Baking with Kefir-- Advice for novice cook?
March 20, 2018 10:22 AM Subscribe
So I'm not a pro in the kitchen, but I've recently started baking with kefir, and love the results, but I haven't figured out fermenting dough with kefir yet. I'd greatly appreciate any advice from someone more knowledgeable about bread making. Is it possible to ferment dough with ALL of the ingredients in, or should sprouted (pre-fermented) flour be used for this?
Hi,
So I'm not a pro in the kitchen but I've recently started baking with kefir and tried actually letting the dough ferment with the kefir once -- but it didn't turn out well. The recipes I find say to only mix flour & fermenting agent (kefir) first, plus maybe water and then add other ingredients after it ferments.
But this resulted in hard dough that was hard to mix things into; it didn't readily accept my other ingredients so I ended up with pieces of plain, shredded dough suspended in a mixture of other things (eggs, baking soda, spices, apple purée, molasses, etc.) I have this spice bread I love making and I'd love to use up my wheat flour but I want to ferment it.
For anyone who is curious and isn't familiar with this, (according to my research), fermenting the dough is necessary to break gluten down and make certain grains more digestible in our bodies. Industrialized America has abandoned this practice (or tried to bypass it with things like self-rising, quick-rise agents) in many commercial goods, but for those of us with digestion problems/health issues, getting back to the traditional way of preparing food can be pretty important.
I've done some research and have attempted my bread recipe like 4 times now, once with sprouted flour (grains already fermented, no need to let dough ferment). I'd greatly appreciate any advice from someone more knowledgeable about bread making. Is it possible to ferment dough with ALL the ingredients in, since the dough doesn't really incorporate other things well after it has sat overnight? Or am I just doing something wrong? I don't know how these recipe bloggers didn't end up with lumpy, inconsistent bread.
Or is it required to use pre-sprouted grain flour for complex recipes with lots of ingredients? The kefir baking recipes I keep finding are mostly simple -- like butter, sugar, flour, kefir, salt, water. Thank you in advance!
PS. If anyone wants the spice bread recipe I'll happily post it!
Hi,
So I'm not a pro in the kitchen but I've recently started baking with kefir and tried actually letting the dough ferment with the kefir once -- but it didn't turn out well. The recipes I find say to only mix flour & fermenting agent (kefir) first, plus maybe water and then add other ingredients after it ferments.
But this resulted in hard dough that was hard to mix things into; it didn't readily accept my other ingredients so I ended up with pieces of plain, shredded dough suspended in a mixture of other things (eggs, baking soda, spices, apple purée, molasses, etc.) I have this spice bread I love making and I'd love to use up my wheat flour but I want to ferment it.
For anyone who is curious and isn't familiar with this, (according to my research), fermenting the dough is necessary to break gluten down and make certain grains more digestible in our bodies. Industrialized America has abandoned this practice (or tried to bypass it with things like self-rising, quick-rise agents) in many commercial goods, but for those of us with digestion problems/health issues, getting back to the traditional way of preparing food can be pretty important.
I've done some research and have attempted my bread recipe like 4 times now, once with sprouted flour (grains already fermented, no need to let dough ferment). I'd greatly appreciate any advice from someone more knowledgeable about bread making. Is it possible to ferment dough with ALL the ingredients in, since the dough doesn't really incorporate other things well after it has sat overnight? Or am I just doing something wrong? I don't know how these recipe bloggers didn't end up with lumpy, inconsistent bread.
Or is it required to use pre-sprouted grain flour for complex recipes with lots of ingredients? The kefir baking recipes I keep finding are mostly simple -- like butter, sugar, flour, kefir, salt, water. Thank you in advance!
PS. If anyone wants the spice bread recipe I'll happily post it!
Sprouted isn't the same as fermented, is it? I thought sprouted meant the seeds have been allowed to start germinating before they get ground into flour--so there's less starch. Does that also mean less gluten? Why would that be?
posted by Don Pepino at 11:33 AM on March 20, 2018 [4 favorites]
posted by Don Pepino at 11:33 AM on March 20, 2018 [4 favorites]
I've used kefir in place of buttermilk when making sourdough buttermilk pancakes
The ratios aren't quite right for kefir -- not as much liquid as buttermilk, so I add more and/or supplement with water.
Are you making a batter bread or a yeast bread ? It sounds like batter bread. How are you mixing it ? (hand, kitchen-aid - dough hook or batter ?)
If things aren't incorporating, you could be mixing in the wrong order, or a number of other possible problems (too dry, usually).
posted by k5.user at 11:55 AM on March 20, 2018
The ratios aren't quite right for kefir -- not as much liquid as buttermilk, so I add more and/or supplement with water.
Are you making a batter bread or a yeast bread ? It sounds like batter bread. How are you mixing it ? (hand, kitchen-aid - dough hook or batter ?)
If things aren't incorporating, you could be mixing in the wrong order, or a number of other possible problems (too dry, usually).
posted by k5.user at 11:55 AM on March 20, 2018
I'm not sure if I've made this particular recipe, but the Ukrainian cookbook Mamushka has some delicious recipes for baking with kefir. They have this deep fried dill-cheese bread that is eye-rollingly good, though not a health food.
Also, what about sourdough? That's a common/traditional way to get fermentation involved in your bread baking, and reliably delicious and not lumpy. Here's a recipe for sourdough written by N. America's King of Fermentation, Sandor Katz (seriously if you haven't read his books Wild Fermentation will totally thrill you)
posted by hungrytiger at 12:00 PM on March 20, 2018
Also, what about sourdough? That's a common/traditional way to get fermentation involved in your bread baking, and reliably delicious and not lumpy. Here's a recipe for sourdough written by N. America's King of Fermentation, Sandor Katz (seriously if you haven't read his books Wild Fermentation will totally thrill you)
posted by hungrytiger at 12:00 PM on March 20, 2018
"... after it has sat overnight"
Aha! Overnight.
I don't think you're letting your starter grow long enough. You have to keep it a week and keep feeding it more flour to let the yeast grow.
If you're using baking soda, you're making a quickbread, which is a whole different deal--the soda reacts with the acid in the kefir and makes bubbles. You don't have to get into the whole struggle to keep microorganisms from starving or killing themselves with alcohol, you don't have to either keep a smelly, carby pet in your refrigerator for the rest of your life or grieve when inevitably you forget to "feed" it and it goes flat, you just mix the dry ingredients, including the soda, pour in the wet stuff, mix, fling it in a loafpan and go. (I love sourdough so much, but I know it is beyond my emotional and intellectual capacity to maintain a "mother" of anything fermented that keeps doubling in size all the time or else dying, plus having access to sourdough all the time would make me even more of a wide load than I already am--hence resentful tone about sourdough starter above.)
posted by Don Pepino at 12:06 PM on March 20, 2018 [3 favorites]
Aha! Overnight.
I don't think you're letting your starter grow long enough. You have to keep it a week and keep feeding it more flour to let the yeast grow.
If you're using baking soda, you're making a quickbread, which is a whole different deal--the soda reacts with the acid in the kefir and makes bubbles. You don't have to get into the whole struggle to keep microorganisms from starving or killing themselves with alcohol, you don't have to either keep a smelly, carby pet in your refrigerator for the rest of your life or grieve when inevitably you forget to "feed" it and it goes flat, you just mix the dry ingredients, including the soda, pour in the wet stuff, mix, fling it in a loafpan and go. (I love sourdough so much, but I know it is beyond my emotional and intellectual capacity to maintain a "mother" of anything fermented that keeps doubling in size all the time or else dying, plus having access to sourdough all the time would make me even more of a wide load than I already am--hence resentful tone about sourdough starter above.)
posted by Don Pepino at 12:06 PM on March 20, 2018 [3 favorites]
According to Bread making using kefir grains as baker’s yeast (found on Science Direct; originally published in Food Chemistry Volume 93, Issue 4, December 2005, Pages 585-589; PM me or ask your favorite librarian if you need access), kefir grains make a pretty decent sourdough bread, subbing out completely for any rising agents (commercial yeast, baking soda, etc.) They made a very lean dough (e.g. just flour, water & kefir grains) and found it held up favorably to bread made with baker's yeast.
Their recipe was:
g 500 g flour
300 ml water
15 g of pressed kefir biomass
knead 10 minutes
let rise for 30–60 minutes at 30°C
shape & let rise for 45 minutes at 46°C
bake at 190°C for 60 minutes
That might give you a starting point for adapting it for an enriched bread.
King Arthur Flour has traditional sourdough starters available for purchase as well as recipes for them. Reading through one of them may also help you figure out when to add additional ingredients.
posted by carrioncomfort at 10:01 AM on March 21, 2018
Their recipe was:
g 500 g flour
300 ml water
15 g of pressed kefir biomass
knead 10 minutes
let rise for 30–60 minutes at 30°C
shape & let rise for 45 minutes at 46°C
bake at 190°C for 60 minutes
That might give you a starting point for adapting it for an enriched bread.
King Arthur Flour has traditional sourdough starters available for purchase as well as recipes for them. Reading through one of them may also help you figure out when to add additional ingredients.
posted by carrioncomfort at 10:01 AM on March 21, 2018
Okay, I read through this a few times and I think I see where you're trying to go. I'm going to make some assumptions based on information you didn't include, so tell me if I've gone wrong anywhere. It sounds like maybe you're trying to make one class of bread (your spice bread, probably a quick bread or maybe an enriched soda bread) into another class of bread (a yeast bread with kefir being the yeast), and that likely won't work without more adaptions.
(First, as an aside: Sprouted flour is germinated, not fermented. Sprouting and fermentation or souring are two different things.)
I did a quick look around the web for kefir bread recipes, since you didn't link the ones you reference having read, and I found two types: yeast-bread-type recipes with kefir replacing yeast, and soda-bread-type bread recipes that have kefir used for fermentation with additional baking soda as a raising agent. (I suppose one could argue that that second type are yeast + soda types based on the yeast in the kefir, but I'm simplifying a little here to make this easier to understand.)
You didn't provide the original recipe for the spice bread you're trying to adapt, but based on the ingredients you list (eggs, baking soda, spices, apple purée, molasses), it sounds like it could be a quick bread, with the apple acting as a sweetener. (A more standard quick bread recipe would use sugar as a sweetener.)
But since you don't provide the recipe and I don't know how much sweetening we're talking about, I can't be sure that it's not an enriched soda bread (raised by chemical leavening, i.e. baking soda combined with an acid in the form of apple purée and molasses, plus eggs). ("Enriched" here means the eggs rather than vitamin supplementation.) An enriched soda bread would be less sweet than a quick bread.
In either case, those two types (quick and enriched soda) are raised by chemical leavening plus eggs. (Regular soda bread is raised by soda alone.)
You describe mixing flour and fermenting agent (kefir) first, letting it ferment, and then that you have trouble combining other ingredients into that mixture. You might want to read about sponge and dough and straight-dough methods for some terminology here.
You don't say whether your mix of flour and fermenting agent was kneaded it before letting it ferment.
If it's a sponge (not something you kneaded before fermentation), it sounds like you have a sponge that has too little liquid in it to permit the incorporation of more ingredients.
If it's a dough which you kneaded before fermentation, kneading "develops" gluten. That doesn't mean it increases the *amount* of gluten, but that the physical manipulation of the dough causes the gluten already present to form a springy network in the dough. That springy network is what makes it difficult to incorporate more ingredients in a kneaded dough. It is also what gives yeast breads made with wheat (or other grains containing gluten) their structure - the yeast consume sugars and starches and put out carbon dioxide. The network of gluten and gliadin (and other stuff) traps the carbon dioxide, so the dough rises. In yeast breads you want to encourage the development of gluten, because it's what gives the bread its height.
A quick bread is a different animal. A quick bread is closer to a cake. Quick breads are made from a batter and get their height from chemical leavening (baking powder and/or baking soda) and eggs. A quick bread is made from a batter mixed a short time - thus the development of gluten is not encouraged, because it would make the bread tough.
In a soda bread, likewise, you don't want to encourage the development of gluten, because it will make the bread tough. Soda breads are generally kneaded for a very short time, just enough to encourage the dough to be uniform. If your spice bread has soda and eggs, both of those are what would give it its height.
Now, if your intent is to avoid "self-rising, quick-rise agents," what that is is...baking soda and baking powder. Those date back to the 19th century. They allow us to bake without relying on yeast for rise. You describe trying to add baking soda after your first stage of mixing, so I'm not sure if you're trying to avoid it or not.
If you're not trying to avoid it, here's what I'd say: Combine your flour and kefir with all of your ingredients that won't quickly spoil - so spices, molasses, apple purée - as long as that will give you something that's more liquid than the mixtures you've had trouble with. Do your fermentation. Then when you're ready to bake, beat the eggs enough to combine them, stir the baking soda into the eggs, and stir together the fermented mixture and the egg mixture. Get the result into the oven quickly, because baking soda gives off its gas as soon as it's combined with an acid. (Modern baking *powders* are what's called "double-acting" - they start to work a little right away, but do more once put in the oven. Baking soda doesn't have that advantage.)
If you are trying to avoid chemical leavening, your options for creating height are yeast and eggs.
Kefir does contain some yeast, and you say at the end that most of the kefir baking recipes you see are simple. This may be because kefir, containing less yeast than you'd get from directly using yeast meant for baking (and kefir yeast is not necessarily the same strains as baking yeast), does not have as much raising power, so those recipes don't have inclusions because kefir alone couldn't produce enough rise, with the added burden of the inclusions, to turn out a good finished product. Many sourdough bread recipes, even plain ones without inclusions, use a sourdough starter plus yeast in order to get enough lift. (And this even though sourdough starters can be originally begun with regular old store-bought yeast. Other stuff grows in there along the way.)
Eggs can be used to do a lot of height creation. What you want to do to make that happen is carefully separate the yolk and white and beat them separately. If you get yolk in the white (or any sort of oil or fat), the whites won't beat to a high volume. Beat your whites until they hold a stiff peak when you raise the beater. Beat the yolks separately until they're light yellow and significantly greater volume. Mix all your other ingredients together first and ferment, then fold first the yolks, then the whites, into your batter. Folding is a special kind of mixing done with a gentle over and under technique so as not to deflate the volume of a frothed ingredient. You can find videos of how to do it on the web, I'm sure.
For this to work, your mixture before the eggs is going to have to be liquid enough to combine well. I would expect a quick bread batter to be liquid enough for that; a yeast or soda bread dough I would not expect to be so. And if you remove the baking soda from a quick bread or soda bread, even with well-beaten eggs you may bake up a brick.
If you are trying to avoid baking soda/baking powder, where you're trying to go, as I've mentioned, is the first half of the 19th century or earlier. There are a lot of old cookbooks digitized on the web; I've read a fair number as that's a particular interest of mine. In those older books you'll often see yeast referred to by the cup - "add a cup of yeast" in a bread or cake recipe. What they're referring to is homemade yeast, effectively what we now call sourdough starter. If you're interested in baking without chemical leavening, you might want to look at some books of that age. I will say, of course, that those old recipes contain very little instruction (because it was assumed you already knew the general procedures) and are necessarily imprecise, because homemade yeasts varied, and flour varied more then as well, as did its moisture content because homes had a lot less climate control. It is easier to be a good baker now with more standardized ingredients, measures, and appliances.
You may also want to get to know the website The Fresh Loaf. They have forums and there is discussion of baking with kefir over there that comes up in the search.
posted by jocelmeow at 2:30 PM on March 22, 2018 [2 favorites]
(First, as an aside: Sprouted flour is germinated, not fermented. Sprouting and fermentation or souring are two different things.)
I did a quick look around the web for kefir bread recipes, since you didn't link the ones you reference having read, and I found two types: yeast-bread-type recipes with kefir replacing yeast, and soda-bread-type bread recipes that have kefir used for fermentation with additional baking soda as a raising agent. (I suppose one could argue that that second type are yeast + soda types based on the yeast in the kefir, but I'm simplifying a little here to make this easier to understand.)
You didn't provide the original recipe for the spice bread you're trying to adapt, but based on the ingredients you list (eggs, baking soda, spices, apple purée, molasses), it sounds like it could be a quick bread, with the apple acting as a sweetener. (A more standard quick bread recipe would use sugar as a sweetener.)
But since you don't provide the recipe and I don't know how much sweetening we're talking about, I can't be sure that it's not an enriched soda bread (raised by chemical leavening, i.e. baking soda combined with an acid in the form of apple purée and molasses, plus eggs). ("Enriched" here means the eggs rather than vitamin supplementation.) An enriched soda bread would be less sweet than a quick bread.
In either case, those two types (quick and enriched soda) are raised by chemical leavening plus eggs. (Regular soda bread is raised by soda alone.)
You describe mixing flour and fermenting agent (kefir) first, letting it ferment, and then that you have trouble combining other ingredients into that mixture. You might want to read about sponge and dough and straight-dough methods for some terminology here.
You don't say whether your mix of flour and fermenting agent was kneaded it before letting it ferment.
If it's a sponge (not something you kneaded before fermentation), it sounds like you have a sponge that has too little liquid in it to permit the incorporation of more ingredients.
If it's a dough which you kneaded before fermentation, kneading "develops" gluten. That doesn't mean it increases the *amount* of gluten, but that the physical manipulation of the dough causes the gluten already present to form a springy network in the dough. That springy network is what makes it difficult to incorporate more ingredients in a kneaded dough. It is also what gives yeast breads made with wheat (or other grains containing gluten) their structure - the yeast consume sugars and starches and put out carbon dioxide. The network of gluten and gliadin (and other stuff) traps the carbon dioxide, so the dough rises. In yeast breads you want to encourage the development of gluten, because it's what gives the bread its height.
A quick bread is a different animal. A quick bread is closer to a cake. Quick breads are made from a batter and get their height from chemical leavening (baking powder and/or baking soda) and eggs. A quick bread is made from a batter mixed a short time - thus the development of gluten is not encouraged, because it would make the bread tough.
In a soda bread, likewise, you don't want to encourage the development of gluten, because it will make the bread tough. Soda breads are generally kneaded for a very short time, just enough to encourage the dough to be uniform. If your spice bread has soda and eggs, both of those are what would give it its height.
Now, if your intent is to avoid "self-rising, quick-rise agents," what that is is...baking soda and baking powder. Those date back to the 19th century. They allow us to bake without relying on yeast for rise. You describe trying to add baking soda after your first stage of mixing, so I'm not sure if you're trying to avoid it or not.
If you're not trying to avoid it, here's what I'd say: Combine your flour and kefir with all of your ingredients that won't quickly spoil - so spices, molasses, apple purée - as long as that will give you something that's more liquid than the mixtures you've had trouble with. Do your fermentation. Then when you're ready to bake, beat the eggs enough to combine them, stir the baking soda into the eggs, and stir together the fermented mixture and the egg mixture. Get the result into the oven quickly, because baking soda gives off its gas as soon as it's combined with an acid. (Modern baking *powders* are what's called "double-acting" - they start to work a little right away, but do more once put in the oven. Baking soda doesn't have that advantage.)
If you are trying to avoid chemical leavening, your options for creating height are yeast and eggs.
Kefir does contain some yeast, and you say at the end that most of the kefir baking recipes you see are simple. This may be because kefir, containing less yeast than you'd get from directly using yeast meant for baking (and kefir yeast is not necessarily the same strains as baking yeast), does not have as much raising power, so those recipes don't have inclusions because kefir alone couldn't produce enough rise, with the added burden of the inclusions, to turn out a good finished product. Many sourdough bread recipes, even plain ones without inclusions, use a sourdough starter plus yeast in order to get enough lift. (And this even though sourdough starters can be originally begun with regular old store-bought yeast. Other stuff grows in there along the way.)
Eggs can be used to do a lot of height creation. What you want to do to make that happen is carefully separate the yolk and white and beat them separately. If you get yolk in the white (or any sort of oil or fat), the whites won't beat to a high volume. Beat your whites until they hold a stiff peak when you raise the beater. Beat the yolks separately until they're light yellow and significantly greater volume. Mix all your other ingredients together first and ferment, then fold first the yolks, then the whites, into your batter. Folding is a special kind of mixing done with a gentle over and under technique so as not to deflate the volume of a frothed ingredient. You can find videos of how to do it on the web, I'm sure.
For this to work, your mixture before the eggs is going to have to be liquid enough to combine well. I would expect a quick bread batter to be liquid enough for that; a yeast or soda bread dough I would not expect to be so. And if you remove the baking soda from a quick bread or soda bread, even with well-beaten eggs you may bake up a brick.
If you are trying to avoid baking soda/baking powder, where you're trying to go, as I've mentioned, is the first half of the 19th century or earlier. There are a lot of old cookbooks digitized on the web; I've read a fair number as that's a particular interest of mine. In those older books you'll often see yeast referred to by the cup - "add a cup of yeast" in a bread or cake recipe. What they're referring to is homemade yeast, effectively what we now call sourdough starter. If you're interested in baking without chemical leavening, you might want to look at some books of that age. I will say, of course, that those old recipes contain very little instruction (because it was assumed you already knew the general procedures) and are necessarily imprecise, because homemade yeasts varied, and flour varied more then as well, as did its moisture content because homes had a lot less climate control. It is easier to be a good baker now with more standardized ingredients, measures, and appliances.
You may also want to get to know the website The Fresh Loaf. They have forums and there is discussion of baking with kefir over there that comes up in the search.
posted by jocelmeow at 2:30 PM on March 22, 2018 [2 favorites]
Response by poster: Hi everyone! Thank you so much for your great responses. I'm sorry for the delay, I had a big test & have been running around (hence the big batch of bread for survival). I'm linking the recipes I used/was inspired by below, and copying my recipe, which I'm still experimenting with.
Ashwagandha -- Thank you. I was aiming for a 'long proof', I guess, not making a sourdough starter with kefir. Though I found instructions for making a starter! I'm using milk kefir.
Don Pepino -- I can't answer all of your questions unfortunately, but yes you're right -- I guess sprouted isn't the same as fermented. But from what I've read below, sprouting helps break down things in grains, like phytates, that are hard for our bodies to handle.
I wasn't trying for a starter, but just to let the kefir break down the dough -- though you're right, the recipe I used calls for baking soda which reacts with the kefir/yogurt.
http://theelliotthomestead.com/2012/02/homemade-sprouted-flour/
https://www.westonaprice.org/health-topics/vegetarianism-and-plant-foods/living-with-phytic-acid/
K5user -- Yes it's a batter bread. Mixing by hand. Maybe I did let it dry out too much, it was really dry.
Hungrytiger -- thank you for the advice!
Carrioncomfort -- Thank you for the tips! Maybe I'll try with kefir grains instead of kefir, though they may be expensive, unless I start making my own kefir.
Jocelmeow -- Thank you for sharing! This is definitely more complicated than I thought. The recipes I used had baking soda, so maybe this is a quickbread. I admittedly haven't researched baking soda enough -- I am trying to cook as naturally as possible, so if baking soda is just a modern way to 'speed things up' with chemicals then yes, I'm aiming for yeast, sourdough or using kefir/kefir grains to 'ferment' and raise the dough.
The recipes I drew from for my recipe: an apple bread that turned into a spice bread with yogurt/kefir.
http://www.geniuskitchen.com/recipe/apple-bread-20549
https://www.gimmesomeoven.com/greek-yogurt-gingerbread/
https://homesteadlady.com/kefir-fermented-bread-dough-no-yeast/
My recipe:
Bake at 350 for 1 hour
(I use two bread pans/makes two loaves)
5 c flour
1/2 c goat milk kefir (or increase other kefir by 1/2 c)
2 c milk kefir
1/2 tsp cloves
2 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp salt
1/4 c molasses
1.25 tsp baking soda
2 apples, cored & blended
3 tbs honey
3 tbs maple syrup
2 c sugar / 7 dates, blended
3 eggs
1 Tbs vanilla
2 tsp ginger
1-5 rounded tbs coconut flour (optional, added to use it up & add fiber -- I don't even notice it)
1 c coconut oil
What I've done:
Mix wet ingredients and dry ingredients separately, then stir together.
Note: I blended the apples with the eggs instead of beating the eggs.
Grease two bread pans and bake!
This came out really well the first time with wheat flour, which I didn't 'ferment'. I also tried it with sprouted spelt flour with success. I've tried taking out the sugar and just using more maple syrup/honey/date syrup, and that turns out ok too. It's definitely a dessert bread. I hope this is helpful in giving more details!
posted by dancer4life at 4:04 PM on March 29, 2018 [2 favorites]
Ashwagandha -- Thank you. I was aiming for a 'long proof', I guess, not making a sourdough starter with kefir. Though I found instructions for making a starter! I'm using milk kefir.
Don Pepino -- I can't answer all of your questions unfortunately, but yes you're right -- I guess sprouted isn't the same as fermented. But from what I've read below, sprouting helps break down things in grains, like phytates, that are hard for our bodies to handle.
I wasn't trying for a starter, but just to let the kefir break down the dough -- though you're right, the recipe I used calls for baking soda which reacts with the kefir/yogurt.
http://theelliotthomestead.com/2012/02/homemade-sprouted-flour/
https://www.westonaprice.org/health-topics/vegetarianism-and-plant-foods/living-with-phytic-acid/
K5user -- Yes it's a batter bread. Mixing by hand. Maybe I did let it dry out too much, it was really dry.
Hungrytiger -- thank you for the advice!
Carrioncomfort -- Thank you for the tips! Maybe I'll try with kefir grains instead of kefir, though they may be expensive, unless I start making my own kefir.
Jocelmeow -- Thank you for sharing! This is definitely more complicated than I thought. The recipes I used had baking soda, so maybe this is a quickbread. I admittedly haven't researched baking soda enough -- I am trying to cook as naturally as possible, so if baking soda is just a modern way to 'speed things up' with chemicals then yes, I'm aiming for yeast, sourdough or using kefir/kefir grains to 'ferment' and raise the dough.
The recipes I drew from for my recipe: an apple bread that turned into a spice bread with yogurt/kefir.
http://www.geniuskitchen.com/recipe/apple-bread-20549
https://www.gimmesomeoven.com/greek-yogurt-gingerbread/
https://homesteadlady.com/kefir-fermented-bread-dough-no-yeast/
My recipe:
Bake at 350 for 1 hour
(I use two bread pans/makes two loaves)
5 c flour
1/2 c goat milk kefir (or increase other kefir by 1/2 c)
2 c milk kefir
1/2 tsp cloves
2 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp salt
1/4 c molasses
1.25 tsp baking soda
2 apples, cored & blended
3 tbs honey
3 tbs maple syrup
2 c sugar / 7 dates, blended
3 eggs
1 Tbs vanilla
2 tsp ginger
1-5 rounded tbs coconut flour (optional, added to use it up & add fiber -- I don't even notice it)
1 c coconut oil
What I've done:
Mix wet ingredients and dry ingredients separately, then stir together.
Note: I blended the apples with the eggs instead of beating the eggs.
Grease two bread pans and bake!
This came out really well the first time with wheat flour, which I didn't 'ferment'. I also tried it with sprouted spelt flour with success. I've tried taking out the sugar and just using more maple syrup/honey/date syrup, and that turns out ok too. It's definitely a dessert bread. I hope this is helpful in giving more details!
posted by dancer4life at 4:04 PM on March 29, 2018 [2 favorites]
So I think what you're asking is to figure out a way to make that quick batter bread into a fermented loaf. I think that recipe will need to be altered - I'm not entirely sure how. At the moment the main raising agents are the eggs (though you mix them with the apples which could counter their action as a raising agent) and the baking soda which reacts to the acidic molasses and kefir. Seems too wet and sweet though. I guess you could make a sourdough starter that you could add to that - I've seen traditional enriched bread recipes (think brioche) that use yeast and/or sourdough starter. Maybe look for traditional recipes for things like Pain D'épices (a French gingerbread that has added fruit) or French rhubarb bread which are denser but sweeter breads that use a portion of rye four and traditionally use sourdough (though I think people mostly use chemical raising agents now). Moving towards a fermented loaf from an enriched bread recipe might be easier then from a quick batter bread recipe.
posted by Ashwagandha at 10:35 AM on April 4, 2018
posted by Ashwagandha at 10:35 AM on April 4, 2018
Just saw your reply today. Thanks for providing your inspiration recipes. The Genius Kitchen Apple Bread is a quick bread recipe, mixed by the muffin method. The Greek Yogurt Gingerbread is a cake, mixed by the creaming method. The Kefir Fermented Bread is unusual, but let's call it a mixed yeast and soda bread. Your own recipe is also a quick bread.
Converting one of these types to another is an expert-level kitchen endeavor. And it's not usually done even by experts because experts know the types are different enough to create substantial problems in doing so. The best way to come up with a "new" baking recipe is to take one of the type you want that already works and modify it somewhat, but not introduce enough changes to make it fail. So for example, take a cake or bread recipe and add a different flavor to it rather than try to make one into the other.
If you want to avoid the converting types problem, here's a gingerbread that's raised with kefir and sourdough that looks like it's up your alley. Here it is baked up. (I found that by googling for sourdough cake and using the minus symbol to exclude several things you're trying to avoid, like so.)
Now, if that's not exactly what you want, and if a little tinkering won't get it there, I do think it's possible to come up with a yeast recipe with the flavors that you love, and I know you'll feel an immense degree of satisfaction in it when you finish the recipe development process. The existing type that's probably closest to what you want is yeast-raised cake.
But in order to do that, it seems like you probably need more familiarity with how yeast formulas work and what they can do and withstand. Baking with yeast is more complicated than chemical leavening. (I had a loaf fail today, a recipe I was trying for the first time, and the first yeast bread I baked was 30 years ago, when I was 12. But I've baked enough bread that I know what caused it.)
I think the best thing to do (if it's an option for you and where you are) is to take a class or read up on yeast and sourdough baking in general. I suggest a class because there's so much about yeast baking that requires experienced judgment as compared to chemical leavening. A good teacher can show you all the things you need to be looking for along the way and save you before you realize you're going wrong. And almost nobody will complain if you bring them the easy thing you start with, fresh homemade white bread. Obviously you'll also want to learn about yeast-raised cakes, but that I expect you'll have to read about rather than take a class on. As for cakes raised with sourdough alone, if you develop an expertise in them, you'll have something very special. (I see that this book seems to have some sourdough cakes, but I don't see a standalone book on them yet.)
So: Yeast-raised cakes. One type is called a savarin, but I won't be surprised if you've never met one before - they're not a common type in the U.S. Here's one from King Arthur, a reliable source of baking information. You might have heard of babka (this is one kind; there are also layered ones).
The one type of yeast-raised cake that is still common in America is coffee cake (I'm setting aside the other common one, yeast-raised doughnuts, because they're fried). Not coffee-flavored cake, mind you - coffee cakes are a class of cake. But not all of them are yeast-raised, which can create confusion. Remember what I said up top about tinkering with a working recipe? Yeast-raised coffee cake is the type I would find a solid recipe for and attempt to modify if I were in your shoes. I suggest that because they often already have fruit included.
Also take a look at breads rich in molasses, like steakhouse-type brown bread, which is already pretty sweet. And take a look around for existing sourdough coffee cakes that suit your fancy. Try recipes of those types, find some you like, and then change one thing at a time so if you have a failure or a near failure, you know what made the difference. And write down what you do every time.
If you decide to go for egg rather than yeast, and thus want egg cakes without chemical leavening, I don't have a great many specialized cake books, but in my library I'd turn to Paula Peck's The Art of Fine Baking for genoise. She has a disdain for chemical leavening too.
As I mentioned before, antique cookbooks from the 19th century and earlier will have yeast-raising used in places it's not common today. But also as I mentioned before, those books won't generally have great instructions. Once you get more yeast and sourdough baking under your belt, though, that might be a rich source for you.
posted by jocelmeow at 5:18 PM on April 9, 2018
Converting one of these types to another is an expert-level kitchen endeavor. And it's not usually done even by experts because experts know the types are different enough to create substantial problems in doing so. The best way to come up with a "new" baking recipe is to take one of the type you want that already works and modify it somewhat, but not introduce enough changes to make it fail. So for example, take a cake or bread recipe and add a different flavor to it rather than try to make one into the other.
If you want to avoid the converting types problem, here's a gingerbread that's raised with kefir and sourdough that looks like it's up your alley. Here it is baked up. (I found that by googling for sourdough cake and using the minus symbol to exclude several things you're trying to avoid, like so.)
Now, if that's not exactly what you want, and if a little tinkering won't get it there, I do think it's possible to come up with a yeast recipe with the flavors that you love, and I know you'll feel an immense degree of satisfaction in it when you finish the recipe development process. The existing type that's probably closest to what you want is yeast-raised cake.
But in order to do that, it seems like you probably need more familiarity with how yeast formulas work and what they can do and withstand. Baking with yeast is more complicated than chemical leavening. (I had a loaf fail today, a recipe I was trying for the first time, and the first yeast bread I baked was 30 years ago, when I was 12. But I've baked enough bread that I know what caused it.)
I think the best thing to do (if it's an option for you and where you are) is to take a class or read up on yeast and sourdough baking in general. I suggest a class because there's so much about yeast baking that requires experienced judgment as compared to chemical leavening. A good teacher can show you all the things you need to be looking for along the way and save you before you realize you're going wrong. And almost nobody will complain if you bring them the easy thing you start with, fresh homemade white bread. Obviously you'll also want to learn about yeast-raised cakes, but that I expect you'll have to read about rather than take a class on. As for cakes raised with sourdough alone, if you develop an expertise in them, you'll have something very special. (I see that this book seems to have some sourdough cakes, but I don't see a standalone book on them yet.)
So: Yeast-raised cakes. One type is called a savarin, but I won't be surprised if you've never met one before - they're not a common type in the U.S. Here's one from King Arthur, a reliable source of baking information. You might have heard of babka (this is one kind; there are also layered ones).
The one type of yeast-raised cake that is still common in America is coffee cake (I'm setting aside the other common one, yeast-raised doughnuts, because they're fried). Not coffee-flavored cake, mind you - coffee cakes are a class of cake. But not all of them are yeast-raised, which can create confusion. Remember what I said up top about tinkering with a working recipe? Yeast-raised coffee cake is the type I would find a solid recipe for and attempt to modify if I were in your shoes. I suggest that because they often already have fruit included.
Also take a look at breads rich in molasses, like steakhouse-type brown bread, which is already pretty sweet. And take a look around for existing sourdough coffee cakes that suit your fancy. Try recipes of those types, find some you like, and then change one thing at a time so if you have a failure or a near failure, you know what made the difference. And write down what you do every time.
If you decide to go for egg rather than yeast, and thus want egg cakes without chemical leavening, I don't have a great many specialized cake books, but in my library I'd turn to Paula Peck's The Art of Fine Baking for genoise. She has a disdain for chemical leavening too.
As I mentioned before, antique cookbooks from the 19th century and earlier will have yeast-raising used in places it's not common today. But also as I mentioned before, those books won't generally have great instructions. Once you get more yeast and sourdough baking under your belt, though, that might be a rich source for you.
posted by jocelmeow at 5:18 PM on April 9, 2018
I was having trouble falling asleep last night when it suddenly occurred to me what is close to what you're trying to make that already exists. Election Cake! I nearly smacked my forehead when it occurred to me. Doing some reading about related types this morning led me to Bara Brith, an English bread I hadn't met before and one you also might want to investigate.
Both are historically yeast-raised egg-enriched sweet spice breads with dried fruit included. Election Cake is often flavored with spirits. (Flavoring cakes with spirits was common before vanilla in the U.S.) Both are descendants of English fruitcake.
Election Cake was a traditional New England treat, first for muster days, then for election days. Elections were a gala event around which there was partying. Election Cake is something I happen to know about because I love both old cookbooks and spice cakes, but there were a couple news stories that brought it to wider attention during the 2016 election cycle. Those stories provided some modern interpretations (one, two) of the cake, because most of the old election cake recipes make enough for the whole town (because you *were* baking it for the whole town), but there's no reason you can't go back to the source and try some of those old recipes once you get comfy with sourdough baking.
Most of them don't have molasses, but I found one for you that does, though it's only a touch of it. That one has no booze.
Bara Brith has variations too. Here's one with molasses for you.
posted by jocelmeow at 12:18 PM on April 10, 2018
Both are historically yeast-raised egg-enriched sweet spice breads with dried fruit included. Election Cake is often flavored with spirits. (Flavoring cakes with spirits was common before vanilla in the U.S.) Both are descendants of English fruitcake.
Election Cake was a traditional New England treat, first for muster days, then for election days. Elections were a gala event around which there was partying. Election Cake is something I happen to know about because I love both old cookbooks and spice cakes, but there were a couple news stories that brought it to wider attention during the 2016 election cycle. Those stories provided some modern interpretations (one, two) of the cake, because most of the old election cake recipes make enough for the whole town (because you *were* baking it for the whole town), but there's no reason you can't go back to the source and try some of those old recipes once you get comfy with sourdough baking.
Most of them don't have molasses, but I found one for you that does, though it's only a touch of it. That one has no booze.
Bara Brith has variations too. Here's one with molasses for you.
posted by jocelmeow at 12:18 PM on April 10, 2018
This thread is closed to new comments.
posted by Ashwagandha at 11:27 AM on March 20, 2018 [3 favorites]