We miss bringing in special guests to BAKE! in-person, so, throughout this year, in addition to virtual classes and events, we’ve been bringing chefs, authors, and friends of the Bakehouse to your kitchens via recipes created exclusively for us.
These special guests will be creating recipes that use Bakehouse breads or freshly milled flours, or that put their own spin on one of the recipes found in our cookbook or cookbooklets.
This month, we’re welcoming cookbook author Alexandra Stafford:
The single biggest tip I give to anyone looking to up their bread-baking game is to introduce freshly milled flours into their breads. Why? For one, swapping out one flour for another is simple (as opposed to, say, making the leap from yeast-leavened bread to sourdough). But second and more important, freshly milled flours impart incredible amounts of flavor, aroma, and color into bread. You will discern the potential of these flours immediately upon opening their storage bags, which will release sweet, earthy, wheaty fragrances into the air. If you dip your nose into a bag of commercial flour to compare, the difference will be stark—it will smell of nothing.
Get started with freshly milled flours
When introducing freshly milled flour into your bread doughs, start small—a little goes a long way. In this sandwich bread recipe, for instance, 25% of the flour is rye. This percentage gives the loaf a great tang without turning it into a brick. Once you make this recipe once, you may find yourself wanting even more rye flavor, in which case you can increase the amount, keeping in mind rye has less gluten, so the more you use, the denser your loaf may get.
I love the inclusion of a little bit of caraway seed here, but it is a strong flavor and not everybody’s favorite, namely children, so I often omit it. When freshly baked, this bread is great for sandwiches, and day or days old, it makes excellent toast.
Finally, use a scale for best results. Depending on your environment and the specific flour you are using, you may need to adjust the amount of water. If you use a scale to measure, you can make precise, meaningful adjustments moving forward.
3cups(384 grams) bread flour, plus more for shaping
2teaspoons(12 grams) salt
2teaspoons(8 grams) instant yeast
1tablespoon(7 grams) caraway seeds, optional
1 3/4cups(400 grams) lukewarm water
1tablespoon(24 grams) honey
1tablespoon(14 grams) olive oil
softened butter for greasing
Instructions
In a large bowl, whisk together the flours, salt, instant yeast, and caraway seeds if using. Add the lukewarm water, followed by the honey and olive oil. Using a spatula, stir to combine. Dough will be wet and sticky. Cover the bowl with a towel and set aside for 30 minutes.
Using wet hands, grab one side of the dough and pull it up and to the center — the dough may tear and it might feel very fragile. Repeat this several times re-wetting your hands as needed to prevent sticking or, if you are familiar, you can slap and fold the dough several times until it feels smoother and more elastic — the purpose of this step is simply to ensure the flour is completely absorbed by the water and also to help develop some gluten. Cover the bowl and set it aside in a warm place to rise until it doubles in volume, roughly 2 hours.
Heat the oven to 375ºF. Butter a 10x5-inch loaf pan generously with softened butter.
When dough has doubled, gently deflate it; then turn it out onto a floured work surface. Pat it into a rough rectangle, then roll it into a log. Transfer log to prepared loaf pan.
Let the dough rise until it crowns the rim of the pan, 45 minutes to an hour.
Transfer to the oven and bake for 45 minutes. Turn loaf out onto a cooling rack. Let cool for at least 20 minutes before slicing. Once completely cool, transfer to an airtight bag and store at room temperature for up to 3 days or freeze for up to 3 months.
Alexandra Stafford lives in upstate New York with her husband and four children. Her cookbook, Bread Toast Crumbs, was nominated for the 2017 IACP Julia Child First Book award. Alexandra's food journey began in 2003 when she graduated from Yale and moved to Philadelphia, where she attended cooking school and worked in professional kitchens. After spending two years at Fork, first as a prep cook, ultimately as sous chef, she left the restaurant world and started her blog, Alexandra's Kitchen. Today, she updates her blog weekly with new recipes and contributes to various food websites and magazines as well.
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Justin Etheridge
2 years ago
Fantastic, recipe. I’ve made it four times and it is my go-to sandwich bread recipe. Today, I mixed it up a little bit and got my best results so far. I used 100g of sourdough starter, replacing 50g each bread flour and water. Then, after doing the stretch and fold after 30 minutes, I kept doing it every 30 minutes until the 2 hours had elapsed. This extra bit of work helped immensely with gluten development during bulk fermentation and the result was a phenomenal crumb.
Thank you for your feedback. I’m glad you enjoy the recipe!
Sue
1 year ago
This turned out perfectly. I’ve been struggling with sandwich bread recipes, they always seem to come out dense and barely clear the edge of the pan, or collapse, but this one rose nicely and held its shape. I followed the recipe closely except for a minor change in baking: since I wanted a softer crust I tented it the last fifteen minutes, and brushed with melted butter when it was finished. Will definitely make again, maybe add some finely minced or dried onion. And try the other commenter’s suggestion of folding the dough every half an hour for a finer… Read more »
Easy and fun to make! Followed the recipe exactly, and it turned out great. We will be making this rye bread again and again. My husband and I make sourdough white bread but couldn’t find a nice soft sandwich rye. Now we have one. Thank you!!!
Followed the other commenter about stretching and folding every 30 mins. First time ever making a rye bread. Did not use caraway seeds. Didn’t have a big enough loaf pan so did a round loaf in a round casserole dish. Delicious!! Normally I don’t eat much bread but have already had 3 servings of this. Did use foil on top during the last 15 mins or so of baking to prevent top getting to browned. Once out of oven basted top with butter and then sprinkled with coarse kosher salt. Once cooled sufficiently but still warm sliced some and buttered… Read more »
Glad you made this work, thanks for baking along with us!
Robert Sumner
7 months ago
Such a lovely loaf mixed, proofed and rose in the bread machine without any significant alteration, although I used 1T of yeast just to be on the safe side and added 4T vital wheat gluten so it would develop to hold together and slice nicely.
Then I tasted it, first with roast beef & mayo and next with butter & jam. It was everything I had hoped for in a sandwich bread and gently rye in flavor.
your content is very excellent i am impressed by it thanks.
Shannon W
3 months ago
I made this recipe as is and it was great! However, if we want more rye flavor, would you recommend a 50/50 ratio of flour instead of 25/75?? Thank you so much for this recipe!! It was my first time making bread!!
Hi Shannon. Congrats on your first loaf! 50/50 could work but know that the loaf may not get as much loft, and may ferment faster and develop cracks on top. The consistency of the dough will change, getting stickier and not as stretchy. That said, maybe try going with 35/65 first so as to avoid significantly changing how the dough feels under your hand and with its fermentation. And if you think that’s not enough, you can inch your way up to 50/50. The other trick you can do is to omit the caraway, which can help open up the… Read more »
Raye
1 month ago
It’s way to high hydration, would not cook and collapsed the second it came out of the oven. It’s gone to the birds.
When introducing freshly milled flour into your bread doughs, start small—a little goes a long way. In this sandwich bread recipe, for instance, 25% of the flour is rye. This percentage gives the loaf a great tang without turning it into a brick. Once you make this recipe once, you may find yourself wanting even more rye flavor, in which case you can increase the amount, keeping in mind rye has less gluten, so the more you use, the denser your loaf may get.
Fantastic, recipe. I’ve made it four times and it is my go-to sandwich bread recipe. Today, I mixed it up a little bit and got my best results so far. I used 100g of sourdough starter, replacing 50g each bread flour and water. Then, after doing the stretch and fold after 30 minutes, I kept doing it every 30 minutes until the 2 hours had elapsed. This extra bit of work helped immensely with gluten development during bulk fermentation and the result was a phenomenal crumb.
Thanks so much!
Thank you for your feedback. I’m glad you enjoy the recipe!
This turned out perfectly. I’ve been struggling with sandwich bread recipes, they always seem to come out dense and barely clear the edge of the pan, or collapse, but this one rose nicely and held its shape. I followed the recipe closely except for a minor change in baking: since I wanted a softer crust I tented it the last fifteen minutes, and brushed with melted butter when it was finished. Will definitely make again, maybe add some finely minced or dried onion. And try the other commenter’s suggestion of folding the dough every half an hour for a finer… Read more »
Happy to hear it turned out for you! Additions sound yummy.
Good, recipe. I need to change the instant yeast to sourdough, thank you so much
Thank you for trying the recipe!
Easy and fun to make! Followed the recipe exactly, and it turned out great. We will be making this rye bread again and again. My husband and I make sourdough white bread but couldn’t find a nice soft sandwich rye. Now we have one. Thank you!!!
Excellent. Thanks for sharing. Enjoy!
Followed the other commenter about stretching and folding every 30 mins. First time ever making a rye bread. Did not use caraway seeds. Didn’t have a big enough loaf pan so did a round loaf in a round casserole dish. Delicious!! Normally I don’t eat much bread but have already had 3 servings of this. Did use foil on top during the last 15 mins or so of baking to prevent top getting to browned. Once out of oven basted top with butter and then sprinkled with coarse kosher salt. Once cooled sufficiently but still warm sliced some and buttered… Read more »
Glad you made this work, thanks for baking along with us!
Such a lovely loaf mixed, proofed and rose in the bread machine without any significant alteration, although I used 1T of yeast just to be on the safe side and added 4T vital wheat gluten so it would develop to hold together and slice nicely.
Then I tasted it, first with roast beef & mayo and next with butter & jam. It was everything I had hoped for in a sandwich bread and gently rye in flavor.
Thanks for sharing this delightful recipe!
Hi Robert! We’re glad you enjoyed the recipe. Happy baking!
Your recipe is very amazing. Thank you for this.
Glad you enjoyed it!
your content is very excellent i am impressed by it thanks.
I made this recipe as is and it was great! However, if we want more rye flavor, would you recommend a 50/50 ratio of flour instead of 25/75?? Thank you so much for this recipe!! It was my first time making bread!!
Hi Shannon. Congrats on your first loaf! 50/50 could work but know that the loaf may not get as much loft, and may ferment faster and develop cracks on top. The consistency of the dough will change, getting stickier and not as stretchy. That said, maybe try going with 35/65 first so as to avoid significantly changing how the dough feels under your hand and with its fermentation. And if you think that’s not enough, you can inch your way up to 50/50. The other trick you can do is to omit the caraway, which can help open up the… Read more »
It’s way to high hydration, would not cook and collapsed the second it came out of the oven. It’s gone to the birds.