Cape Town Food

I've been breading up a storm a lot recently.

On Saturday I baked a bread, which we ended up having with fondue that evening, along with a great wine, Ingwe 2004.

Considering how much bread, and other food stuffs cost, due to the global food crisis, a really important issue in its own right, I've been trying to prepare as much as I can from scratch. Its a lot cheaper (and I hope a lot healthier) knowing where all your food comes from.

This loaf, which you can get a sense of the size from a standard Defy roasting dish, cost me around R5 to make, and weighed around 850g.

There is a lot of the word 'around' when it comes to bread making, because SO many factors come into play, such as the moisture content in the flour, the heat of the water added.

Essentially I made this bread with:

• * Approx. 500g of Nutty Wheat
• * Approx. 150g of White Flour for kneading and sorting
• * Half a packet of Instant yeast
• * Approx. 500ml warm water
• * 2 Tbsp sugar
• * 1 Tbsp salt

The trick I'd say to bread is playing around, watching food channels and seeing how they make bread. Also DONT have your water be too cool or too warm. Too warm, the yeast dies. Too cold, the yeast never activates.

Generally I use about 150mls from a boiled rested kettle, and the further 350 from a cold tap. The water should be LUKE warm. What this actually means is one of those horrible kitchen tricks; luke warm to my mind is BODY temperature; that is pretty hot actually.

You NEED sugar so that the instant yeast has something to feed on, otherwise you'll have a bit of an issue. The sugars in the flour will take a long time to rise.

I also added a couple of table spoons of linseed. This added a really healthy seed taste.

Considering how cheap it is to make your own bread, I encourage everyone to make there own, and save a couple of rands a month in the process.

Labels: Bread

// posted by Andrew la Grange @ 3:36 AM