Day 59: Buttermilk Rye-Whole-Wheat Bread

Everyone's favorite dairy product is back! This bread has a whopper of a name that comes from the three different flours it uses. It uses a cup of whole-wheat (that I luckily had leftover), rye, and all purpose flour. The recipe only makes one regular sized loaf however, and I didn't look at that when I decided to halve the recipe. So what I got was just a little baby loaf. I'm totally okay with this however, because it's texture and taste makes it perfect for small slices accompanied with other toppings. It's got a little sour taste from the buttermilk, and you also get hints of caraway all throughout the bread. This makes for an interesting combination that goes well with some cheese. 

Minus the halving the regular recipe thing, I was really happy how this one turned out. It's a very easy recipe to make, and it even says that you can whip this up in an emergency if you need some bread. I totally agree with that, but I think there might be some easier recipes to make in that time just in case you don't have buttermilk and three different types of flours on hand. We have about a weeks worth of rye breads before we get back into barley breads! 

Day 58: Rye Bread with Sauerkraut

I don't like sauerkraut one bit. I love cabbage and kimchi (when it's not super fishy) but I just can't stand sauerkraut. This made me pretty wary of making this bread, and when I actually had to mix the sauerkraut in, it was taking all my energy not to run away. I of course cut this recipe in half, because if it is gross, there's no way I'm making two loaves of it. Luckily, this bread tastes exactly like the onion rye I made yesterday. It smelled just like sauerkraut when it came out of the oven, but it has the same texture and taste as the onion rye. So I'm totally okay with this bread. The only real downside of this loaf is the fact that you have to buy and possess sauerkraut.

I was really happy how this bread came out mostly because it was nothing really new and tasted pretty okay. I ate it with some soup and it went so well with it. Like the onion rye, it goes extremely well accompanied with some other food. We have a handful of rye left, most of them require a bunch of starters and such, so we're chugging right along through the book! 

Day 57: Onion Rye Bread

Didn't mess this one up! I'm still not 100% sure what happened to those other loaves, but I think it either had to do with how much flour I put in it or how much I kneaded it. I used the mixer, put the flour in a bit at a time, and waited until it was fully mixed before I added the next batch of flour. I tried using the dough hook, but just decided to knead it by hand. I think I might have to hand knead all of these breads, or at least the rye ones. As you can see, this bread came out incredibly! The recipe makes either one big loaf or two small loaves, so I didn't halve the recipe or anything, I just went for it. This bread is pretty standard except for the fact that it is loaded with chopped onions right from the get go. It has a bit of caraway seeds so you get an awesome mix of flavors from the onions and seeds. It's a really soft bread that is specifically made to be eaten with soup I think. It makes an awesome sandwich, but the onion kind of overpowers anything you put on it. If you let it soak up some soup though, I think it would be incredible.

I was obviously really happy how this loaf turned out. It's got great color, texture, and a lot of flavor. I think this bread is going to be better if it's made for a whole meal in mind. It is great on it's own, but I think that, unless you really love onions, it's going to be hard to eat an entire loaf without the help of some soup or casserole. Hopefully the bread curse is gone and I can keep making actual bread loaves from here on out! I'll have to eventually go back and try those crazy breads I messed up, but for now we're going to just keep chugging on.

Day 56: Russian Black Bread

Made the exact same mistakes that I made yesterday, but this time I have some theories as to what I did wrong. Still not completely sure though, which is extremely frustrating. One of them is that I over kneaded the dough. According to this book from the 70's, kneading it in a KitchenAid and hand kneading it take the exact same time. According to KitchenAid's website, about 2-3 minutes in the mixer equals 10 minutes hand mixing. This might be how I over-kneaded the bread (which is really hard to do by hand) but it seemed pretty messed up before I even got to knead it. I never had this problem until I got to rye breads. Now rye breads are extremely sticky, which I started to look into because the dough basically just sticks to the bottom of the bowl, and the dough hook just cuts it up back and forth, not even kneading it. The solution to stickiness though, is to add sprinkles of flour continually. This, however, because rye is so sticky, means that you're going to be adding so much more flour, which in turn, causes the dough to be extremely dense and hard to work with. I have a few more theories that I'll keep working on, but I'm still not 100% sure what happened. This is really frustrating because I didn't do anything to these last two loaves that I did on the sour dill bread, which turned out incredible.

Day 55: Sour Cream Rye Bread

I'm not sure what happened to this loaf, but I definitely messed it up. It's almost unreal how bad this turned out. It looks like a giant cookie, but has the consistency of a half baked loaf of bread. We went from the best rye bread ever to this miserable lump of dough. It's completely on me to be fair, but I have no idea what happened. There's not a lot to really say about this loaf, other than how disappointing it was. Hopefully the rest of the rye breads turn out as well as the dill one did.

I honestly couldn't even finish the slice of bread I cut first. I don't think anything could really help this one, it's just irreparably bad. I'm looking forward to the next few breads, and I just hope nothing I ever bake turns out like this one. It'd be one thing if I burnt it, but to have it turn out this bad and not really know why, it's just so much worse.  

Day 54: Sour Dill Rye Bread

This is easily the best rye bread so far, and on the short list for best bread so far. It's got everything you want in a bread: good flavor, great color, fantastic consistency, and superb crust. The only potential turn off is the dill and caraway flavoring put into it, but I think that it's a plus. There is a lot of dill in it because in Bernard Clayton's new and improved rye dill bread he uses not only copious amounts of dill weed and dill seed, but also the sour dill brine from a jar of pickles. This, I think, separates it from good dill and great dill bread. You use the brine in addition to the water in the recipe, so it's not just an added bonus, but a foundation for the bread. If you don't like dill you're going to hate this bread, but my god is it so delicious.

I've been trying to go in order for the recipes, but we're definitely going to be jumping around now. There are a lot of weird breads coming up that I can't wait to make (and one I can wait to make) including a crazy pumpernickel bread that has to bake for 6 hours! I haven't decided what I'm going to make next, but only a few require starters or sponges, so I should be pretty okay mixing up the order. 

Day 53: Raisin Rye Bread

I really love breads and assorted goodies with raisins in it! Bernard Clayton, in the recipe, said that if he wants to cheer up his wife he just makes some awesome raisin bread for her. This one is supposed to be a really great one and I agree completely. It starts with a sponge that you let sit for a few hours (up to 3 days) made with rye flour, water, molasses, and yeast. While this is fermenting you soak both sultanas (golden raisins) and regular raisins in water or brandy. I used water because I'm a chump, but it still came out delicious. When the sponge is done you throw the raisins in and add more flour and the other ingredients to make the dough. I thought that having the raisins in this early would cause them to be crushed to bits and pieces when you knead it, but they came out in all varying sizes. 

Because of the raisins, the bread has a lot of moisture in it, which helps a lot. There aren't any caraway seeds in this loaf either, so you just a lot of flavor from the rye flour, raisins, and molasses. They all come together to form a delicious loaf that not only looks incredible, but tastes great too. I made sandwich out if this bread and it was to die for. We're cruising through rye breads, and I can't wait to get to some of the even stranger ones coming up. 

Day 52: Triple Rye Bread

Sourdough rye bread! This loaf was quite an ordeal to make, and I don't really think it was worth it. You first start with rye berries that you soak for 2 days and then strain. Meanwhile you combine rye flour, rye flakes (basically oatmeal but made from rye), yeast and some water. This is your sour that you let ferment for about 2 days. It then becomes just like another bread. You combine all of these, add some more rye flour, and mix into a dough. This dough required a lot more flour than the recipe said, which basically means that in order for it to be where I want it to be so I can knead it and let it rise properly, it had to be much larger and thicker than normal. Which means that this bread came out really dense. The sour taste was there, which was great, but it was also a lot of straight rye flavor. There aren't any caraway seeds in this one, so its a more traditional rye bread. 

A lot went into this loaf, and it was ultimately pretty okay. It makes great toast, but it's extremely chewy and dense to eat for a sandwich or something. I'm really looking forward to when we actually get to sourdough breads because that's where the real flavor is going to be.

Day 51: Old Milwaukee Rye

Now this is what I'm talking about when I think of a rye bread. It's loaded with caraway seeds, giving it that distinct rye flavor, and it came out looking beautiful. I cut the tops of the bread with a knife, but the cracks in it let it open much more. this recipe lets you make either two round loaves (spoiler alert: that's what I did) or four longer loaves. It's always easier to eat two loaves instead of four, and I figured I could get rid of them much quicker this way. Plus, big round loaves make better sandwich bread than small baguette size ones. Speaking of sandwiches, that's exactly what I did with this loaf. Right when it was still a bit warm, I cut off a piece and threw some Swiss on that, and it was excellent. 

I was really happy how this one turned out even though it was a hot mess to knead because the dough was massive and unruly. Rye dough is characteristically very sticky, which means you have to really work to get it where you want it. This one required a starter that you can let sit for at least 6 hours, and up to 3 days. I think that's where all the good rye flavor is coming from, but tomorrow's bread is made with a rye sourdough starter, so I'm even more pumped for that one. 

Day 50: Vortlimpa

As the first rye bread, I was pretty disappointed by the fact that there isn't any caraway seeds ( the thing that gives rye bread its rye taste) and a lot of fennel seeds ( the things that have an overpowering licorice taste) in this bread. So it tastes less like an actual rye bread and more like a sweet licorice bread. There was a lot of molasses in this bread, including the molasses brushed on the tops, giving them that shiny look. Because of the two different sizes of bread and pans, I had to put each bread on a separate level in the oven. I also forgot to put it on convection heating, so the top loaf was cooked perfectly while the bottom loaf was scorched a bit. 

These very hard loaves tasted pretty overpowering. They went really well with some cheese, but I'm not sure if I could ever eat two whole loaves of this bread. Regular rye bread is easy to make sandwiches and stuff out of, but this isn't really some sandwich bread. A lot of these future rye breads take starters and sour to be made a few days in advance, so hopefully we're going to start getting into the crazy stuff soon.

Day 49: Chopped Wheat Bread

This bread is extremely wheaty and quite a bit of work. It all starts with wheat berries that you soak for 2-3 days, then throw them in the food processor until they're pulverized. The recipe didn't ask for it to be turned into a flour, so I just processed them until they were chunky. You then throw all of that in a bowl with some flour, molasses, two kinds of yeast, and the other standard ingredients. There were a few chunky seeds that turned up in the dough, but that's okay. Like yesterday's loaf, they add a lot of texture and taste. 

As the last of the whole-wheat breads, these past two loaves were great to make. They required a lot of preparation but turned out to be some of the best whole-wheat breads because they actually tasted like real wheat. We're going to be moving on to rye breads after this, then barley breads, and then corn breads. So we got a few crazy things down the pipeline. 

Day 48: Sprouted Wheat Bread

This bread is incredible. There is some serious upkeep and preparation for it, but damn is it good bread. It all starts with wheat berries. You take them and soak them for a day and a half (I did the cheat way). The original method called for putting them in a mason jar and watering them every 6 hours or so for 3-4 days in a warm spot. So I bailed on that. After that, you set the water aside, grab two kinds of yeast, (bread yeast and beer brewing yeast) and combine it all with some flour and honey. This basically creates a starter that you ferment a bit before adding the rest of the ingredients and forming the dough. Because of this, the dough had to rise 3 times. 

This loaf tastes extremely wheaty, but in a good way. The wheat berries add a unique wheat taste and texture to the loaf. I was really happy how this turned out and the last whole-wheat bread is going to be very similar I feel. We're soon going to be neck deep in rye bread! 

Day 47: Rieska

So I had to cheat on this loaf. It's actually a barley bread, which is after Rye, which is after the whole-wheat breads. My math was off a bit, so I had to skip around in the book. There are only 3 barley bread recipes so I just slipped one of those in. This recipe is actually a Finnish Flat-bread that turned out really well. It came together extremely fast (about 10 minutes) and was done baking in another 15. So it's super easy to make, not the most pleasing to the eye, and tastes pretty okay. It's on the dry side but if you put some butter on it tastes just right. 

The rest of the whole-wheat breads should hopefully be done in the next two days. I just have to soak a lot of wheat berries, which takes a few days. After those two are done though, we're going to be moving on some great rye breads. I was taking a peek at the recipes and there are a lot of crazy ones coming up. After those 15 or so recipes, we'll move back onto the rest of the barley breads and keep on trucking! 

Day 46: Gugelhopf Complet Biologique

So this bread's name actually translates to whole-wheat gugelhopf. A gugelhopf is actually the original name for a Bundt pan, before Nordic Ware trademarked the name Bundt and started selling them. If you go to Europe, they'll call them gugelhopf pans, while here they'll call them Bundt pans. They're basically the same, but there are traditional gugelhopf pans (which are recommended in this recipe) which have a taller and tighter look to them. Overall this bread is delicious. It's got hazelnuts and currants inside the bread, while the pan is layered with almonds before the dough goes in. This bread is really chewy, and isn't actually that sweet, surprisingly.

The presentation value is top notch with this loaf, as most Bundt cakes/breads are. These round breads are a pain in the butt to store because the only way to really keep them fresh is to store them in a cake holder, which is always massive. There's a lot of bread on this one, but I can easily see myself making some bomb french toast with this bread. I don't know if it would make really good sandwich or anything besides that. It was a lot of fun to make though, even though the almonds took forever to slice and attempt to arrange. 

Day 45: Fruit-Nut Graham Bread

There is a lot going on all at once in this bread. I think this is the first whole-wheat bread I've made that uses brown sugar instead of molasses. It uses both all-purpose and whole-wheat flour, and is your typical bread recipe in that regard. What kicks it up a notch is that it's loaded full of walnuts and glaceed fruit. I didn't actually go get some fruit, so I just used currants. I'm not a huge fan of fruitcake, so this much preferable to me. You knead the fruit and the nuts into the bread right after the first rising, then you let it rise once more, throw it in the oven and when it comes out you put the glaze on it. You then finish it off with some more walnuts and bam you're done. 

Like I said, there is a lot going on when you bite into this bread. It's pretty soft, very chewy, and the nuts and fruit add a good change of texture. The bits with icing are the best, because they add all the sweetness and some moisture to the loaf. This bread looks incredible, and was really easy to make. I'd definitely keep it on a list of easy breads to gift to someone. 

Day 44: Rudi's Stone-Ground Wheat

This bread doesn't actually call for stone-ground wheat, but I'm sure the original recipe did. What it does use is bulgur, which is then soaked before hand and then tossed in with regular flour and whole-wheat flour. It's also got some wheat germ in it, so I'm slowly getting rid of my container of that. It's also chock full of honey, molasses, sunflower seeds, and sesame seeds. so there's a lot going on in it. It's got some great color and texture, and the flavor is off the charts. It's really soft, and goes extremely well with some butter on it. 

I think this loaf turned out really well, and I was really impressed by it. This is the first time I've used bulgur for anything and I'm a fan so far. You can't really tell it's in the bread, but that's okay. The recipe was a little intimidating but I worked through it. We're almost done with whole-wheat breads! Just a few more to go! 

Day 43: Whole-Wheat Orange Bread

This one is another batter bread, or quick bread, which basically means that it's a cake batter poured into a bread pan. It's about as moist as a cake and a lot like regular banana bread, but this one had a ton of orange flavor in it. The recipe called for 3 oranges worth of rind to use in the syrup, but I just used some candied orange peel instead. The recipe never called for the orange peel to be taken out of the syrup, but I think it'd be pretty gross to leave them in. I left the candied orange peel in because it absorbed a lot of the honey flavoring, and it was candied to begin with, so I thought it'd be okay. Next time I make this I'll use real oranges and compare the two. 

I'm not the biggest fan of orange flavored thing, besides oranges, but this turned out really well. I prefer lemon anything, but this orange cake bread really hit a spot. There is a ton of orange in it, but the whole wheat taste counter acts the sweetness remarkably well. there are also walnuts in it which give it just another layer of texture. It's a very solid recipe all around.  

Day 42: Dark Sour Bread

Any bread that uses beer, in my opinion, is good bread. I halved the recipe and still got this giant loaf, but at least there was some extra beer left over for me. In a lot of beer breads, you use the beer in conjunction with the yeast as a leavening and flavoring agent, but you can also use very yeasty beers on their own, it will just make a denser loaf. Like I said before, I halved the recipe and still got a lot of bread, so I'm not sure what would have happened if I actually stuck to the original recipe. I don't think there's an oven big enough for that massive loaf. 

Making the bread was a bit different too, because I had to let the beer go flat and then bring it to a simmer before throwing the rest of the ingredients (butter, molasses, corn meal, and salt) together and letting that sit. This bread also used whole-wheat flour, regular flour, wheat germ, and bran flakes. Yeah, there's a lot going on in this loaf. I may have messed up my ratios when halving the recipe, because it was a lot more moist than I was expecting, and had to use about a cup and a half extra flour to get it to a dough. This is my only explanation for how giant it got.

As for the taste, it tastes pretty good, but isn't really sour. I wasn't expecting sour-dough levels sour, but anything would have been appreciated. It's very moist, and has a great color and crust on it. These next few loaves require a couple days preparation in advance, so I'm going to have to jump on those. The rest of the whole-wheat breads I have to do all seem a bit crazy so I can't wait! 

Day 41: Vollkornbrot

Even though I halved the recipe, I didn't expect this loaf to be so tiny. I think it works really well as bread, but it's just microscopic. I've halved a lot of these last few recipes and they turned out regular size or much bigger. I'm not sure what happened here, but it's just fine. It makes the bread less of a sandwich bread and more of an hors d'oeuvre bread. It goes absolutely stunning with a bit of cheese on it.

The name of this bread basically translates to Whole Wheat Bread, and that's really all it is. The only really stand out ingredient is the molasses, which has basically become a staple at this point in whole wheat breads I've made. I'm really pleased how this one turned out even though it was not how I expected it to. Everybody loves surprises though! 

Day 40: Wheat Germ Bread

This is the softest bread I've ever eaten, and it was the last thing I was expecting. I haven't been a fan of the couple of breads I've made so far that actually use wheat germ, but this one isn't bad. A lot of the Bran and now Whole-Wheat breads have used molasses as a sweetener, and I think the reason is because you don't want white breads to be stained by it, but I think it's made all of these breads a lot better. Now I didn't make any of them with regular sugar, but molasses just adds a special quality to anything it's in. I think that is why this is the best wheat germ bread I've made so far, but maybe the heavy wheat taste just fits better with whole wheat flour.

This loaf has some great color and a nice wheat flavor, but the softness sells it. It's actually so soft that it was a giant pain in the ass to cut. It squishes a lot. I think I also let it rise a bit too much before I put it in the oven, because it is massive. This gives it such an airy texture though, that is just incredible. I don't really like the taste, (although it's better with some butter) but the softness is mesmerizing. 

We're cruising through wheat breads, but I keep making interesting breads. I guess if they weren't interesting, Bernard Clayton wouldn't have included them in this book. It's reassuring though, because that means I'll be making cool breads for the rest of the year. I can't wait! 

Day 39: Walnut Wheat Bread

Another walnut bread! I think there is a section on fruit and nut breads later, in which I'll go ham on even more flavor combinations, but this bread is just a regular wheat bread with a bunch of walnuts in it. It's made with honey, which gives it a hint of sweetness, and it balances well with the wheat and nut flavors. It turns out this bread is very soft, which makes it really good for sandwiches. I think tomorrow I'm going to make paninis with it. The nuts give the bread a lot of texture and flavor, which I think would go well in a hot sandwich.

There wasn't anything really out of the ordinary in this bread. You dump your dry ingredients and then your wet ingredients and mix it until it's a dough, which you then take a knead it for a while. It took the standard two risings before I threw it in the oven and bam it was done. I've already talked about the flavors, and how well they go together, but I didn't talk about the texture too much. It's got a great color, and it's a really soft bread, with the walnuts adding a little crunch to it. It springs back when you cut it and it doesn't have a really tough crust.

I'm pretty happy with how this bread turned out. I wasn't expecting a whole lot, but it seems to be a really solid loaf of bread. If you could only make one yeasty whole wheat bread, so far my vote goes to this one. It's great all around, is different enough, and is really easy to make. 

Day 38: Sesame-Nut Bread

This is one kind of bread that I've never even thought of making. Sesame seeds, yeah, and a mainstay in most buns, but what sets this loaf apart is that it actually uses sesame oil in the bread. I've only ever used it in soups and stir fries, and luckily I still had a bit left. A little goes a long way when it comes to sesame oil, and it sure isn't messing around in this bread. It smells like sesame oil through and through, and it's awesome.

You can definitely taste the sesame all over the bread, and the walnuts really add some texture that. I never thought I'd pair walnuts and sesame oil, but hey it works. The sesame seeds on top add a bit of flavor, but most of it comes straight from the oil. This loaf has a great dark color, and a solid crust. It's hard enough to spring back after you bite/cut it, and soft enough to actually have some good texture. 

This bread opened my eyes to just how much you can do with oils as flavoring for breads. I think it would only work with super strong oils, but imagine if you did this with a hot sauce or something. It might come out terrible or it could be the next big thing. I'm looking forward to all the insane flavor combinations located deeper inside this bread book.

Day 37: Molasses Wheat Bread

Not my favorite loaf I've made so far, even though the name makes it sound pretty incredible. For being a molasses bread, this loaf has almost no flavor, and it's extremely dense. It does have a good crust and some good color, but other than that its pretty disappointing. After letting it rise the first time, you are supposed to twist the dough before you drop it into the pans. The only problem with this is that the dough just tears apart and doesn't stay twisted, so it just makes the bread look like garbage. So when some bread recipe tells you to twist you bread and this happens, just re-knead it a bit and don't twist it. Braiding is a lot different because you smooth out strands which makes it easier to weave them together. 

We're cruising through the wheat breads, but we still have a bit to go. There some pretty crazy loaves down the line that I'm looking forward to that take a couple extra days to prep for. Every bread can't be good, and maybe the molasses Bernard Clayton used back in the 70's was a lot more potent than the ones we can buy in stores today. It'll probably be good sandwich/toast bread, but just on it's own it wasn't the best.