The bread, fresh out of the oven, on a cooling rack. It has browned nicely, though there are many white spots from the flour dusting. A handsome, rustic looking bread. It's easy to make but it takes its own sweet time. The morning before baking day you make your preferment: 1g Fast Action Dried Yeast 100g (3.5oz) Room Temperature Water 30g (1oz) Wholemeal Rye Flour 100g (3.5oz) Strong White Bread Flour You mix that and leave it, with a tight plastic cover, in the fridge for 24 hours!
The bread seen from the side. It's hard to get the proofing times right with these breads. This bread spread a little bit too much but it's still gorgeous. One thing you learn as a homebaker: perfection is severely overrated. On the second day you need 5g (0.2oz) Fast Action Dried Yeast or 10g (0.4oz) Fresh Yeast 180g (6.3oz) Room Temperature Water Your preferment 30g (1oz) Wholemeal Rye Flour 240g (8.5oz) Strong White Bread Flour 8g (0.3oz) Salt You can knead this by hand but for doughs with rye in them, I prefer my big standing mixer. I do 4 minutes slow, to mix everything but the salt; then I add the salt and after that is mixed in, I turn it to half its top speed for 8 minutes. It will still be sticky then, but with your scraper 'walking the dough' for two minutes, the dough will be ready to be lightly dusted and put in a bowl as a ball.
A crumb pic. The two cut halves showing. There are little gas holes showing everywhere, which is what you want with this type of bread. The crust is thin and gives good crackle. You first rest the dough at 21C/69.8F for two-and-half hours. Then you shape the dough into a tight ball and let it rest for 15 minutes. After that you shape it as a batard or boule (oblong or round) and put it in a banneton proving basket. You let this rest another hour, again at 21C/69.8F.
Two slices of bread on a white breakfast plate, on my outside table; its glass top looks black here. I put some crumbly soft goat cheese on them. Not too much, because I really want to taste the bread too. Two ways of baking this: - On an oven stone. Preheat the oven to 220C (with fan) for at least 40 minutes but 50 is safer. Bake the bread, with steam for 35 to 40 minutes. Check after 20 minutes, to see if the bread doesn't brown too fast. If it does, lower the temperature, never the oven time. - In a Dutch oven or (in my case) a cast-iron oven pan. If your Dutch oven has a thin bottom and if you have an oven stone, preheat both. If your Dutch oven is also cast-iron preheat it to 230C (fan) for at least 50 minutes. Bake the bread with steam, which means inserting an ice-cube in the closed pan. Use baking paper between dough and pan; put ice-cube under paper. Turn the temperature down to 220C (fan) when you put the pot/pan inside and bake for 15 minutes with the lid on and 25 minutes without. You probably won't need to lower the temperature in the last 15 minutes but do check!
I baked this bread for friends yesterday, and had a small test slice there, which reminded me how much I do love this take on the Pain de Campagne.
So I baked one for myself again today.
It really is stupidly good.
(Details in alt text.)
#Breadsky
#PainDeCampagne
