December 5, 2022 - 7:17am
Frisian Black Bread TRB
The recipe for Frisian Black Bread (Fries Swartbrood) in "The Rye Baker" is unusual but easy.
It has a two-stage sponge at high hydration (I set the proofer to 75 F; my rye starter prefers a warm room temp) that I think is supposed to favor acetic acid; the book promises "a mouth-awakening sour edge". I didn't get that, but my palate isn't great.
The recipe is easy and at 87.5% hydration for 50% medium rye and 50% bread flour, it comes out as a thick batter that has to be baked in a loaf pan. I got very nice oven spring. The hardest part of the recipe is waiting 24+ hours to slice it.
It's not particularly black with KA Organic Rye. I'll probably try it with a whole rye flour.
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I baked this loaf, too, and found that the crumb was not very dark. But I did think that the crust was pretty dark so maybe that is the origin of the Black Bread? I though the flavor was OK, but it was not up there with some of the other recipes in TRB.
I actually overbaked this one a bit. I had been baking with convection at 25 F lower than recipes specified. The convection distributed heat more evenly eliminating the need to rotate loaves on a stone partway through.
But recently, I turned the convection off and I use the published temps and times. I have been finding that I need to check the loaves a few minutes before the shortest recipe bake time. And the dutch oven of course eliminates the need to rotate anything.
The oven has digital controls, not knobs; when I have checked the temps they match the control setting very accurately.
I used KA Organic rye, a medium rye for this one. Maybe the Frisian flour has a higher extraction and comes out darker.