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French Road Bakery
www.frenchroadbakery.tk 902 884 2599
May 5 2012
Organic Wood-Fired Brick Oven Sourdoughs using slow fermentation by natural, living cultures
MIXED WHITE & DARK Large White – blended whites, ground flax, 1kg - $7.00 Rosemary Garlic Sisters –North River garlic, Lebanese‡ olive oil, rosemary, fresh ground salt crystals‡; blended whites, fresh ground rye, spelt (90-5-5%); 450g - $5.00 White Spelt Rye - Rye, white spelt (35-65%), caraway seeds 680g - $7.00 Walnut - fresh ground wheat, rye & spelt, blended whites (30-5-5,30-30%), soaked walnuts 680g - $7.00
100% WHOLE GRAIN Whole Wheat stone ground 680g - $6.00 Dark Rye – rye & Red Fife wheat (50-50%), caraway seeds, 680g $7.00 Fresh-Ground Rye / Spelt with soaked seeds & spices - 700g - $7.00 Ezekiel Multigrain – Sprouted: rye, spelt, lentils, barley, oats, sesame, sunflower, coriander, fennel, anise & caraway; ground flax; 700g - $8.00
SPECIALS Honey Butter Whole White – Speerville's stone ground Whole White, whey from yoghurt, Misty Meadow unpasteurised honey - 680g loaf $7.00. Whole Grain Crackers - blended fresh-ground rye, spelt & wheat, sesame & sunflower seeds, ground flax, Palestinian olive oil, Misty Meadow honey, sea salt - $2.00 a bag.
Ingredients: Natural, living starter cultures from fresh ground organic kernels; flours: certified organic from stone or freshly ground grains. All loaves: vitalized well water; organic Portuguese sea salt (1.2% of baked weight of loaf). Fresh-ground and Ezekiel loaves contain organic anise, fennel and coriander - plus caraway in the Rye & Ezekiel. All ingredients are organic unless marked ‡. ^ = 'altus' water and/or crumb from soaked aged loaves.
Main Ingredients: ‘Wild’ Organic Rye or Blended Fresh-Ground Starter Cultures, Stone or Fresh Ground Organic Grains, filtered & vitalized well water, Celtic sea salt. Vollkörn Ingredients: Fresh-ground organic rye or spelt kernels, filtered & revitalized well water, Celtic sea salt, soaked ground flax & sunflower seeds; spices (organic when available): fresh-ground coriander, fennel, anise and caraway (in Rye loaf) . Shortbread: organic stone ground white flour, unsalted butter, Celtic sea salt, brown sugar. Sprouted Breads: organic kernels are soaked for 1-3 days until they are just beginning to sprout, i.e. the holding or dormant stage has given way to the living, germinating stage, then hand ground and combined with various flour mixes, some fresh ground, starters and so forth. Over time will feature wheat, spelt and rye sprouted loaves which tend to be dense and moist but surprisingly light on the tongue with very rich, balanced and interestingly textured flavour from the released and still vigorous enzymes and vitamins in the germinating grains. I am very pleased to be (finally) offering these types of loaves which many regard to be the healthiest form of bread. Personally I wonder if it is not only the oldest, in the sprouting grains might well have been manually pounded and then roasted on open stones under direct sunlight as per the recipe attributed to Jesus of Nazareth in the Essene Gospels written around 2,000 years ago. Now also adding fresh ground lentils, soaked and/or sprouted: millet and amaranth, sesame seeds for a multigrain loaf.
EXPLANATION OF THE MENUFirst, and simply, am trying to provide a good range of items despite limited number of loaves in this artisan operation, the range mainly being considered in terms of the spectrum of grains (spelt, wheat, rye with others to come), and the type of grinds (white to whole grain dark, to sprouted grains and legumes). Second, the menu synchronizes with the natural heating cycle of the wood-fired brick oven, namely that certain recipes have been developed to be baked at very high temperatures of around 750 F (such as the garlic or other focaccio-like loaves), whilst others are baked at the lower end of the bread-baking range around 400F, with most of the hearth loaves being baked between 650 and 450. Pastries such as shortbread are baked at around 350 and lower.
TECHNIQUE OVERVIEWGenerally 'slow fermentation', albeit not super slow. The slowest method is to a) start with only flour and water and wait for the naturally pre-existing yeasts and bacteria on the flour and in the environment to naturally ferment the flour. This is very rarely done with regular baking that wants consistent results; b) beginning with a very small amount of starter, immediately retard in a fridge or in a cool cellar for 1-3 days c) having built up the necessary amount of starter during the day (about 10% of the flour in the recipe), mix in the evening, retard overnight in the fridge, then bake after shaping the next day about 18 hours after the evening mix. d) the same as c) except without fridge quotient.
I used c) and d), c) with the hearth loaves and d) with all others (because of fridge size).
Other technical elements: Fresh ground starters: fresh-ground grains have more enzymes, oils and other nutrients. Simply put: they are better. Fresh-ground grains: in some 'typical' recipes (like the Walnut loaf) I add in fresh-ground grains to give the loaf a more vibrant and nutritious character. These grains are denser with larger granules than professionally milled bread flours so they do not create such airy crumb structures. The most interesting one here is the La Milanaise Whole Wheat which can create an unusually well rising loaf with a soft, chewy crumb with nice sized holes in a way that is rare with 100% whole grain loaves. But I use fresh-ground mainly in the sprouted (which tend to have 50% sprouted grains and 50% fresh-ground flours to give the loaf more of a bread-like crumb and texture), and the aptly named 'fresh ground ' spelt and rye loaves. This gives them a very robust nutrition profile but also an earthy, rich flavour and mouth feel which, along with soaked seeds and spices, makes for an unusually delicious 'health food' style loaf. Soaking: all whole grains, whether fresh ground or stone ground, are soaked on Mix Day whilst the starter is building up for the evening mix. There are quite a few articles buried on the Links page about phytic acid and suchlike, basically the difference chemically between a grain in a dormant state (i.e. a seed that has not begun to germinate) and one that is sprouting (germinating). The latter is now a living plant, the former is not. The latter, like sprouts, can be easily digested and is packed with nutrition of all sorts, the former cannot, indeed if you just grind grains, add water and eat, it is very difficult, if not impossible, for the human digestive system, given the amount of time things remain in the gut before eventual elimination, to break them down and get any nutrition from them, especially because of the dormant seed chemical profile which is one of holding things back, retaining, not growing, not releasing. Phytic acid is one of the 'binders' in this process and it is an 'anti-nutrient'. In short, soaking activates many of the enzymes within the cell structure of the grain (seed) which begin the germination process and after about twelve hours of soaking most of the phytic acid has disappeared. Sourdough fermentation reduces this much further and is probably the main reason it is so much more user-friendly since the fermentation process releases many of the nutrients trapped within the cell structure of the grain but which are not released except when that grain begins to sprout. Now if you grind the grain before sprouting, some of the germination chemistry can transpire when the flour is introduced to water and warmth, but not all since you have basically chopped the seed up. It won't turn into a sprout, obviously, because it's synergy as a whole entity has been destroyed. Fermentation uses the feeding frenzy of microbial organisms, the building blocks of all life forms and who outnumber us in our own bodies by thousands to one ratio, to convert this latent nutrition in the grain to digestible nutrition for ourselves. Additionally, there are two phases in soaking. Take the Whole Wheat & Barley Beer Loaf for example: in the morning of Mix Day, after the starter is up and running, so to speaking, I mix the beer, water, fresh-ground barley and stone ground whole wheat together and they soak until the evening mix time. So assuming I mix at 10.00 am and then add the starter and salt at 7 pm that is 9 hours pre-soak. Then from 7 pm to 1 pm the next day when the loaves go in the oven is 18 hours. So the total soak time is 9 + 15 = 27 hours. Seeds: for the same reasons as explained above, all seeds used in FRB recipes are pre-soaked before being mixed into the dough along with the starters and salt etc., then continue soaking during the fermentation phase before baking as described immediately above. Sometimes I soak the seeds in home brewed beer. This gives a little more fermentation from the residual yeasts in the beer, but also adds flavour. Sprouting: by soaking the grains for 1-3 days, they begin to germinate. Then I grind them by hand in an old 1880's design sausage grinder. So you have the living, germinated young plants going into the dough to be baked next day as bread. Simple. In my case I mix about 50% sprouted with 50% fresh ground. This is partly because preparing the sprouts and grinding them requires a certain amount of bowls, trays, counter space and grinding time (and effort) and right now I am better with a limited number of loaves done in this 50-50 fashion. But also I like the results better this way and find I just never make the 100% sprouted recipes. A quick break down of the Menu in the light of this technical explanation: Rosemary Garlic Sisters: a high hydration enriched loaf, not retarded overnight, baked in 750F oven for 15 minutes. The garlic is crushed and chopped and simmered in olive oil with soaked rosemary going in briefly at the end of this cooking phase; then this oil, now deliciously infused with garlic and rosemary, is added into the dough with starter and sea salt and fermented over night without fridge retardation (because I don't have room and because this loaf will rise because of the extremely high temperature). Rye and Walnut: mixed dark and white flours, typical hydration, retarded overnight, former proofed in baskets, latter in round metal loaf pans (done to give me more timing flexibility in that dough waiting in the loaf pans can produce delicious results even when over-fermented when the same dough in the baskets would produce collapsed loaves. So the basket-proofed loaves require close-to-perfect timing). Walnuts are washed and rinsed about ten times before soaking during the day, then added into the mix with the starter in the evening, so altogether walnuts soak about twenty seven hours; this reduces the phytic acid, makes them more easily digestible and increases available nutrients (as with all seeds and grains when thoroughly soaked). Whole Wheat/Whole Grain hearth loaves: First the whole grain is soaked, then it is fermented overnight with fridge retardation, then proofed in baskets, then baked. The Barley Beer loaf features 50% of the usual water recipe being home brew beer. This adds different flavours but also yeasts which effect the microbial population balance, which also tends to yield a slightly higher rising loaf. The barley softens the texture and flavour, sort of turning it into a slightly more blond version of an otherwise very dark brunette. It's a good loaf. Sometimes I use the 'barm' from the homebrew to create the starter. This only happens once every few months when I make a new batch of beer. This is an ancient Celtic baking tradition which fascinated the invading Romans who were both delighted and envious at how soft and well risen this 'barbarian' bread was compared to their own. (Who says the British can't cook??!!) Fresh-Ground: these feature fresh ground flours, meaning I grind them myself in a Nutrimill, most with about 50% fine-ground (which is still considerably courser than a Milanaise stone grind for example) and 50% course ground. To which are added soaked seeds, usually sunflower and ground flax, and spices, usually coriander, fennel and anise which are fresh-ground along with the grains at the beginning. These are soaked during the day, then in the evening starter and salt are added along with the soaked seeds. Fresh-ground grain has zero oxidation factor since immediately upon being ground they are soaked. The oils and other nutrients in the grain are fresh in the flour, make for a more vigorous and flavourful fermentation phase and generally are a far more nutritious offering. Sprouted: 50% of the grain quotient is soaked for 2-3 days before being hand ground and combined with pre-soaked fresh-ground, seeds and spices. The result is a very soft, chewy, densely flavoured bread that is surprisingly delicious and also features an expanded line up of grains and legumes, such as red quinoa, millet, barley and lentils. One word of warning: the first day after baking the flavour is very sour and the loaf very moist. It's actually better to wait until a day after purchase before opening it up after which the sourness mellows somewhat and the loaf has had more time to 'set up'.
COMING SOON: ALL ORGANIC INGREDIENTS! ( When I can afford a $1,000 order ) From MillesEtUneSaisons in Quebec I will get LaMilanaise flours (my preferred) plus organic seeds, spices, cheeses, butters, everything!
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