Sourdough Oatmeal Wheat Bread

I love to make crusty artisan sourdough bread but soft sourdough sandwich bread is also a favorite. I developed this recipe over the last several weeks, making multiple loaves each weekend to get it just right. I absolutely love the slightly nutty taste of oats in the bread.

This recipe makes one loaf but I have also doubled it. The Kitchen Aid actually kneads it even better with two loaves. A scale is a must for thus recipe but I assume if you already make sourdough bread then you definitely have a scale. Electronic scales are very inexpensive now, mine was $30 and purchased 12 years ago.

Sourdough Oatmeal Wheat Bread

Makes 1 loaf in an 8x4 pan

PRINTABLE RECIPE CLICK HERE

193 grams warm water

132 grams sourdough starter (bubbly and active, 100% hydration*)

½ teaspoon instant yeast (optional, but it does help it rise a bit more)

55 grams honey (can do as little as 20 grams if desired)

55 grams old-fashioned oats (plus extra for coating the dough)

110 grams wheat flour (I use freshly ground hard spring wheat)

160-180 grams bread flour (start with lesser amount)

22 grams vegetable oil

11 grams salt (approx 1½ teaspoons table salt)

Place all ingredients in your Kitchen Aid mixer. Knead on speed 2 or 3 approximately 6 minutes.
You want the dough to be tacky, not too wet, not too dry. Add an extra tablespoon or two of bread
flour if needed. The way I gauge this is it should stick to the bottom of the bowl but not the sides.
Or, by touch it should feel pretty sticky but not stick too much to your hands when you pull your fingers
away from, the dough. Better to be too sticky than too dry as it will absorb more of the flour during the first rise.

After kneading for six minutes in the Kitchen Aid place in a greased bowl and let rise until close to
double in size, approximately 2 hours depending on temperature of your kitchen. I have also mixed
the dough at night and immediately placed in my refrigerator overnight. Press out dough into a rectangle
the width of the pan, roll up, coat in a few more tablespoons of oats, place in greased 8x4 loaf pan,
cover with greased plastic wrap. Let rise another 1-2 hours (or place in refrigerator overnight)  then
bake at 350 degrees for 30-35 minutes or until golden brown.

*I use equal parts water and flour, by weight, to feed my sourdough starter.

Cranberry & Almond Sourdough

Sourdough is about as good as it gets for bread. Homemade. Slightly tangy. Chewy crumb. And that crust. This is not a normal bread recipe with commercial yeast that is fluffy and soft, made in your mixer, and done start to finish in a few hours. This will take all day or up to 24 hours. It is mostly hands off but you do need to be around to stretch and fold the dough. It is artisan bread; made the old-fashioned way.

I don't explain how to make a starter, or how to stretch and fold dough. You can go to You Tube and look up videos on how to make sourdough bread. Or buy the book Tartine. Or educate yourself over at the blog The Perfect Loaf.  Or do all of the above like I have done. This is just my favorite version of a fruit and nut sourdough bread. It assumes you have those skills already.

THIS IS NOT A FIRST-TIME SOURDOUGH RECIPE. Not because this isn't easy (it is), but because I am scant on photos for illustrating each step.

golden raisin and almond dough

banneton baskets

loaves proofed overnight in the refrigerator

cloche clay bakers

Cranberry and Almond Sourdough

printable recipe click here

Makes 2 loaves

by Cynthia Winward

608 grams warm water*

167 grams sourdough starter

110 grams sugar**

160 grams whole wheat flour

640 grams bread flour

16 grams salt

150 grams cranberries or raisins

100 grams sliced almonds or other nut

DIRECTIONS

1. Put sourdough starter and water in bowl and mix all together with your hand. Add flour and mix until flour is all incorporated. Cover tightly.

2. Let sit 30 minutes to 2 hrs covered.

3.  Add the salt to the top of the dough and mix it up the best you can with one set of stretch and folds.

4. Do one more set of Stretch and Folds, 30-45 minutes apart. On the second Stretch and Fold, add the fruit and nuts. Don’t worry if all the fruit/nuts don’t get mixed in right now. They will on the next stretching. Do 1-2 more stretch and folds every 30 minutes. If my dough seems strong I skip the last, if it seems limp I might add another.

5. Let the covered dough ferment on the counter or in the oven with the light on in the same bowl for another 2 hours until it is about 1.5 times the size. If my kitchen is cold I can let it go 3 hours.

6. Divide dough in half,  pre-shape the dough on a lightly floured board into a round.

7. Let sit for 20 minutes covered.

8. Shape loaves as desired and put into well floured banneton baskets or floured cloth lined bowl. (Cloth should be a tea towel or other lint free towel.)

9. Place bannetons in a plastic bag that you “blow up” with air, secure it close with twist tie. Put it fridge overnight to bake the next day.

Or to bake the same day, let it rise another 2 hours then bake right away.  

10. 30-45 minutes before you are going to bake turn oven to 475 degrees and place baking vessels  in the oven. (Either a dutch oven, combo cooker or cloche). I use cloche bakers.

11. Score the loaf and place bread in pan. I use parchment paper to transfer to the pan.

12. Bake covered at 475 for 25 minutes and remove cover. Turn oven down to 400 degrees. Continue to bake for 15-20 minutes until bread reaches internal temp of 205. (You might need to play with the temp and time depending on your oven.)

*This is a 76% hydration dough, increase or decrease to your desired percentage.

**To make this a regular sourdough, eliminate sugar, fruit, and nuts.

The Best Bran Muffins

I’m a big believer in muffins for breakfast. But let’s face it, most of time you are just eating cake. Not that I have a problem with cake for breakfast, but most days I am trying to get some fiber into the family. These muffins are the perfect kind of bran muffin—lots of fiber, lots of tasty ingredients like butter and molasses, and just enough sweetness so they don’t taste like health food. I’ve loved this recipe for years—probably at least 10 years. And of course, it’s from Cook’s Illustrated. You can find the original recipe by clicking here.

I prefer a recipe where a box of cereal isn’t the source of fiber. I find it easier to keep a small bag of wheat bran in the pantry rather than a box of All-Bran cereal. I like Bob’s Red Mill but I am sure there are many other choices. I do however like the cereal box version of the Cook’s Illustrated muffin. I’ve made both at the same time and had the family do a taste test. They like the cereal box version just slightly better whereas I prefer this version with the wheat bran. And since I am the baker, my vote counted more. So this is the version I make and freeze in small batches so that we can easily microwave a few at a time for breakfast.

Enjoy! Printable recipe click here.

The Best Bran Muffins

Original recipe from cooksillustrated.com

1 1/4 cups bleached all-purpose flour

1/4 cup whole-wheat flour

1 1/4 teaspoons baking powder

½ teaspoon baking soda

3/4 teaspoon table salt

1 1/4 teaspoons ground cinnamon

3/4 teaspoon ground allspice

½ teaspoon fresh grated nutmeg

7 tablespoons unsalted butter, softened

1/2 cup dark brown sugar plus 2 additional tablespoons

2 large eggs

2 ½ teaspoons vanilla extract

3 tablespoons molasses

1/4 cup sour cream

1 cup buttermilk plus 3 additional tablespoons

1 ½ cups wheat bran (I like Bob’s Red Mill)

1 cup raisins (optional)

INSTRUCTIONS

1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Mix flour through nutmeg in medium bowl; set aside.

2. Beat butter in large bowl of electric mixer or with handheld mixer at medium speed until light and fluffy, 1 to 2 minutes. Add brown sugar, increase speed to medium-high, and beat until combined and fluffy, about 1 minute longer. Add eggs one at a time, beating thoroughly before adding the next. Beat in vanilla, molasses, and sour cream until thoroughly combined and creamy, about 1 minute longer. At this point mine always looks curdled. Reduce speed to low; beat in buttermilk and half the flour mixture until combined, about 1 minute. Beat in remaining flour mixture until incorporated and slightly curdled looking, about 1 minute longer, scraping sides of bowl as necessary. Stir in bran and raisins if using.

3. Spray a muffin tin. Divide batter evenly among molds using spoon or ice cream scoop. Bake until a toothpick inserted into center withdraws cleanly or with a few moist particles adhering to it, about 20-25 minutes. Set on wire rack to cool slightly, about 5 minutes. Remove muffins from tin and serve warm.

I prefer to double this recipe and freeze muffins. They microwave great while still frozen!

 

 

Cinnamon Swirl Bread

The Holy Grail of Cinnamon Bread has been found. I’ve made six loaves of this goodness already and plan to make more this week. I’ve given some to a sick friend (better than Tylenol right?), to a friend for her birthday, and to my ungrateful family. I warn you—this bread goes down easy. And by easy I mean I can easily eat 4 slices in 10 minutes and still want to go back for more. Dangerous to your waistline. The first time I made it I left home for half the day, dreaming of eating a couple more slices only to arrive home and find the teenagers had finished it off without saving me the last slice. Savages.

If you don’t already have a digital scale, get one. Please invest $30 because I can see how easy it would be to make this dough too dry by adding too much flour. The dough is VERY sticky and I would have thought something was wrong if I had not weighed out my flour.

The recipe is from The Cook’s Illustrated Baking book. I’m quickly making my way through this amazing book. Have mercy. It’s also on their website.

This bread is not a fast bread. You have to let it rise 4 different times, maybe 5, I can’t remember. Yes, the rise times are kinda short—around half an hour to one hour for each rise. But don’t think you’re gonna make this when you have errands to run. Make it when you are cleaning your house or working from home that day. It’s easy but messy and requires a good 4 hours of your time. Just look at my counters? The dough needs to rest too after I roll it up—yup, more rise time. You have to let it rest like this for a few minutes before you cut the logs in half lengthwise and twist together.

Once twisted, they go in a pan, rise some more, get a bath with an egg, and then finally you can bake.

You’ll have to cover them with foil the last little bit in the oven or else they’ll burn. They do get really brown but don’t worry, they won’t burn. Unless you skip the foil tent. Don’t do that.

I am not a huge fan of raisins in desserts (definitely not in my cinnamon rolls) but this recipe convinced me otherwise. My son thinks it needs even more raisins but I like the current ratio. I don’t use golden raisins—just regular brown ones. The texture is light and fluffy which you can’t say about most cinnamon swirl breads. Not heavy at all! It has just the right amount of sweetness too. Perfect for toasting and adding butter.

I would suggest getting the recipe from the website (watching the video really helps too) or the book because the illustrations really do help. This just isn’t a beginner recipe for bakers without the extra help. Here’s the written recipe though if you don’t need photos/video help. (A paid subscription is necessary to cooksillustrated.com to view videos. Best money I spend every year.)

CLICK HERE FOR PRINTABLE RECIPE

Blueberry Cobbler with Frozen Blueberries

It’s March and we’re now in the dog days of winter.  But making this cobbler made me feel like summer would come again and fresh fruit would indeed find it’s way to Utah. You make it with frozen blueberries, or rather, there is an option to use frozen which is exactly what I did. I wouldn’t exactly call this cobbler health food, but as far as dessert goes, it’s about as healthy as you’re going to get. A simple biscuit topping on top of pre-baked blueberries.

The recipe, from the Cook’s Illustrated Baking Book,  says that once thawed, the blueberries should emit about 1 cup of juice. Ummm, mine gave me maybe a tablespoon of juice so I nixed the directions to follow when using frozen berries and instead just doubled the amount of cornstarch the recipe called for. It worked! The blueberry fruitiness was thick and jam-like while the biscuit made it a great weeknight dessert.

Printable recipe for Blueberry Cobbler

Winter Birthdays

It’s only February 5th and so far we’ve celebrated three birthdays in our household of five. That’s a lot of cake.

First, came my birthday on January 14th. It was the big 40th birthday. All my amazing friends brought me treats like meringues, flan, homemade croissants, and éclairs. That’s a lot for one middle-aged woman to eat but I did my best. I almost made myself my own cake but then decided to buy some Provo Bakery Donuts instead. Oh yea, those hit the spot.

I asked my hubby for a 40th birthday party but he just couldn’t come through—it’s not in his DNA to throw parties. I love him to pieces and he treats me wonderfully every day of my life (think foot rubs and dishes) but still, a party would have been nice. After all I threw him a party for his 40th a couple years ago as evidenced by these photos. I’m such a good wifey.

Back to the birthdays in 2014.

The next birthday was my daughter’s big day.  She turned 13. Gulp.

For her big day I made a Texas Sheet Cake by Cooks Country with Hershey’s Special Dark Chocolate Cocoa powder. Umm, that makes for a cake that is almost black. The kids were a bit thrown off by the color but once I told them Oreos are made with dark cocoa that is Dutched they were okay with that. Not to mention once we tasted it…….holy cow. Best Texas Chocolate Sheet cake ever. And I’ve made a lot of them.

Sorry for the night time photos but I think you can still see just how nearly-black this cake is! So good.

Brothers and rabbit ears. Good grief.

The third birthday came just last night for my youngest child—I can’t believe she is 10 now. Sheesh, where have the years gone? That last sentence made me sound old.  Sheesh again. For this birthday I made a Boston Cream Pie. Why is it called pie when clearly it’s a cake? I must know.

Cake filled with pastry cream and then smothered in ganache. Yes please.

It was as good as it looked.

Aren’t birthdays fun? The next birthday in this house is just 24 days away…..hmmm what kind of cake to make. Better start thinking now.

Thanksgiving 2013

This year it was just our family. Nobody came over, nobody invited us over.  We live in Utah but most of our family does not—and if they do live here they had other plans. This might sound sad to you—but I actually love it. No pressure. I can make peanut butter sandwiches for all I care. I would never do that—but it’s nice to know it’s an option. I like options.

All my recipe came from America’s Test Kitchen this year. There’s a shocker. If cookbook companies had groupies, I’d be one. I’d go to their concerts and throw pie on the stage. I’m totally mesmerized by cooks. (Once in Chicago I went to Rick Bayless’ restaurant and my eyes went all foggy and my throat dried up when I saw Mr. Bayless himself.) You can have your lame-o movie stars—I stalk chefs. Ok, I don’t stalk them, but I’d love to if it were legal.

First up—Mr. Turkey. He was brined the day before for six hours and then left overnight on a rack to dry out. America’s Test Kitchen says this will give a crackly crisp skin and moist meat. Boy did it ever. I’ve never had better turkey. I even overcooked it a bit (I blame the convection) and still the white meat was jui-cy!

Here’s Mr. Turkey taking a nice salty briney bath on Wednesday. My garage is plenty cold in November but I added plenty o’ ice to the cooler just in case.  Nobody’s getting food poisoning at my house. I did have to double the brine recipe to completely cover my 13 pound turkey.

Here’s Mr. Turkey resting after 2 hours in the oven. You give him that St. Tropaz tan by starting him on his tummy then flipping him to his back after an hour. Crispy goodness all around. He rested for half an hour after his tan so that I could make the gravy and so that all his juices would redistribute throughout the bird lest he be dry.

Next up: making pie dough on Wednesday afternoon so that Thanksgiving day I can get up early (like a bona fide baker) and cook my Lemon Meringue and Pumpkin pie.

All good desserts start with an inordinate amount butter. Gosh I wish I could eat like this everyday.

Pie dough ready for a chill in the refrigerator before rolling out.

Baking done by Thursday morning at 10am. Lemon Meringue Pie, Pumpkin Pie, and Crescent Rolls. Did I mention I only fed 5 people? Mmm, leftovers.

A simple orange cranberry sauce…..

And something new this year: Green Bean Casserole with a homemade mushroom cream sauce. This was my favorite dish this year. I will make it for Christmas too. Holy cow, so good. You won’t even miss the metallic-tasting mushroom canned soup.

Ilene is so happy to be trimming the green beans.

Here’s my son Nathan peeling sweet potatoes. I believe in manual labor before the feast for all involved.

Everybody had a job this year. Thank goodness the kids are old enough to help now. My husband Paul did the grunt work for the turkey but he’s not pictured because he stayed in his pajamas all day. I’m not kidding. You wear pajamas, you don’t make the blog cut.

I’ve broken with my childhood tradition and do not stuff the bird anymore. Just bake the stuffing  dressing on the side. (Sorry Mom.) Sausage, Cranberry and Bread stuffing. Good stuff.

I didn’t burn the crust—it kinda looks that way on the Pumpkin Pie though.

I served most everything on my mother’s fine China that my Dad bought her for a wedding gift in Japan during the Vietnam War. My kids said it shouldn’t be called China if he bought it in Japan. True.

Let the feast begin! The best part? We ate ate all the leftovers for three more days.

Gracious I love Thanksgiving. I can’t think of anything more fun than cooking for two days without needing to do anything else—to me that’s heaven.  God Bless America!