Rye Sourdough with Spelt and soaker

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Mebake on 7 Apr 2013 at 23:06

Last week, I had some left over whole spelt flour, some corn meal, and some semolina in addition to a ripe Rye starter. Therefore, I decided to put them all to use in a new recipe as follows:

UPDATE** INSTRUCTIONS:

Prepare the Rye sour by adding a tablespoon and a half of your active rye starter to the 250g water, and mix well to disperse. Add the Whole rye flour, mix well, and let stand for 8-12 hours at room temperature until the surface just starts to crack and collapse. To prepare the soaker, weigh all soaker ingredients into a bowl, and then weigh 160 grm of water, boil it, and add it to the soaker. Mix well, cover, and let stand until overnight, or when your rye sour is ready.

Next day, mix all ingredients at once, by hand or using a mixer for 5-10 minutes. The dough will remain relatively sticky, so try to resist adding any flour at this stage.Shape as a round and let ferment in an oiled bowl for 2 hours at preferably 78 F or 24-25C, folding it half way through at the 1 hour mark. By the end of bulk fermentation, the dough will have risen by 50-60%. scrape your dough onto a heavily floured surface, pat the dough even (Don't knead), divide into the desired dough pieces, and round each piece leaving them to rest for 15- 20 min, covered. Dust your basket with a mixture of all purpose flour and rice flour, and shape your dough and invert it smooth side down into the basket. The final fermentation will be only 45 minutes, but watch the dough NOT the clock. Preheat your oven at this stage with a stone in place to a 500F or 260C. 5 minutes before loading the bread, place your steaming dish filled with wet towels on the bottom of your oven.  When ready, invert the dough on baking paper lined peel/ board and close the oven immediately. Bake for 15 minutes with steam, and then remove the steaming dish and reduce the temperature to 400F for another 20-25 minutes. 

When the time is over, remove your bread from the oven. Wear oven mitts, and tap on the bottom of one loaf, It should  sound hollow. Furthermore, you may insert a thermal probe into the center of the loaf from the bottom, and the temperature should register 195-200F or 90-95C. If it doesn't, put it back in the oven for another 10 minutes. Cool the bread completely on a wire rack, prior to cutting. 

 

 

Due to the soaker, the aroma of this bread is really attractive. When cool, The crust was somewhat chewy, and the crumb slightly moist but not chewy. The flavor of this bread is earthy sweet and very pleasant. The crumb is close textured and compact due to all the whole grains, the bread might have benefited from extra lightness by increasing bread/all purpose flour.

I have eaten this bread thinly sliced with a spread of cheese, and it was fabulous. This bread keeps really well.

 

- Khalid

 

I'm always impressed with how expert bakers like you and Ian and dbm can scan your pantry and conjure up a formula that bakes out at nicely as this one did for you.  Sign of an expert.  I'll bet the flavor disappointment you described with one of your recent bakes doesn't apply here!  Corn, rye, spelt, semolina...man, this must taste great.  Plus superb shaping and dramatic bloom (Floyd -- headline material here, no?).  Great crumb for a bread with 50% gluten-challenged flours.   31% prefermented flour (incl. rye & spelt) kinda shortens the proof -- no waiting till midnight for the bread to come out!

Nice baking Khalid,  and two thumbs up for your documentation as well - great photos and easy on the eyes [and brain] spreadsheet.  Thanks for sharing.

Tom

That is a very generous praise, Tom! Thanks. 

 Now, any bread with a good rye sour and a soaker that contains corn and semolina just has to taste great. This bread is assertively Rye, and should be cut and consumed as one. The spelt also adds to the darkness and denseness of the bread, so you may consider this as a 50% rye-like bread.

I like the simple recipe layout of Hamelman, it is easier to discern than others i've come across.

Many thanks for your encouragement, Tom!

ears on these batards are decent enough to be called fabulous.  This is the kind of healthy bread you can eat every day and never get tired of it.   It has to taste as good as it looks inside and out.  Very nice baking Khalid.  It's good to get you back on track taste wise.  I'm thinking if you, Ian and I had a baking club, we would have to let Toady Tom in not just because he is a good bread baker but also because he has a good eye and is so nice!  We like this bread a lot!

Happy Baking Khalid.

Much thanks to you DA!

The useage of soaker has been a revelation to me, it salvages any flavor flaws you might end up with. You are absolutely wise in adding soakers to your wholegrain breads, as they tend to balance out the sourness from the starter with their sweetness. You'd have to be a well established baker to perfect a sourdough wholegrain recipe that does not contain a soaker. 

Thanks again DA!

and very elegant shaping.    I cannot imagine the taste given the contents, but it looks very rye-like.   I'm sure the taste is a lot more complicated than that.   -Varda

Way to go Khalid!  I'll have you adding dates and spices before you know it:)

Nice combination of flours and flavors.

i love your scoring and your crust.

i do have a few questions....how long and at what temperature was the water in the soaker?

I'm surprised you only needed a 45 minute rest after shaping.  How hot was your resting area?

Thank you, Ian!

I'm not sure about spices, but anything is possible :)

It was a cold soaker (room temperature) for 10 hours. As to the rest, no, the final fermentation took 45 minutes. My kitchen ambient tempertaure is 25C.

Hi Khalid,

What beautiful loaves!  I am surprised by how quickly you dough fermented!  Must have been the rye sour.  I know when I use fresh rye things happen very quickly!  

I know your family prefers the lighter breads so I am wondering how they like this one since it is definately not a light sandwich type of bread.  I figure if they don't like it YOU get to eat it all :-)

Thanks for the post and your photos.

Take Care,

Janet

Hi Khalid,

If your perfectly shaped and scored batard has any competition, it is between its own crust and crumb!

Alpana

That's a very nice formula and wonderful looking loaves, Khalid! I'm sure they taste just as good as they look, and the soaker ought to keep them fresh for days. As the rest, I'm also surprised how quick the final fermentation was. Did you notice that the dough was pretty well developed as you shaped them? With such a short final proof, you might be able to mix, ferment and bake it during a single evening session mid-week as well? Lovely bread, Khalid!

Thanks, Hans!

Yeah, the dough was perfectly developed and ready for a short final proofing, as two hours bulk fermentation were more than necessary. True, this recipe can be baked during the weekdays.

Always a pleasure to hear from you, Hans!

Beautiful batards, Khalid! 

I haven't experimented with the majority of the ingredients you've used in your recipe, but if they were available to me, I know for certain that I'd buy them in bulk. If only I could get my hands on whole rye and spelt...

Keep up the baking,

Zita

Thank you, Zita! 

Like you, i have limited access to speciality flours like rye and spelt, as no store here carries them, save ofcourse spinneyes. Look around, you might end up with a speciality mill, or a store that carries them.

 

Khalid.  Nice rye!  I love rye's like this one.  Very nice crust as well.  The bloom you got on the scoring must have been a pleasant surprise!  I only hope for my loaves to turn out like that.

Good job and happy eating!

John

Thanks, John! 

They were underproofed, so they burst open. I end up with such blooms only when i use two stones, one above the loaf, and one under it, both are preheated for an hour. Good steaming ( i use sylvia's steaming technique), and good scoring ( i learned from David (dmsnyder) , all contribute to the effect you see above. Oh and slightly underproofing also helps.

 

Hi Khalid, Beautiful rye and spelt loaves! Superb scoring! :^) breadsong
Thanks alot Breadsong :) I'm consistently being able to score successfuly, thanks to the set of conditions i learned here. In my oven, an additional stone above the loaf helps alot too.

Mebake

Your batards are stunning! I had to share how visually I was drawn to them as soon as I saw them!  You captured them perfectly.

Warm Regards,

Casey

I made this recipe today and it worked out really nicely. Delicious! 

I would love to bake this bread, but the list of ingredients and quantities are not followed up with instructions. Would it be possible to post the instructions? Thanks!

 

Hi, floreivan

I apologize for not including the required amount of rye starter. I just changed the recipe, and instructions.

Thanks for noticing this. I hope you try it soon!

Khalid

The link doesn't work. However, i don't see why mixing of rye sour with water will lead to overfermentation. What was the temperature of the water that you mixed the dough with?

I can't judge on the results with seeing a picture of the sliced bread.

khalid

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CAphyl on 9 Mar 2014 at 15:30

Khalid:  If you were going to use a different flour than Semolina in this recipe (I may not have any), what would it be? I know have a lot of Amaranth flour....what do you think?   Or perhaps you have another Amaranth recipe to recommend?  Lovely loaves...thanks for sharing.  Phyllis

p.s.  another question....if you could add anything else to the soaker, what would it be?  Double thanks!

Hi, Phyllis and thanks!

i haven't used amarnath in my baking, sorry. Semolina is from durum wheat, and may be coarsely ground  Kamut (which somewhat resembles Durum wheat) can be used instead. But, Kamut is hard to come by and is expensive, so it isn't a suitable replacement! 

Looking at the comment below, i think that couscous (which is essentially pre-steamed semolina) would worked well , if you can find it.

If i would add anything to the soaker it would be a tablespoon of barley malt extract (sweet malt syrup).

Thanks,

Khalid

Khalid:  I haven't tasted it yet, but it looks great.  Really enjoyed the process.  I made a few changes that I will list in my blog later when I have the second loaf and crumb shots. Thanks so much for this recipe.  Lots of fun.  Best,  Phyllis

Hello Khaled..I made this bread today yet got a little dense crumb...I substituted the 50g rye with spelt..as for bulk I did one hour room temperature with one fold after the hour, then in the fridge around 8 hours since it was 1 am :(..in the morning the dough was nicely proofed and not collapsed..cut preshaped and 20 minutes later I shaped into two boules..the first loaf left it over an hour, did the poke test and was satisfied yet dense crumb although tastes beautiful..still waiting on the second one to cool but it rested another hour I guess at room temperature...I guess I used to all rye bread so I know when ready, or wheat bread..yet not sure I can tell when the loaf is ready for the oven in final proof..How to check? thanks in advance for your time

Hello, and thanks for trying the recipe. It could be a challenge to tell when a dough of wheat is proofed and ready to be baked. practice should be your guide. Ideally, you have to look for a soft slightly pillowy (pillow -like) feel to the dough, and not tight and springy. 

from your description on the density of the loaf, i can tell that either the bread flour is weaker than it should, or you have not kneaded it /folded it enough. It could also be due to the fact that you've only allowed it to rest for 20 minutes. A cold dough needs to rest for a longer period of time. I'd shoot for 1 hour.

 

i hope this Helps!

best wishes,

 

khaled

Hello, in bulk fermentation and proofing what am I to look for? just the increase in size? since I tried the pocking technique and I do not think that it is accurate in such a bread since from the first hour of fermentation the indentation did not bounce back

Thank you Khaled

Keeping to the spirit if not the letter of the formula, I used substitutions based on what was in the pantry: : coarse whole rye flour (pumpernickel) for the whole rye flour, whole wheat flour for the whole spelt, and buckwheat groats for the semolina in the soaker.  And a little extra water because the dough looked as if it needed it.

The crumb is more open than I expected from nearly 60% whole grains (counting the soaker) at 75% hydration (counting the soaker).  

The flavor is pretty mild, but pleasant.  The combination of whole grains means that none of them stand out particularly but they all combine in a nice way.  I'm  surprised that the buckshot pellets of buckwheat groats in the soaker just melted away, adding their mild flavor, plus nutrients and fiber, to the bread.

The pumpernickel makes the grain a little more coarse, in a nice way.

Sourdough Rye w/Multigrain Soaker Photos