This was a bit challenging for me, having never made bread before. Luckily chris woke up just in time to rescue it for me! We decided you probably want to do the first stage in a mixer with a dough hook as it’s extremely wet and was totally impossible to mix. It was a delicious bread though and chris is going to make it again for our autumn fair party in a couple of weeks because it’s an ideal bread to go with soup.
350g rye flour (had to get this from tesco)
150g strong white flour
10g salt
10g fast action yeast (awkward, given they sell it in 10g packs!)
50ml black treacle
140ml cool water
250ml full-flavoured pale ale
Olive oil for oiling
beer batter topping
150ml ale
100g rye flour
Pinch caster sugar
50-75g rolled oats
For the loaf
Mix flours and add salt on one side of bowl and yeast to other
Add treacle, 100ml water and 200ml ale
Use fingers in a claw to mix together (this is the stage I’d do next time with dough hook and mixer)
Add remaining water and ale, a little at a time to make a soft sticky dough. Apparently you might not need all the liquid but use as much as you can… I used it all!
Oil surface and knead dough for 5-10 mins. It gets less sticky. But the first stage is really tricky hence it needed to stay in bowl, or mixer, far longer than I left it
When it’s smooth and stretchy put into a lightly oiled bowl, cover with cling film or tea towel and leave to rise until doubled in size. Prob around 4 hours.
Beer batter topping
Mix ale, rye flour and pinch of sugar
After 4 hours, knock back the bread dough
Flatten, make a round loaf. Paul has a complex way of doing this but basically, make the shape
Spread beer batter on loaf and sprinkle oats on (I messed this up as I mixed a load of oats into the topping itself. Don’t do this!)
Prove for 1 1/2 hours until doubled in size. Ready when it springs back if you push finger into it
Heat oven to 220 (mine stops at 190, so I guess just as hot as you can)
Bake for 25 mins
Lower oven to 200 and bake for 10 mins until golden brown and hollow sounding when you tap on base
The Hoblog 