Sourdough Rye with Raisins and Walnuts

The third and final bread of the month was a 35% rye bread with raisins and walnuts. Between the relatively low rye content and the added raisins and walnuts, this did not come across as a rye bread. And since I don't particularly like rye breads, I consider this a strong point!

Whenever I cook breads with raisins (or olives if you just read the last post), I try to be careful to avoid exposed fruit that will char in the oven. Apart from this, the loaf is straightforward and easy to make. I used a hashed scoring that didn't really work well for this loaf in that it exposed some of the raisins and I didn't have as much oven spring as I would have liked. (Perhaps I should have allowed it to rise a bit longer?)

While a bit dense, this was still an excellent loaf and well worth making again.

Olive Levain

This is another terrific bread! I think the key to a good olive bread is good olives. If you wouldn't eat the olives out of the jar, why would you want to eat them in a piece of bread? For this recipe, I use Mezzetta Pitted Kalamata Olives that, according to the label, had been marinated with herbs in Napa Valley Cabernet. I really love these olives, and they worked well in this bread.

There were no problems with the recipe. The dough was a bit slack, but not enough to cause problems. As is my habit, I baked the bread in a cloche. A really great bread! I wish I had some left.

Potato Bread with Roasted Onions

What great bread! I love roasted root vegetables, and I particularly like roasted onions and potatoes. So I'm all for adding them to bread (and making a little extra to snack on)!

Since Hamelman notes that we can form the loaves several ways, I decided to make sandwich loaves. Although not on Hamelman's list of possibilities, these worked out nicely.

The bottom line, I really like this bread. A winner!