I'm enjoying trying corn (maize)-rye blends in a variety of breads. Today I baked a pair of sourdough boules where 40% of the flour is an equal blend of corn and rye. The baked loaves came out attractive and wonderfully good eating
Pix first, then details.
Recipe
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- 360g (60%) - KA bread flour
- 120g (20%) - Indian Head fine corn meal
- 120g (20%) - Locke's Mill stone ground rye
- 80g - (13%) - 90% hydr starter
- 360g + 15g - water (initial + later)
- 13g (2.2%) - salt
- 0g sugar (I forgot to add a touch of sugar)
Overall hydration with starter: 64%.
Mix lightly, add water, rest 30 minutes, knead, rest, 3 s&f sessions. Bulk room temperature (73°F) 7 hours, approximately doubling in volume.
Divide in two, shape into preform balls, rest 15 minutes, gently for boules without more folding, only tightening the surface.
Proof ~ 1 1/2 hours, retard in fridge until morning. Bake cold.
Preheat 500°f, bake with initial steam 300°F 15 minutes, finish 415°F 21 minutes.
The baked loaves have a mild, lovely flavor with neither the corn nor the rye standing out over the other. The crumb is soft and fairly open for the flour mix. The crust has a little crunch without being chewy. One loaf ended up weighing 50g more than the other. There is no hint of sourness. The oven expansion was modest, which I expected what with the flour mix and the amount of rising in the fridge.
Overall, two delightful loaves. I'll freeze one for later.
TomP
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Tom
Nice looking bread and it sounds like it tasted great. I've used freshly milled corn in the past and have really enjoyed the added texture and crunch.
Tony
Thanks, Tony. The corn meal I used this time is too fine to give a crunch but then I wasn't looking for any. Now that I know this flour blend works well, I will probably scald the corn first next time.
swell-looking loaves, Tom!
Beautiful breads, Tom. Beautiful colour and crumb.
All flours used were not milled by yourself, right? A bit confused by the comments above.
Gotta say, you've been doing great promotion work on the corn-rye combination. It's just something I've never considered before, even though I use both in breads I've never considered before that they might go well together.
-Jon
Thanks, Jon. You are right, I don't mill my own flours. I'm not against it but don't have a good place to put a mill. Also, I'm not sure I want to deal with the dust and cleaning ...
The combination seems to bring out something more than the separate flours. I think 60-40 corn-rye may be the best ratio.
These look perfect and you’ve got the “ simple is better” down pat!
I’ll mill my own and probably do the Trinity just because 😊. The bake time did you mean 300° for 15 min or? Haven’t been near any fresh baked goods yet and missed the farmers market this morning as my husband wasn’t feeling well after a meal out yesterday that evidently didn’t agree. Will get to it next Sunday for sure and report back.
Since sugar works so well with a corn-rye blend, Trinity ought to be excellent. I've also scalded the corn and rye together (using milk) and it tasted great but it had way too much liquid for a stand-alone dough.
As for simple, after dividing the dough, I worked up a pair of ball-shaped preforms by tucking some dough under. For the final shaping, all I did was to round up the preforms and tighten the surface some. Nothing fancy at all.
That initial bake temp of 300 deg F really means that I let the oven drop where it wants to after I generate the initial steam. I used to set it at 250 - the exact setting doesn't matter. If you don't ask the oven to reheat, the loaf's surface will take longer before it stiffens too much to expand any more. This can allow for more expansion. So I just turn the setting down somewhere in that neighborhood for 15 or even 20 minutes (I started out at 10 minutes and worked my way up). Of course, this only works if you've got a steel or a good stone to keep pumping heat into the bottom of the loaf, and you need to preheat very thoroughly. Note that most of my loaves are baked free-standing. For loaves in a Pullman pan, I don't do anything weird like this.
I've measured a few loaves at that point, and have gotten internal temperatures in the range of 150 - 180 deg F. A larger loaf will be cooler inside. Then I increase the temperature to a finishing level, say 410 - 425 deg F for another 15 - 22 minutes depending on the bread. If one has a real baker's oven everything will be different but for my home electric oven (and probably most peoples') this strange way of working is effective.