Bread for the Masses

pics by Sunniva

Monday morning freshly baked bread

Monday morning our fridge is mostly empty(after a weekend with three ferocious teenagers plus one a little less ferocious), and the spirits sometimes a little dim...What could be better then than waking up to the smell of freshly baked bread seeping through the bedroom door...

That’s actually what has become one of our weekly little rituals...both out of necessity and out of a request from our 2.oldest daughter ,Johanna,who says she doesn´t feel like eating so early in the morning unless we have our home-made bread. So of course my mother heart makes a jump of love ,and get s up extra early on Monday morning to get the bread in the oven so that it is just done ,and fuming hot by the time «my little baby birds» come down to eat their breakfast.

Of course ,they have to make a little effort them selves, and it´s Johanna’s job to set the bread dough Sunday evening. This bread is delicious,very healthy, and stays fresh and moist in a cool place for as long as it takes us to eat up , which is normally about 3 days.

The recipe makes 3 large breads,and it´s based on the recipe for «Thor´s bread»,and then we have made our own little variations on that.

What make the bread so good in my eyes, apart from the fact that it tastes great, is that its a minimal of yeast in it, the dough rest over the night, some times I leave it for as much as 24 hours, to get a chance to really develop its flavours.This also makes a bread that stores really well. It´s also extremely easy to make and requires only 10-15 min total in preparations and clean up...

Of course we use only organic ingredients, as I really think this makes a difference in its nutritional value and also it is important for our planet how we cultivates our food.

You need;

1 kg spelt flour,finely milled. Or wheat flour..

1 kg whole grain spelt or rye or any other preferred flour.( Often we use only fine flour to get a lighter bread,)

250 g oat flakes

10 tablespoons sesame seeds

10 tablespoons linn seeds

5 g fresh yeast

17 dl water,body temperature

1-2 tablespoons salt

Mix all the dry ingredients, take half a dl of the water to mix in the yeast. Pour it in together with the rest of the water,and mix it all together with the dry ingridients. The dough should be loose but not runny. The moisture in the air gets into the picture here,and you have to regulate the water/flour quantities with that in mind. Sometimes you need a little more water,and other times a little more flour. Put a kitchen towel over and leave to rise over the night,or for a minimum of 8 hours.

Butter or oil 3 bread forms, pour in the dough and then you can put it directly into a cold oven and turn it on to 200 degrees Celsius.

I first only bake the one bread that we are going to eat for breakfast, and leave the other two to rise in their forms till the first bread is done, after approximately one hour. The ones that get some extra time to a rise in their forms before being baked, taste even better!

An other possibility that makes even less work in the morning, is to pour the dough into their forms in the evening , and then put them directly into the oven in the morning,

Enjoy!