current favourite whole wheat bread recipe

though i haven't blogged much about bread baking lately, i'm still doing it every weekend. will make the dough on saturday, let it ferment over night and bake on sunday. i've been tweaking the recipe bit by bit and have observed the changes. current favourite is still richard bertinent's ciabatta recipe tweaked for whole wheat flour.

here's the recipe again.

to ferment overnight or at least 12 hours (this is your biga):

• 350 gm of organic whole wheat flour
• 2-3 gm or quarter teaspoon of instant yeast
• 200-220 gm of water (if it's too dry, a bit more water is fine here)
• 1-3 teaspoon apple cider vinegar (optional but recommended!)

on baking day

• everything above, mix with
• 350 gm organic whole wheat flour 
• 100 gm organic bread flour  (also known as white flour)
• 1/2 teaspoon instant yeast 
• ~10 gm sea salt or rock salt 
• 330 gm water
• 30 gm olive oil (use more if you prefer)

the vinegar is a nice addition. the dough ferments faster and the yeast is a lot more active. said to aid digestion of whole wheat, i don't know about this but i like the effect of the added vinegar. i used to do 100% whole wheat but the substitution of just 10% white flour results in very good rise. you could of course opt for 100% whole wheat.

this is a very wet dough. you can't knead it. it has to be so wet as we are dealing with almost 100% whole wheat flour here. if you ever cooked brown rice, you know that cooking whole grains require lots of water. same here!

so instead of kneading, you use the "stretch and fold" technique as illustrated in this video by richard bertinent. http://bleedinggumsmurphy.blogspot.com/2009/10/video-showing-bertinents-method.html. you really need a dough knife here!

don't over stretch yourself working the dough. work for a few minutes, let it rest for a few minutes then work on it again. better results than working on it continuously for 10 minutes. after you are done (say after 10 minutes or you couldn't be bothered anymore!), let it rest for about 30 minutes in a well oiled (olive oil) bowl.

after 30 minutes, it should have grown at least 50% in volume. pour it out (if you didn't oil the bowl, you'll regret now) on a flat surface and divide into 2 or 3, up to you. you could also switch on your oven now, set it for 250C or maximum temperature.put in your baking sheet now.

divided into 2, you get 2 large loaves of slightly more than 0.5kg each. divided into 3, you get 3 loaves of roughly 330 gm each.

once divided, gently stretch the dough again and fold into half. be gentle... to do this, you need 2 dough knives as there's no way your hands could handle the very wet dough. use the dough knives like an extension of your hands. place the ready dough on a piece of wood or baking sheet coated with lots of rice flour. you need this so that you could slide the dough into the oven.

once the oven is ready, use a very sharp knife, oil it slightly and slice on the top of the dough. slice it length wise or breadth wise or both. most likely you won't get a nice cut as the very wet dough will somewhat stick to your knife. never mind, let it be. slice for a depth of around 1 cm. if you don't slice it, as the dough rises up during baking, it may "break" at the sides, resulting in a not so pretty loaf of bread. if sliced at the top, it'll rise more evenly. anyway, it's okay to forego this step. most books recommend using a double edged razor blade but even with this, it still sticks as we are dealing with a very wet dough here. i know as i've tried this!

prepare a handful of ice cubes and throw into the oven after you slide in the doughs. be very quick here! you don't want too much heat to escape from the oven.

after 5 minutes at 250C or whatever max temperature your oven can handle, set it down to 220 C and let it bake for another 20 minutes.

then take it out! you are done!

if you desire for a slightly burned crust (i like this!), instead of 20 minutes, let it bake a little longer.

there you go! crusty, soft best tasting whole wheat bread. haven't tasted better!

video showing bertinent's method

as you know, when it comes to baking bread, good ingredients play an important role, but the rest is all technique, the baker's technique.

have been experimenting with bread baking for a while now but had the most fun lately when i learned about richard bertinent's "stretch and fold" technique of working with very wet dough.

yes, it's true that very wet dough makes good bread, but try working on it with your hands!

now this video illustrates very well on how to work wet doughs ala the bertinent technique.

remember, no flouring of the work space. you just got to have faith. after 10-15 minutes of stretch and fold, the dough really takes shape!

http://www.gourmet.com/magazine/video/2008/03/bertinet_sweetdough

reached an impasse in bread baking so have to try new ground

i have reached an impasse in my bread baking. been baking for about a year now but have stopped experimenting with new stuffs. been using the same basic recipe over and over again.


so need to try new stuffs.

it so happened that i bought 2 books on bread baking recently during the book fair organized by popular about a week ago. kuala lumpur bookworms have been having one hell of a time as there have been so many book fairs etc. i have acquired more than ten books in the past few months and have had hell of a journey devouring them!

one of the bread book i bought and just finished reading is richard bertinent's crust.

this book was sold at half price (hardcover!). it comes with a dvd too as no amount of text written could describe better the techniques used by mr bertinent than watching him in action.


and so, i tried one of the recipes in his book.


baked the ciabatta...

of course, this is all done with white flour, not my favourite at all, as i'm for wholemeal bread.

followed the recipe to a tee, as i wanted to see how it would turn out in the end.

mr bertinent recommends to weigh all ingredients (even water) rather than use spoons or cups as this is far more accurate. but he also acknowledged that some adjustments have to be made to cater for your local environment, say it's a hot sunny day or a cool rainy day etc.

now this ciabatta consists of 2 parts, a biga and then the real thing. this biga is unlike previous biga i did before, as it's a lot drier and consists more than 1/3 of the flour.

instead of the usual kneading, mr bertinent recommends the "stretch and fold" technique. it's quite interesting but could be very very messy as we are dealing with a very wet dough here. i do agree him that wet doughs still turn out better bread than dry doughs even dry doughs are easier to handle/knead.

needless to say, i made a mess on my kitchen top. got wet gooey dough all over the place!

the other difference in technique is that mr bertinent prefers to preheat the loaf pan to 250c and sprays mists of water into the oven to create steam. something which i never tried before! he suggests to preheat the oven to 250c, then once you place the dough in, let it bake for 5 minutes, then turn down the temperature to 220c for an additional 20 minutes.

compare to my tried and tested 180c over 40 minutes, this is interesting!

well... after all the work... i can say the result is worthwhile!

 

please forgive the pics. took with my phone as can't resist taking a bite! 

look at the holes! look at the beautiful holes!

look at the crust! look at the beautiful crust!

even wifey agrees this is a wonderful bread. smells lovely and the crust is just heavenly...

my only complaint is that white bread absolutely sucks! so will be trying the same recipe but with wholemeal bread this weekend.

stay tuned...

have not been experimenting much with bread these days...

... probably because i've been baking the same recipe over and over again!

can't seem to tire of current favourite. with more practice and experience, every loaf is getting more and more consistent! also, realized that we have gone 100% white flour free!


100% no white flour, wholemeal and rye bread

• 3 cups of wholemeal (whole wheat) flour
• 1 cup of rye flour
• 1-2 tbsp of honey
• 1/2 tsp of instant yeast
• 1 tsp salt
  
• about 1 cup full of seeds - sunflower seed, pumpkin seed and flaxseed.
• approximately 2 cups of water

have been using the same  recipe above for couple weeks now. only differ in the technique.

1. if you have time... try the biga method. mix 1 cup of rye flour, 1/4 tsp of yeast and 3/4 cup of water. let it sit overnight (12-16 hours). then mix the rest of the ingredients the next day.
2. if you don't have time at all. use the same above but increase to 1 tsp instant yeast. go for single rise.
3. if you have some time but not too much. then mix all the above. let it sit for 3 hours or until doubled in size. then stretch the dough and let it sit for another hour. go for 2 rises.

in all cases, i don't knead at all! there's not much gluten as there's no white flour at all so save your energy. instead let the yeast, water and father time do the work. you'll notice the dough will be kind of wet anyway so you still want to knead this glob of mess?

err, the amount of water is just a rough guide. the dough should feel kind of wet. if it looks a bit dry, add 2 tablespoons of water. in any case, should you decide you need more water, add in increments of 2 tablespoons.

before baking, sprinkle a liberal dose of seeds on top of the dough. some rolled oats look really good too!

as before, bake in a covered tin pan at 180C for 30 minutes, then remove cover and bake for another 15 minutes.

sorry, no pics. by the time i finished this loaf, it was kind of late. but it looks not much different from the other loafs of the approximately same recipe.

a better basic bread recipe

i wrote a basic bread recipe some time ago. and have been using that same recipe with good success for so long.

however, after trying the pre-ferment method, i'm sold! this is better, works faster and tastes better. only snag is the work is now spread out over 2 days. if you don't mind this (hey, good bread comes to those who are patient), then try this. i assure you you won't be disappointed.

[btw, it's called the pre-ferment method as a small quantity of dough is left to "ferment" overnight, then mixed with the rest of the ingredients. this method was in use when commercial yeast first came about as commercial yeast was expensive back then and this method utilizes less yeast. also, said to have some "sourdough" qualities. what i know is, it works fast! like yeast on steroids! and taste better. so i'm sold!

sponge, biga, poolish are all different variations of the same technique. the method shown below is about 100% hydration (meaning equal  weight of flour and water), so it's more like a biga.]

the day before

• 1 cup of flour
• 3/4 cup of water
• 1/4 tsp of instant yeast (after using instant yeast, i find dry yeast a hassle)

mix above ingredients and let it sit in a bowl, overnight. of course, covered with a plastic cling film. it could sist for 8-16 hours, it's all fine. overnight is best.

the next morning,  it should look wet, with holes and smell mildly acidic. what happened is that the dough has grown until its max, then collapsed down. if the dough looks like the same as yesterday, you can be assure the yeast is dead!

notice that no salt is used above. so we encourage the yeast to grow and grow until it collapses. hence you get a mild acidic smell.

baking day

• 3 cups of flour
• about 1 and 1/4 cup water (mixed with 1 tsp of honey). add more if dough feels dry
  
• 1/4 tsp instant yeast
• 1 1/2 tsp salt
  
• optional: 1 cup of "extras"

on baking day, mix all the ingredients above together with the overnight dough.  note that this differs from the basic bread recipe in the sense that we use more salt than before.

the amount of water needs to be estimated. the best feel is this :  the resultant dough feels sticky but doesn't stick much to your hands. some add more flour if too wet, add more water if too dry. if not sure, let it be a bit wet.

the optional 1 cup of extras could be anything of your fancy. it could be

• 1 cup raisin, 1 tsp rosemary for our favourite rosemary raisin
• 1 cup of grains like amaranth, quiona, buckwheat, millet, flaxseed, sunflower seed, pumpkin seed for another favourite of ours, the multigrain bread.

hey hey! anything to your fancy! you could slice open the dough before baking and put in some slices of ham/cheese...

anything goes!

even the flour mixture, you could vary. it's a good idea to use a "stronger" flour for the pre-ferment. i usually use rye or wholemeal. the other 3 cups of flour could be anything of your fancy!

so after you have mixed up everything, hand knead vigorously for about 30 minutes. machine knead is too much trouble for me. i hate the washing!

then put aside and let it grow.

within an hour, you should see some substantial growth!

once doubled in size (just slightly more than an hour needed)... gently "press down" the excess air and stretch the dough somewhat, so that the yeast will work for you again. be gentle here.

shape it to whatever shape you want to, then let it sit for another 45 minutes, then bake it!

i usually bake at 180c for about 23-25 minutes, or until golden brown.

easy peasey!

basic bread recipe

baking your own bread is very simple. the ingredients are cheap and easy to source. the basic recipe consists of only 4 ingredients, namely flour, yeast, salt and water.

yeast plays the leavening role here though you could substitute with baking powder for "quick breads".

of course, you need measuring cups, spoon and an oven too!

my first 2 attempts at bread baking was an utter disaster. i got interested after reading all those "no knead bread" blog posts around the net. tried it but instead of getting soft fluffy bread, all i got was tough hard-to-chew bread, if we could still call it bread.

i later traced this to the mistake of not paying attention to the yeast i bought! i bought active dry yeast but thought it was instant yeast.

be careful here! you could make this mistake too!

there are 3 types of commercially available that yeast i know of, fresh yeast, dry yeast and instant yeast.

both fresh and dry needs to be "activated" first before mixing with flour. activation requires mixing the yeast into lukewarm water and then wait 5-10 minutes where you'll begin to see the water become cloudy and bubbly. this is when you know your yeast is ready to begin work.

instant yeast could be mixed into the flour right away but not dry yeast. be careful here!

okay, here's my basic recipe. works every time. every bread i've baked is just variations of this.

• 4 cups of flour
• 1 teaspoon dry yeast
• 1 teaspoon honey
• 1 teaspoon salt
• approximately 2 cups of lukewarm water (read on)
  

to begin, heat some water (preferably filtered water as we don't want chlorine here) until boiling point. then mix into equal quantities of room temperature water. total volume of about a cup.

this will be about just nice for yeast to grow. about our body temperature. to test, put in your finger. it should feel a bit warm but not uncomfortably hot until you need to pull out your finger. easy test huh?

then pour in 1 teaspoon of honey. the purpose of honey is for the yeast to feed on. you could substitute with sugar or malt extract. understand the rationale here. once you do, then you understand it wouldn't matter at all even if i were to put in one tablespoon of honey.

once your lukewarm water + honey mixture is ready, put in your teaspoon of yeast. stir it. 5-10 minutes later, the mixture will be cloudy and bubbly. excellent!

now if you are using active yeast, you could skip all the above and just go to the next step. i prefer to use dry yeast as i could test whether my yeast is alive. with instant yeast, you only know it's dead when it hasn't risen in hours!

now it's time to mix into your flour mixture. put the 4 cups of flour into in a large bowl and make a little well in the center. pour in the yeast mixture. then stir...

okay, here's where i get a little unscientific here. i don't care how much water any bread recipe calls for as i don't care whether the resultant bread is more french or italian, or has a higher water extraction blah blah blah... my other hobbies are wood working and electronic stuffs, so permit me to be a little unscientific here. baking bread is very relaxing for me and i surely don't want all that details to curtail my enjoyment.

to me, bread is bread! so i usually just add more lukewarm water until the resultant dough is slightly sticky on your hands. if it's too sticky, add more flour! if it's too dry, add more water! see? so simple! but add 1 tablespoon at a time, so that you don't overdo it.

most likely you'll have to use your hand here to mix everything up. don't worry if it looks like a mess. once you mix everything up, we'll stop for a break here and wait about 20 minutes. this process is called "autolyse" - a rest period giving everything to settle down together and let the yeast grow a little. you could skip the autolyse process and add salt into the flour first but autolyse helps you develop better bread and reduces kneading time. here's one important point to remember. never never mix salt with yeast. the idea of salt is to slow down the yeast fermentation process. if you mix salt into yeast directly, it'll kill it. remember this!

so after the autolyse period, you knead the dough and knead in the salt, little pinches each time.

here's a pretty good video on kneading.

YouTube - Kneading Bread Dough

after kneading, put into a large bowl and cover with cling film or a moist towel. then wait... magically after about 2 hours, the dough would have doubled in volume! however, if it hasn't risen much, do not despair as yeast activity is greatly affected by ambient temperature. i usually place in a cool place and let it rise slowly. with rich doughs, sometimes i wait up till 8 hours. it doesn't matter as the longer the yeast works on the bread, the better the overall flavour.

then you need to do "proofing". this video explains so well!

YouTube - Second Rise (Proofing)

the idea of "punching down" shown at the beginning of the video is to distribute the trapped air bubbles inside the dough so that the resultant bread won't have just large holes at the top but little holes everywhere inside. the dough is then stretched so that the yeast can be exposed to more starch and let it feed on again, and thus release more air into the dough.

then finally bake into an oven at about 200 C for 20-25 minutes.

easy!