersed. I used 10g of red malt flour and 2g of diax. Lepard uses 2 teaspoons of fast-action yeast. I kind of thought this dough will need a long rising to develop useful amounts of gluten, so stuck with my normal practice.

Flours
Lepard uses 250g rye flour out of a total of 400g, and only 75g strong white. No way, matey!

150g strong white flour
80g strong wholemeal wheat flour
160g wholemeal rye flour
4g salt

All this mixed up and left to autolyse for about half an hour. I then attempted to knead it, but it was too dry and there was too little gluten. It tasted really nice though. I decided to leave it overnight in the fridge. It would at least make lovely duck food.

Today, it still looked a bit horrible so I added some water and made a more successful attempt at kneading. Then let it rise at room temperature, and the yeast had obviously begun to stretch the gluten. After about four hours, it looked like proper dough. I kneaded it fairly lighly and put it into a tin (lined with baking parchment - I'm not sure that was necessary). It came up to about 1cm below the top of the tin.

Within two hours it had risen to about 1cm above the tin, and I guessed it was ready to go.

Into the oven - my new combination microwave oven, which is clearly more efficient than the built-in one - at 200C for 10 minutes, then 180C for 30, out of the tin for the last five.

Here it is. I can't imagine what it would be like with 300g of seeds in it, or with 250g of heavy rye flour. But this is surprisingly firm - I mean it doesn't fall apart - and obviously tasty.