Soaked-Grain, Whole Grain Bread

Bread-baking day is today!  The process began yesterday when I mixed the ground whole wheat and rye flour with a mixture of water and raw apple cider vinegar.  I know it sounds weird, but soaking the whole wheat flour before using it for baking makes the finished bread soft and chewy!

When I first began baking bread a few years ago, I was curious about how to make a whole grain bread that would still be soft and chewable.  In searching, I learned about soaking whole grains before baking them.  You can read about this discovery here. 

I adapted Sally Fallon's recipe for "Yeasted Buttermilk Bread."  Her recipe calls for soaking the grains in buttermilk.  Although I always have kefir around and fermenting, I don't really want to use it to make bread.  To lower the cost of the final product, I decided to soak the grains in a mixture of water and raw apple cider vinegar.

Soaked Grain Bread
Make one large loaf or two small loaves.

4 cups of whole grain flour (wheat, rye, spelt, kamut, or a blend)
2 Tbs. of raw apple cider vinegar mixed with 1 1/2 cups of water
1/4 cup of very warm water
2 1/4 tsp. of active dry yeast
2 Tbs. of honey
1 tsp. salt
1/2 tsp. baking soda
1 cup of unbleached white flour

Combine the whole grains and mix with the apple cider water mixture.  Cover with a plate or a towel and let soak for 12-24 hours.

Combine warm water, yeast and honey and let the yeast dissolve for about 5 minutes.  Add the salt and the baking soda.  Combine this mixture with the soaked grains.  Knead until a smooth ball forms, adding white flour as necessary.


Cover and let rise until doubled in size, for about two hours.  Punch down dough, stretch and fold and place in a colander lined with parchment paper.  Let rise until doubled, for about one to two hours.

Place a covered cast iron dutch oven in the oven and preheat the oven to 450 degrees (with the covered dutch oven heating, too). 

When the dough has doubled in size and the oven is preheated, carefully remove the dutch oven and the lid.  Carefully lift the dough from the colander and place inside the dutch oven.  Cover the pot and put into the oven.  Bake for 30-35 minutes.  Remove the lid for the last 5-10 minutes of baking to brown the top.  Cool on a rack. 

For more information about how and why to soak grains try these resources:

• Nourishing Traditions by Sally Fallon
• The Passionate Homemaker

Granola Bars

A few weeks ago, I looked up a recipe for homemade granola bars.  This is the one I chose.  The first time I made this, they turned out very good just as the recipe is written.

Of course when I went to make them again last night, I didn't have all of the ingredients, and since I live on an island and have no access to a grocery store without taking a boat first, I had to make some substitutions. Here's the recipe I came up with:

Ingredients
2 cups of rolled oats
1 cup of peanuts
1 cup of shredded coconut
1/2 cup of sesame seeds
3 Tbs. butter
1/2 cup of honey
1/4 cup of brown sugar
1 1/2 tsp. of vanilla
1/2 tsp of salt
1 cup of raisins
1/2 cup of dried cranberries

Directions
Toss the oats, coconut, peanuts and sesame seeds.  Spread evenly in a pan and bake @ 350 degrees for about 15 minutes or until it is toasted.  Reduce oven to 300 degrees.

Mix and bring to a boil the honey, brown sugar, salt, butter and vanilla.

Pour over and mix wit the oat mixture.  Add the dried fruit.

Press mixture into a 9"x13" pan lined with parchment paper.  Bake for 20-30 minutes.  Cool at least 2-3 hours.  Cut into squares.

All I can say is DELICIOUS!  They turned out kind of crunchy and chewy at the same time.   They're perfectly sweet and a little bit salty.  And the sesame!  Oh my goodness it's a great addition to the mix.  It was all I could do to not eat the entire bag this afternoon!

This batch turned out more crunchy than chewy and so didn't cut very well.  But the flavor was amazing!  I will make this one again.

The Fruits of Summer

It is pouring outside. I woke up this morning around 5am, thinking about my 6:30am running date, and I smiled when I heard the rain beating on the roof. Eliza and I have a deal that we don't run if it's raining. We've been running together Mondays-Fridays since April, and this is the first day that we've actually gotten to use our rain rule. I'm fully enjoying it!

Yesterday the fog was so think you could barely see the end of the dock, and the mosquitoes were buzzing around everywhere, looking for exposed flesh to bite. But Lil's currants and my raspberries needed picking, so I put on long pants and a sweatshirt to protect against those nasty little suckers and I headed down to Lil and Chuddy's to pick and pick and pick those juicy currants! I've never seen her red currants like this. They're dripping from the bushes. Big, fat, red berries dangling on skinny vines up and down the branches of each laden bush. I picked the vines off of the branches a few at a time and then swept my finger and thumb down the vine to remove the berries. They dropped into my two-quart bowl and before long the bowl was filled up. I poured the berries into a gallon-size bag. I worked methodically, cleaning one branch at a time, moving slowly around the bush until it was picked clean. Three hours and dozens of mosquito bites later, I went home with three gallons of red currants. And I only picked one bush. There are still two out there just as heavy with fruit.




The original plan was to make room for all those currants in the freezer. When I got home and looked into the freezer I realized that was impossible. It's completely full. Filled right up to the top with bread and meat and rhubarb and cider and all sorts of things that we need to begin to use up. So, what the heck to do with three gallons of currants?! I put them on the counter and went out to take care of the raspberries while I thought about just what to do. After about an hour, I had two quarts of red raspberries and the idea of raspberry-currant jam circulating throughout my head.


I came home and began to page through my Ball Complete Book of Home Preserving, but once again I was dismayed by how much sugar the jam and jelly recipes called for. One recipe for berry or currant jam called for five cups of fruit and seven (SEVEN) cups of sugar. That's one cup of sugar for every eight ounce jar of jam! Crazy. I searched for the book for an alternative with less sugar, but all of them called for at least one cup of sugar per jar of jam or more. Then I decided to look for a recipe on-line. I found the recipe I was looking for here: Strawberry-Currant Jam

This recipe calls for half of the sugar in other recipes, just about 1/2 cup per jar. The jam turned out perfect. The flavor is not too sweet, in fact a bit tart and powerfully berry-ish! It jelled beautifully without the use of any added pectin. Apparently currants have enough pectin in them naturally to jell without adding any more! The color is just beautiful--bright red and fresh.

The recipe is as follows:

Strawberry-Currant Jam
(Makes about seven 8-ounce jars)

1 quart (4 cups) red or white currants, or gooseberries (I used red currants, and I didn't boil them with water to make the juice/puree. I have a great foodmill that strains berries, tomatoes, etc. without cooking them first. It's called the "Roma Food Strainer Sauce Maker")
1/4 cup water

2 quarts strawberries (I used one quart of red currants and one quart of red raspberries)
4 cups sugar
1/4 cup fresh lemon juice

Put the jars into the canner, and cover them with water by at least an inch. Bring them to a boil, and boil them for 10 minutes.

Wash and drain the currants and put them with the water in a sauce pan. Bring to a boil and boil, stirring gently, until they are all popped, about 5 minutes. Press them through a sieve, and reserve the puree. Discard the skins, stems and seeds.

Gently rinse the strawberries and drain them well. Mash them in a large canning kettle or pot; a potato masher does the trick nicely. Mix the currant puree, sugar and lemon juice into them.

Bring to a boil, stirring constantly until the sugar dissolves. Boil hard until the mixture reaches the gell stage, about 20 minutes. Stir occasionally to prevent it from scorching. Remove from the heat and skim off any stubborn foam. Fill the sterilized jars and seal with lids prepared according to the manufacturer's instructions; generally boiled for 5 minutes. Return the jars to the boiling water in the canner for 5 minutes.

Let cool, check that the jars have sealed, label, and keep in a cool, dark place until opened, when they go into the refrigerator.

I still have a gallon of whole currants that I managed to squeeze into the freezer. Additionally, I juiced 3 quarts for future jam. The rest I gave away. I'm planning on making another batch of the raspberry-currant jam and a batch or two of blackberry currant jam this fall when the blackberries are ripe. I'm so excited to have a reduced-sugar jam recipe and to know that currants eliminate the need for added pectin!

The other two bushes are still loaded. If they're not picked by Friday afternoon, I'm going in for more!