Pain Rustique

Besides spelt bread I am fond of Pain Rustique. There are many recipes to be found, but I use the method published by Ed and Marieke (Weekend Bakery). This bread is a little sour by using rye-based sourdough culture and it needs only a little bit of yeast. Because of using sourdough I make a poolish the evening before making the bread, so I can start baking the next morning. For making a sourdough culture yourself, please check one of my previous posts.

Poolish:
- 225 g wheat flour
- 60 g whole wheat flour
- 280 g water
- 12 g sourdough culture

Mix the ingredients in a bowl and cover it (I always put the bowl in a transparent pedal bin liner) and let it rest during the night at room temperature. The next morning you can start making the Pain Rustique:

Ingredients:
- the poolish
- 275 g wheat flour
- 90 g water
- 10 g salt
 - 3 g dry yeast

Mix the poolish with the flour and the water for only a minute, just until the flour has absorbed the water. Now cover the bowl and let it rest for half an hour. After this you can add the salt and the yeast and start kneading on a flat, clean surface (don't use any extra flour at this stage!) until the dough is ready. It needs some experience to understand when you reach this 'ready'-point: the dough turns into a soft, flexible substance and shines a little. And yes, it is (very) wet... It usually takes about 5 minutes kneading. Again I mention Richard Bertinet, whose method I use for kneading. You can find an instruction video on YouTube: The Bertinet Method. You can also check my post about making Spelt Bread for more information about kneading wet dough.
Now transfer your dough to a clean bowl, cover it and let it rest for about 40 minutes at room temperature.
Now it is time for the stretch-and-fold technique: take out the dough and place it on your work surface. Don't use any flour yet: just your hands and a clean dough-scraper. Put your scraper partly under the dough and stretch it by using your free hand. Fold the stretched part over the dough. Now do this four times: up over under, left over right, under over up and right over left. A great instruction video you can find here.
After this stretch and fold the dough goes back in the bowl for another half hour's rest on room temperature.
After this a second stretch and fold and another half hour's rest.
Now it is time for shaping your bread and for the first time you can use some flour to make the dough easier to handle. Put your dough on a floured work surface and sprinkle some flour on it. Now shape the dough with your floured hands. For Pain Rustique I form it into a batard and put it in a cane banneton to proof for at least half an hour. For proofing I put the banneton (covered in plastic) on a rack on the warming plate of my Aga. My oval banneton I ordered at the Weekend Bakery Webshop: it works very well!
The best instruction video you can find on YouTube for shaping bread is probably this one.
After proofing and scoring the bread with a razor blade it is time for the Aga: bake the bread in the roasting oven for about 45 minutes. In my post about baking Spelt Bread I described how I use my roasting oven for baking bread. Don't forget to create steam by pouring some hot water in a baking tin.

Carrot Cake

I got this recipe of a carrot cake from my friend Monique Kok (the original recipe is on the pic below, in Dutch). I adjusted it a bit by adding less sugar and adding salt, because I think that also 'sweet' bakings always need salt. And the cake needed more time in my Aga than in the recipe: I left it over one hour and a half in the baking oven and it came out perfect!

Ingredients:
125 g sunflower oil
400 g sugar
4 eggs
300 g self raising flour
2 teaspoons cinnamon (powder)
2 teaspoons nutmeg (powder)
1 teaspoon clove (powder)
1 teaspoon salt
300 g carrot (grated)
100 g crushed walnut

Method:
Mix the oil and the sugar and add the eggs. Mix well, until the sugar is all solved. Then add the powdered spices and the salt. Finally you can add the flour and the grated carrots. Make it a homogene mass and work the crushed walnuts in the dough.
Put it in a well prepared baking tin (greased and powdered with flour) and place it in the baking oven.
After about one and a half hour your carrot cake will be ready. Check this with a toothpick: when it comes out dry your cake will be fine.

Sourdough Bread with Spelt

In my opinion bread consists of only four ingredients: flour, water, salt and (some) yeast. I learned preparing the best dough for baking fantastic breads from the book Dough of Richard Bertinet. And this recipe for a perfect Spelt bread by using sourdough I got from Ed and Marieke. They have a fantastic website about baking bread: the Weekend Bakery.

The evening before the day I bake my bread I make a poolish by mixing flour, spelt, water and sourdough. I use a rye-based sourdough starter, which is already a half year old. I keep it in the fridge and feed it with some teaspoonfuls of rye once or twice a week, after I have used some of it for my poolish. Please check the website of Ed and Marieke for their method of making the starter.

Poolish:

- 100 g spelt flour

- 200 g wheat flour

- 300 g water

- 15 g sourdough culture

Mix the ingredients in a bowl and cover it (I always put the bowl in a transparent pedal bin liner). Let it rest at room temperature during the night.

The next morning you can start making your two loafs.

Ingredients:

-  the poolish

- 300 g wheat flour

- 80 g water

- 11 g salt

- 3 g dry yeast

Mix the poolish with the flour and the water for only a minute, just until the flour has absorbed the water. Now cover the bowl and let it rest for half an hour. After this you can add the salt and the yeast. At this point you can start showing your kneading-talents: take your dough out of the bowl and knead it for about 10 minutes. For kneading my dough I bought a tile of Chinese black stone (60 x 40 cms) and placed it on my working surface. I don't use any flour while kneading and the dough doesn't stick to the stone during this process. It needs some practice (or actually a lot of practice!). On YouTube you can find some great instruction-videos about kneading: here is my favorite (the Bertinet-method).

After the dough has become a real nice, smooth dough, put it in the bowl again, cover it and put the bowl on a rack on the warming plate. Let it rest for about 40 minutes. Then take it out and do a stretch and fold (one fold actually means four: west over east, north over south, etc.). Ed and Marieke published a fantastic video about this technique. You can find it here.

The dough goes back in the bowl again for an half hour rest. And another stretch and fold. And another half hour rest.

Now comes the tricky part. Shaping the two loafs. Again I can direct you to an instruction video for this.The video is made by the people of King Arthur Flour; the second half of the instruction is about shaping a batard (our spelt loafs). By the way: when I am shaping my loafs, I do use a little flour to prevent the dough from sticking to my working surface.

Let your two loafs proof on a well floured towel for again half an hour. Then it is time to score them (watch the video) with a razor blade. Two slashes will do.

Now you can put your loafs in the roasting oven for about 25 to 30 minutes. I have placed another tile of Chinese black stone on the floor of the roasting oven; it is a perfect (and very cheap) baking stone. Put a rack with a small backing tray above it and fill this with hot water just after you put your loafs in. Because baking bread means creating steam in your oven! After 20 minutes rearrange the loafs: turn them and change their places, so they will brown evenly. When they are gold brown, transfer them to the baking oven, on a rack, half high. Let them get ready in about 10 minutes.