Homemade Organic Bread - The Recipe

Hello Dear Reader,

This is going to sound a bit cheesy, and I am not bragging about my breadmaking but, last week Darling Hubbie was out on a guided nature ramble in a disused quarry which is rarely open to the public and when they stopped for a break dh discretely took out his oversized homemade cheese roll and started happily munching away.

The Ranger leading the group spotted this from a short distance away and shot over excitedly exclaiming "is that amazing roll homemade, and why does it look so dark and crispy" (no prompting! Honest!)

He was eager to know all about it!   Dh explained to the best of his memory how it was made (ie kneading, rising and baking in the oven).  It turned out the Ranger uses a breadmaker himself but he leaves it in the machine to bake. This has prompted me to divulge my recipe.

In my previous post I mainly talked about my breadmaker and explained how I prepare the dough for rising and eventually for cooking but didn't give details of my recipe, which I highly recommend as it has worked brilliantly every time I use it!

Ingredients:
Water - 360ml
Salt - 10ml
Oil - 15ml (I use Rape Seed Oil)
Soft brown sugar - 25ml (I used Billingtons Demerara sugar)
Flour -600g  ( I used Waitrose Duchy Organic Strong Malted grain bread flour)
Fast action yeast - 7.5ml  (I used Allinson's Easy Bake Yeast)

Today I made a medium sized loaf of bread and 2 rolls (see below).

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I have amended this post, as I realise, thanks to Catherine's comment, that I missed this part of the process out previously:


As I remove the dough from the machine I turn my oven on to heat to 100 degrees C.   Once it reaches temperature I turn the oven off.

Meanwhile I clean the work surface with very hot water which has a couple of spoonfuls of white vinegar in - antiseptic properties or something, I believe.

I sprinkle a dessertspoonful of bread flour over my squeaky clean worktop and swish the flour about to make sure it covers the actual spot where the dough will be placed.  I rub a little of the flour over my fingers and palms so that when removing the dough from the machine the dough doesn't stick to me or the worksurface.   The dough will be sticky as you remove it from the pan, just keep dipping your fingers in the flour from the worksurface, brushing the excess flour back onto the surface and easing the dough off the pan again. Once the dough is on the floured surface I work the edges into the centre of the dough all round until all the sticky edges have disappeared. I knead for a few minutes. The dough will feel firmer and will be getting drier. I continue working until I think it isn't going to stick to itself anymore. This probably takes about 5 minutes.

As I knead the dough I do add a little more flour to the surface if necessary, bearing in mind too much flour at this stage can spoil the mix of the bread - the flour that is in the dough already has had its gluten worked in the kneading in the machine.

Place the dough in your lightly oiled bread tin, cover with clingfilm (as described in my previous post), cover with a tea towel and place in warmed oven for 30 minutes to rise.

When risen remove from the oven and warm oven to 190 degrees C.  When oven is ready, remove tea towel and cling film, place tin in oven and cook for 30 minutes.

I hope this is not too much information now!

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On a previous occassion I used the same mixture to make 8 rolls. My recipe book indicated they should be cooked at 190 degrees C for 15-20 minutes, however we tried this and felt the rolls were too soft, so I now cook them for 30 minutes (still at 190).

Dough covered with lightly oiled cling film

Allow to stand for 5 mins after cooking

After cooling for 5 mins the bread will be easy to remove from the tin.

Cool before covering

A crispy crust of bread with organic butter.

Once the bread has cooled, I usually leave it on a plate overnight,and cover with a clean tea towel   I find the bread will cut easier the following day.  I then slice the loaf and freeze what won't be used immediately.

I find this breadmaking process quite easy, however I did have a couple of disasters in the early days when I forgot to add the yeast!

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I have put Izzy to one side and am working on a cat door stop which I hope to show more of next time.

Barbara xx