daily bread

I love a loaf. Really love it. In fact, please ‘scuse me for one minute while I go an make some toast to accompany the writing of this post.

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I love toast. With peanut butter. Even at 10.15pm at night. (Maybe most of all then.)

I’ve posted about bread before but I’ve had a few emails about the Artisan Bread in Five Minutes recipe so thought I’d dip in again. And besides, I get all giddy at the sight of a hunk of bread on a board so really this one’s entirely selfish.

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I have two types of bread I make. Neither involve much work. I love the idea of standing kneading bread, really I do, but I much prefer letting the breadmaker or the mysterious genius of the Artisan Bread do the work for me.

I went off the Artisan recipe for a while, I was worried about the amount of yeast in a loaf… then I burnt my breadmaker cord (Adam had suggested I move the breadmaker away from the stove where I tended to drape the cord across the back of hot elements… oops.) I shelved my breadmaker recipe and started using the Artisan recipe again and now I love it.

My incredibly wonderful Dad showed up at my place one day with some tools and in a wink had replaced the Breadmaker’s cord for me, so now we have both kinds of loaf, depending on my mood.

The Artisan recipe basically goes like this: 

Put 3 cups of lukewarm water in a bowl.

Sprinkle 1.5 tablespoons of yeast over.

Stir through with 1.5 tablespoons of salt (I only use 1).

Add 6.5 cups plain flour (I use 6 cups of wholemeal).

Stir up. Leave to rise for 2 hours. Put a portion (I make 2 loaves with this volume) into your bread tin or onto a tray for a round loaf. Rest for 40 minutes then bake at 230 degrees (Celcius) for 30 minutes.

Sometimes I use a 2/3 proportion and just make one big loaf-tin loaf.

It’s so so easy. And never fails. I really must go get their book sometime.

My other grainy loaf goes like this: (for breadmaker)

300ml cold tap water

3 cups wholemeal flour

2 tblsp wheatbran

2 tbsp wheatgerm

1 tblsp cracked wheat

1 tbsp linseed

1 tbsp sunflower seeds

1.5 tbsp milk powder

1.5 tbsp oil (I use macadamia nut)

1 tsp salt

2.5 tsp dry yeast

Add all the above, in order, to your breadmaker and set to ‘dough’.

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Once it’s ready, take out and put into a loaf tin and allow to rise for about 40 minutes.

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(Sprinkle with sesame seeds or poppy seeds or both or whatever you fancy)

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Once risen again by about half, bake in a hot oven (approx 200 degrees) for about half an hour or until toasty on top and hard if you poke it and making your house smell like heaven.

You can make this without a breadmaker of course. The water must be lukewarm and you would set your water and yeast to start in a cup with a teaspoon of sugar. You’d mix all the ingredients together and knead it for about 10 minutes. Give it two rises (let it double, punch it down and let it double again) then bake the same as above.

Apologies to any gluten-free readers today.

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I sincerely hope you don’t know what you’re missing.

xxx

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