Cakes & Bakes: Seeded sourdough boule

For this week’s Cakes & Bakes recipe we have a delicious, crusty, seeded sourdough boule (a fancy French word for a round, slightly domed loaf).

My starter and, as a result, dough are getting quite lively in this warmer weather!

The seeds add texture and and depth of flavour, with distinctive little hits as you crunch through individual seeds. You could even lightly toast them before adding them to the dough – something which I’ll try next time.

It’s a very versatile loaf, suitable for accompanying all manner of meals and perfect for sandwiches. It makes for great toast too! We enjoyed ours liberally spread with a lovely soft goat’s cheese on day 1 – and then it was transformed into the aforementioned toast and served with poached eggs on day 2. Both fabulous!

Click here to save the recipe to Pinterest

Seeded sourdough boule

2019-07-04 15:46:25

Yields 1

Prep Time

23 hr

Cook Time

1 hr

Total Time

24 hr

Prep Time

23 hr

Cook Time

1 hr

Total Time

24 hr

Ingredients

350g/12⅓oz water at 27ºC/80ºF
108g/3¾oz fresh sourdough starter (100% hydration) that has been refreshed the night before and again in the morning
400g/14oz strong white bread flour
140g/5 strong wholemeal bread flour
150g/5oz lightly toasted mixed seeds (sesame, poppy, sunflower, pumpkin, flax, linseeds, pine nuts etc.)
6g/¼oz fine salt
a little rice flour for dusting your banneton

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Instructions

In a large mixing bowl, whisk the warm water and starter to combine
Knead in the flour, cover with a reusable food cover / cling film and let the dough rest in a cool environment for 1½ hours
Add the seeds and salt and mix until all the ingredients come together into a large ball
Lift and fold your dough over, do a quarter turn of your bowl and repeat three more times. Repeat hourly 3 more times
Shape your dough lightly and place it into a dusted banneton
Cover again and refrigerate (overnight) for 8-12 hours
Remove from the fridge and allow to warm and prove until the dough has risen by about 50%. This normally takes about 2 hours in a kitchen that is about 18-20ºC
Preheat the oven to 220ºC/425ºF/Gas mark 7 for ½-1 hour (also preheat your La Cloche or baking stone if using)
Gently remove the loaf from the banneton, slash the top of with a lame (grignette) and put it into the oven
Bake for 40 minutes, turn the heat down to 190ºC/375ºF/Gas mark 5 and bake for another 10-15 minutes depending on how brown you like the crust
Allow the loaf to cool completely (at least an hour) on a wire rack before slicing

H is for Home Harbinger https://hisforhomeblog.com/

Cakes & Bakes: Seeded sourdough loaf

Since I revived my sourdough starter a fortnight ago, we’ve been enjoying pancakes (for brunch on Justin’s birthday), waffles and last week’s raisin bread. This week, I made a seeded sourdough loaf.

To begin with, I used my go-to overnight sourdough recipe and simply added a selection of seeds. It’s a very good recipe for using up bits & pieces of packets of seeds you have in the cupboard. However, if you don’t use seeds that often, rather than buy a bag each of say sunflower seeds, pumpkin seeds and linseeds, Morrisons (and all large supermarkets, probably) do little packets of ready mixed seeds.

Also, I changed the order of cooling and proving. Vanessa Kimbell recommends proving for a couple of hours and then putting it into the fridge. To begin with, I do the final folding at night and put the loaf in its banneton straight into the fridge. Then, in the morning, I bring it out to prove while the oven preheats – that way round works better for me!

It made a delicious, crusty 1kg loaf. Sliced, it’s perfect with bowls of soup – or on its own with just a bit of butter. The good thing about home-made sourdough bread is that it can last over a week without going mouldy. After a number of days, as the loaf begins to go hard, it makes brilliant toast or bruschetta; the twice-cooked seeds impart an even nuttier taste.

If you want to try it out, click here to save the recipe to Pinterest for later

Seeded sourdough loaf

2019-04-18 13:05:06

Yields 1

Total Time

24 hr

Total Time

24 hr

Ingredients

350g water at 27ºC
108g fresh sourdough starter (100% hydration) that has been refreshed the night before and again in the morning
540g strong white bread flour
50g mixed seeds (anything like sesame, sunflower, pumpkin, flax, pine nuts or linseeds)
6g fine salt
a little rice flour for dusting your banneton

Add ingredients to shopping list

If you don’t have Buy Me a Pie! app installed you’ll see the list with ingredients right after downloading it

Instructions

In a large mixing bowl, whisk the warm water and starter to combine
Knead in the flour, cover with a reusable food cover / cling film and let the dough rest in a cool environment for 1½ hours
Add the seeds and salt and mix until all the ingredients come together into a large ball
Lift and fold your dough over, do a quarter turn of your bowl and repeat three more times. Repeat hourly 3 more times
Shape your dough lightly and place it into a dusted banneton
Cover again and refrigerate (overnight) for 8-12 hours
Remove from the fridge and allow to warm and prove until the dough has risen by about 50%. This normally takes about 2 hours in a kitchen that is about 18-20ºC
Preheat the oven to 220ºC for ½-1 hour (also preheat your La Cloche or baking stone if using)
Gently remove the loaf from the banneton, slash the top of with a lame (grignette) and put it into the oven
Bake for 40 minutes, turn the heat down to 190ºC and bake for another 10-15 minutes depending on how brown you like the crust
Allow the loaf to cool completely (at least an hour) on a wire rack before slicing

H is for Home Harbinger https://hisforhomeblog.com/

Cakes & Bakes: Raisin sourdough loaf

I’ve resurrected my starter after spending 3 weeks away from home – abroad in Trinidad. Justin requested a sourdough raisin loaf, but with no added spices, so that it would be more versatile with regards to teaming it with other food and dishes.

I like to pre-soak the dried fruit that I use in baked goods as it stops them drying out and burning in the oven. Depending on what you’re making, you can soak them in strong tea, alcohol or plain old water.

On self same trip to Trinidad, the friend that I stayed with introduced me to some wonderfully useful kitchen devices – if you can call them that. They’re like shower caps for covering food… just brilliant! She bought them in a dollar store when she was visiting her sister in the USA. They come in 3 different sizes and the largest is the perfect circumference for fitting over the bowl of my vintage Kenwood mixer and 1-kilo-sized round banneton. They’re reusable and knock the socks of cling film and the plastic bags that I’ve been using. For those of you that are interested, I’ve since found them for sale in Lakeland.

I adapted a recipe by Vanessa Kimbell, baker, teacher, originator of my favourite 24-hour sourdough loaf recipe and the author of The Sourdough School: The Ground-breaking Guide to Making Gut-friendly Bread.

Click here to save my raisin sourdough loaf recipe to Pinterest

Raisin sourdough loaf

2019-04-03 09:33:19

Yields 1

Cook Time

1 hr 10 min

Cook Time

1 hr 10 min

Ingredients

100g/3½oz raisins, soaked in strong tea for at least an hour
215g/7½oz water
180g/6⅓oz sourdough starter (100% hydration)
90g/3oz wholemeal flour
305g/10¾oz strong white flour
10g/⅓oz fine salt
13g/½oz cold water

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Late afternoon

MIX

In a large bowl whisk your water and starter and mix well. Add all the flour and mix until all the ingredients come together into a large ball
Cover with a clean damp cloth and let the dough rest on the side in the kitchen for between 30 minutes and 2 hours – this is what bakers call the 'autolyse'

FOLD

Add the salt mixed with the water and dimple your fingers into the dough to allow the salty water and salt to distribute evenly throughout the dough. Leave for 10 minutes
Next, lift and fold your dough over, do a quarter turn of your bowl and repeat three more times. Repeat 3 times at 30-minute intervals with a final 15-minute rest at the end

SHAPE

Shape the dough lightly into a ball then place into a round banneton dusted with flour (If you don’t have a banneton, use a clean tea towel dusted with flour inside a colander). Dust the top with flour, then cover with a damp tea-towel

PROVE

Transfer the dough in its covered banneton to the fridge and leave to prove there overnight for 8-12 hours

Following morning

Take the banneton out of the fridge to allow your dough to warm up and finish proving (it should get to 50% bigger than when it went into the fridge)

BAKE

Preheat the oven to 220°C/450ºF/Gas mark 8 for at least 30 minutes before you're ready to bake. Place your cloche, Dutch oven or baking stone in the oven and a large pan of boiling water underneath. The hydration helps form a beautiful crust
Once the oven is up to full heat, carefully remove the cloche/Dutch oven/baking stone from the oven, taking care not to burn yourself. Dust with a fine layer of semolina or rice flour, which stops the bread sticking, then put your dough onto the baking stone and slash the top with your blade. This decides where the bread will tear as it rises. Bake for an hour
Turn the heat down to 180°C/350ºF/Gas mark 4 (and remove the lid if you're using a cloche or Dutch oven) and bake for another 10-15 minutes. You need to choose just how dark you like your crust but I suggest that you bake until it's a dark brown - it tastes much better

Adapted from Vanessa Kimbell's basic sourdough recipe

H is for Home Harbinger https://hisforhomeblog.com/

Cakes & Bakes: Fried bakes

Following on from last week’s pholourie recipe, here’s another of my favourite fried foods that hails from Trinidad – fried bakes (or fry-bake, if you’re a proper Trini!). ‘Fried bakes’ – a contradiction in terms!

My aunt sent me a recipe that she cut out of the TT Guardian – complete with a few of her personalisation notes!

It’s a very quick and simple recipe; a basic dough of flour, raising agent, fat and liquid – but the end product… wow!

Fried bakes are traditionally eaten with fried fish (the famous bake & shark eaten al fresco at the beach) or buljol, a spicy salted fish dish.

Here is a video of my aunt making fried bakes recently. This is what she advocates:

I decided that tapping the dough down into the oil, whilst turning it but by bit, results in it puffing up immediately.

As a vegetarian, I thought about what best to stuff them with. In the past, I’ve had them with extra mature cheddar, Branston pickle and salad. Perhaps smashed avocado or hummus with grated carrot. Instead, I went a step up and decided on fried bakes with grilled halloumi, salad and hot sauce.

Click here to save the recipe to Pinterest

Fried bakes

2019-03-17 12:48:29

Serves 6

These bakes are traditionally served with fried fish or buljol

Ingredients

260g/9oz plain flour
8g/¼oz butter/shortening
2 tsp baking powder
½tsp salt
½tsp brown sugar
190ml/6 fl oz water
vegetable oil for frying

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Instructions

In a large mixing bowl, combine the flour, baking powder, salt and brown sugar
Rub in the butter/shortening until the mixture resembles fine breadcrumbs
Add enough water to just about make a soft dough
Flour your work surface and knead for about 5 minutes
Cover the bowl with a tea towel and rest the dough for 30 minutes
Divide the dough into 2 equal pieces and then divide each into 6 equal pieces (getting 12 in total). Or, weigh the entire ball of dough and divide into 12 equal weights; mine were about 40g/1⅖oz each
Rest the dough again for a further 5 minutes before rolling each piece into rounds about 7cm / 3" in diameter
In a heavy-bottomed, deep frying pan or saucepan, heat the vegetable oil and fry each bake making sure that it's covered in oil (my aunt recommends spooning oil over the top of the bake as it cooks, to help it puff up)
Carefully flip and fry the other side until fully ballooned or puffed
Remove and drain on kitchen paper to remove excess oil
Slice in half horizontally and load with your chosen filling

Adapted from Trinidad & Tobago Guardian

H is for Home Harbinger https://hisforhomeblog.com/