100 % Rye Bread with Sourdough

In my house bread that sells without any fussiness is the rye bread. My hubby and little princess love that bread, and occasionally he would need scrambled eggs or a spicy pickle to go with the bread.  To get my daughter to eat, I need to try all sorts of tricks, and in the morning it is a lot more frustrating.  I became fan of rye bread, once my hubby bought pumpernickel from store. After having them, I fell in love with rye bread.  I have tried some varieties of rye bread at home, and every time I eat a rye bread I am getting more and more addicted to that grain. 

Rye is the grain you will love it or hate it. Rye flour has fragile gluten, so kneading won’t help improve any rising, and it also gives a nutty chewy texture. Furthermore, it has tendency to make sticky dough, whatever you do, it will come up like a thick sticky mud.    

I was planning to make pumpernickel bread for a longtime, but I put it off, as I needed rye berries and pumpernickel flour. I haven’t bought it yet, and one of these days, I will buy   and then going to try them. For the time being I am happy with this 100% rye bread.  

Rye flour has an inclination for fermentation.  Rye flour has indigenous microorganisms  waiting to do “their thing” just like Urad dal/ split black gram (which makes wonderful dosa with own micoorganisms).   Usually there are two types of  lactic acid fermentation that takes place with  yeast and other organisms(sourdough),either homo or hetero.  In Homo lactic acid fermentation, or a single fermentation produces, aside from alcohol and carbon dioxide, lactic acid is produced which results in a sweet tasting bread having the taste of the whole grain. Hetero-fermentation produces the same components with the addition of acetic acid and it yields heartier, sour, and better keeping breads.  Best example for  hetero-fermentive leaven  is The San Francisco type leaven . So it will better to use sourdough for making rye bread. 

I have been keeping my sourdough (whole wheat and rye flour starter) for almost 1 year and 5 month.  I love them and even though   I was not able to feed them in between they will spring back once I gave them new food.  They are really forgiving individuals; I should learn forgiveness from them when I get angry at something. 

When I googled 100% rye bread recipe, I found this recipe from Zeb bakes  which she learned from Simon Michaels of the Wild Yeast Bakery. I made this bread twice, once with my original sourdough starter and the other with 100% rye starter. Both the breads turnout to be really good, and very tasty with nice sourness and hint of sweetness from molasses and caraway seeds which enhance the flavor of the bread. One time my sourdough starter was so active that it overflowed from the plastic container and making a mess on the kitchen counter. My hubby dear had to clean the top as he saw the lava from that plastic tin, the first thing in the morning.  

 For this bread you need a larger volume of starter, so make the starter day before bread baking. Since this makes very sticky dough, you don’t need to worry about kneading the dough. It will be like cake batter once you are done with the first fermentation, add the dough into bread pan and wait for it to double. I like that part very much. 

 You can keep this bread at room temperature for 3-5 days with the cut side down, and just wrapping it with towel or foil. My hubby and I eat this bread as such, while my princess discovered that if you add nutella on the top of this bread, it make it more delicious. I tried that, l loved that too. So she is genius on her own.

So if you can get hold of rye flour, and have sourdough babies in refrigerator and love rye bread, try this one. You are going to love them. Here goes the recipe. 

One year ago: Vettu Cake/Sweetened fried dough
Two year ago: Churros and chocolate sauce

 What you need

  Recipe adapted from  Zeb bakes  originally from  Wild Yeast Bakery.

Print recipe from  here

Day before baking

Starter

 Mature Rye starter: 66.4 g/ ½ + 1/8 cup ( I used 100% saturation)

Whole rye flour:  265.5g/ 2 cup

Water: 398.18g/ 1 ½ cup

Dough

 All the above 730.08g of starter

Luke warm water: 119.45g

Molasses:  20g

Salt: 13.27 g

Whole rye flour:  305 g

Caraway seeds: 3 g/ 2 teaspoon

How I made

In the evening of day before baking mix all the ingredients in starter   in a plastic container and set aside. Use freshly fed mature rye starter to ensure better activity. 

 Next morning you see bubble rich starter with a nice tangy or acidic smell.

To this add all the ingredients in the dough, mix everything well and set aside for 3-5 hours. ( first time I set aside for 3 hours and second time I kept for 5 hours).

Grease the 9" x 5" loaf pan generously with canola oil. Pour the dough, it will be like cake batter and flatten the top with butter knife, sprinkle with caraway seeds and set aside for second rise. It will take about 2 hours. 

By the end of second rise pre-heat oven to 410 F. Keep an empty broiler pan in the lower rack of oven. Add boiling hot water into the broiler pan when you are ready to bake the bread. (This will create steam, necessary to make the thick crust).

Bake the bread for 50 minutes. When done the bread will are golden brown and its internal temperature will register 190°F on an instant-read thermometer.

Cool the bread for five minutes in the pan. Then Cool it in a wire rack, leave for a day before you cut them. Wrap in paper/towel for that day.  It is always better to leave high percentage rye breads as they are gummy when cut too early.

Enjoy with cheese or as a sandwich.

Preparation time:  overnight+ 8 hours

Yield: 1 loaf

Verdict: Yummy

Will you make it again: Yes I will

I am  linking this delicious bread to Hearth and soul blog hop hosted here
Yeast spotting
Bake your own bread by Heather of Girlichef.