Help with Recipe from The Rye Baker
I just tried the recipe for Yogurt Rye (Chleb Mieszany) from Stanley Ginsberg’s The Rye Baker. The bread did not turn out like I would expect—I got a brick instead of a loaf. Here are the ingredients:
Whole wheat flour is KAB and the rye flours are Bay State Milling from the New York Baker. I made slight changes to the original recipe. I used nonfat Greek yogurt, so I added a small amount of butter to add fat, and replaced some of the yogurt with water, as per recommended substitution on Cook’s Illustrated and elsewhere. I also added a small amount of vital wheat gluten and a pinch of ascorbic acid to avoid getting a brick. Obviously, that did not work!
I also do not have a stand mixer and had to guess the amount to knead the dough. I estimate it was about 15 minutes total kneading. The dough did not double during the bulk ferment (only about 1.5× in 2 hours) and essentially had no extensibility to allow shaping into a loaf for the final proof. The dough did not rise at all during the final proof, but was baked anyway.
The crumb was dense and moist but not gummy and the bread tasted OK. I would appreciate any suggestions on how to modify my techniques or the ingredients to get a better loaf. Specifically, is a stand mixer absolutely required to make the breads in The Rye Baker?
Thanks!
Try it without the substitutions. And no need for vital wheat gluten or ascorbic acid unless the formula calls for it.Also, if the formula calls for regular (full fat) yogurt, don't use fat free. Fat free yogurt (and buttermilk) have thickeners and emulsifiers that can really mess up bread and biscuits. I learned that the hard way.
Also, Greek yogurt should not be substituted in for regular (non-greek) yogurt.
If the formula said just "yogurt" with no further specification, then plain regular unflavored full-fat yogurt should be used.
Also, did the formula call for "whole rye" or "dark rye" ? They are not the same. Bay State Milling's "dark rye" is very denser and bran-ier than whole rye. Other millers conflate the two. But to Ginsberg, NY Bakers, and Bay State, they are very different.
The recipe did call for dark rye, medium rye, and yogurt. The nonfat Greek yogurt I used contains no additives—it's just nonfat milk. I have used it before in muffins (just made some banana bran muffins last week) without any issues. I know the gluten and ascorbic acid were not in the recipe, but Reinhart suggests adding them as optional to rye breads in Whole Grain Breads, especially to mitigate the very problem I encountered. I guess I should try it again without the substitutions before I give up.
I'm concerned that the instructions for mixing with the stand mixer might not translate to hand kneading. Have you had any experience with the recipes in The Rye Baker?
I have had much success with the breads in Whole Grain Breads. I have given some thought to converting this recipe to the biga/soaker procedure if I can't get it to work as written.
"I have given some thought to converting this recipe to the biga/soaker procedure if I can't get it to work as written."
That's a good idea, try it as written first, no substitutuons unless absolutely needed, such as mixing/kneading by hand since you don't have a mixer.
Btw, muffins are more "forgiving" than bread, which is why a substitution that works for muffins does not necessarily carry over to yeasted bread.
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Another common tripping-up point that I've seen here on TFL is new bakers combining systems from two different authors before they do a formula as written.
Any given author's _system_ is designed and tested to be internally consistent with itself. When novice bakers mix systems from different authors, they run the risk of breaking the internal consistency... ingredients or procedures that depend on each other.
Another way of saying it is: erroneous (or false) equivalents. What a novice thinks is an equivalent may not really be a true equivalent. Or, even harder to understand, is that something may be an equivalent in one system, but not an equivalent in another system.
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An example is when I violated my own rule making Josey Baker's nut and seed bread without psyllium. I dislike psyllium, so I substituted other stuff. But psyllium was a key ingredient. So I finally had to make it with psyllium just so I could see and experience how it felt when wet, and how it was _supposed to_ turn out after baking.
Good luck, and bon appétit.
Thank you for taking the time to respond. Yes, I should have known better. In my career as a synthetic chemist, I almost always would perform a new procedure as written, unless there were safety issues that had to be addressed. I tried to adhere as much as possible to the rye bread recipe, but, like your feelings about psyllium, I do not care for regular yogurt, full fat or otherwise. I forgot about the acid whey that is drained off yogurt to make the Greek version and I suspect that lack of acidity (as @harum mentioned) led to the failure of the loaf. Out of curiosity, I searched for lactic acid concentration in acid whey and found that the amount is small but it probably was enough to change the pH of the dough and allow the rye chew on itself.
What is your recommendation for hand kneading compared to the stand mixer? Double the amount? Or just try for windowpane? I do find windowpane a little harder to interpret with 100% whole grain doughs.
Thanks!
I've never gotten a good windowpane with high % whole grain bread.
I don't even know if it's possible with a 50% rye bread. And the "dark rye" portion has little endosperm anyway.
What does the book say about windowpane for this formula ?
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So I'm not sure what to recommend about kneading. Someone on TFL likely has a rule of thumb to convert times and RPMs on a mixer to kneading. One fold/turn by hand might be equal to "X" revolutions of a dough hook. But what it is, I dunno.
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Adding a little moisture makes kneading easier. And it sounds like your dough was a bit under-hydrated anyway.
Adjusting water is a very common thing as everyone's flour is a little different in terms of moisture content due to transport and storage conditions.
I have been able to achieve a windowpane with recipes in Whole Grain Breads. I know its not the same as a white flour windowpane, but I can more or less match Reinhart's picture of a whole grain windowpane following his instructions.
One of the shortcomings (for me anyway) of The Rye Baker is that it seems to be written for more advanced bakers. For example, the instructions for the Yogurt Rye state to mix at low speed (KA2) until the dough cleans the side of the bowl, 8–10 minutes. If I am hand-mixing and kneading I have no idea what my target is. I like rye breads and the recipes in the book sound delicious, but if I have to buy a KitchenAid to make them, then I guess I'll put the book back on the shelf to collect dust. And make rye breads found in other books. I want to learn how to make these breads but without instructions for the less-experienced baker, I will not be able advance my skills. That is why I was hesitant to buy the book in the first place.
When I was an inexperienced undergraduate chemistry student, I repeated a procedure in a publication that was meant for novices and experts alike. The procedures had been checked by an independent lab before publication and were written in a detailed step wise manner. I was able to obtain essentially the same result as was published and learned new skills in the process. That's why I think Reinhart's WGB is a superior cookbook; it has taught me new skills while producing good breads.
Reinhart does have a good rep on TFL as an excellent teacher, above the other bread authors. Hamelman comes close.
I think if you make a Forum post with the question on how "clear the side of the bowl" translates to hand-kneading, there will be people who chime in with a decent enough description. Maybe do a site-search to see if it has been addressed.
I hand mix and hand knead in a metal bowl, so to me, it directly translates as the same thing. But word-crafting is not my strong suit.
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If Ginsberg doesn't mention windowpane, then there is likely no need for it in that formula -- unless it is somewhere in the intro and he says to apply it to all formulas.
User "Mini Oven" is our current rye expert. I'll invite her to this thread.
I don't want to distract from the thread, just to say I really want to like Reinhart's work, but for some reason I'm not too smitten. I much prefer Hamelman (above all others in my collection, actually - the "teaching" books, though not a tight definition).
I am an eternal "cross-pollinator" as you describe above, though I'm equally monomaniacal about "mastering fundamentals," which would suggest just such an approach as you lay out excellently well above. Don't need to venture off to Reinhart again right now, but based on his rep here I know I must come back to him again with a sustained focus.
Great post.
Thanks for the input. I have Hamelman’s Bread on my wishlist; I’m hoping I can find a copy on sale. I might be able to request it from my library on interlibrary loan. So far, I am partial to Reinhart for whole grain breads. The recipes in WGB have been nearly bulletproof for me. After many years not baking bread, when I resumed, I wanted to bake with whole grain. I started with some recipes from King Arthur Baking and then Laurel’s Kitchen Bread Book. I had not made a truly satisfactory 100% whole grain bread until I got Reinhart’s WGB.
In greek yogurt most of the whey, which is the only source of lactic acid in this recipe, is removed by straining. Could this 50% rye/50% ww recipe be improved by more whey, more salt, and longer fermentation at warmer temperatures? Or use one third of the whole wheat for poolish?
Thank you for taking the time to respond. I forgot about the acid whey that is drained off yogurt to make the Greek version and I suspect that lack of acidity led to the failure of the loaf. Out of curiosity, I searched for lactic acid concentration in acid whey and found that the amount is small but it probably was enough to change the pH of the dough and allow the rye chew on itself.
Assuming yoghurt's water content is 85%, the hydration amounts to 75%. That's not terribly high for whole grain bread. The seeds absorb some of that as well. There's not enough water for the yeast to do its thing. I would suggest pushing hydration up to about 85%.
I've only made his Danish Rye bread so far and it was seriously underhydrated as well.
It did seem a little dry when I was mixing and kneading. I even added a small amount of water during kneading. When I try this again with regular yogurt, I'll keep an eye on the hydration.
you could bump the hydration all the way to 100% or even more. That way you won't have to knead it at all. Just make a batter (basically) and dump it into the pan.
I personally have been often frustrated by the fact that many of the recipes in this book do not have photos: for me (and I would expect also for most of the target audience), the majority of the breads are unfamiliar, and without a photo it is much harder to know how it "should" turn out.
To maybe partially address your question about mixing by hand: I recently baked the Munster Country Boule from the same book. The bread has the similarity of being a roughly 50/50 wheat/rye bread using primarily dairy for the liquid. That said, there are many differences: the recipe uses lighter flours (AP wheat, light/medium rye) and a large amount of buttermilk as the only liquid (100% !), and both a sourdough and instant yeast are used.
However, it is still a 50/50 wheat/rye mix, which I attempted to mix by hand. I found it much more difficult than either pure rye or pure wheat: the viscosity of the rye made it difficult to develop the gluten, but there was not enough gluten strength to handle the dough with kneading techniques I would normally use for a wheat bread. I ended up vigorously stirring with a sturdy spoon, to try to mimic a mixer to some extent and develop the gluten a little bit. It was a workout!
I also found the bread difficult and sticky to shape, much more the character of shaping a rye loaf than wheat, but in the end I was happy with how it turned out and the crumb was not too closed, see pics below.
So: a stand mixer is not strictly necessary to bake the breads in that book.
That said, an easier place to start might actually be one of the 100% rye recipes: because no gluten development is needed, you just need to make sure everything is fully hydrated, no worrying about kneading!
Hi MikeV, your images are not displayed. I am interested in seeing what some of these loaves look like.
I found it hard to mix the dough with a spoon by hand and switched to kneading in the last bit of flour that remained in the bowl. Then I kneaded for about 8–10 minutes, let it rest for 5, then kneaded for another 5 minutes or so. I could not really tell if I had kneaded enough; the windowpane was kind of inconclusive with all that bran, but the dough seemed to have some elasticity. I am planning on trying some of the 100% rye recipes (Westphalian Pumpernickel) so no kneading there. I would have preferred if there were instructions for bakers that don't have (and don't want) a KitchenAid. I commend Peter Reinhart for having instructions for both methods in Whole Grain Breads.
I also have found the instruction for preparing the rye sour culture a little confusing in The Rye Baker. The build phase of the prep makes sense, but the maintenance is where I get fuzzy. I realize the book may have been written for more advanced bakers, but other authors have included instructions for those of us that are less seasoned.
Hi alcophile,
Whoops, new to trying to post pictures on the forum, let's see if it works this time:
Sounds like we share similar frustrations with the book: being a novice baker, I find it a nice source of inspiration, but really difficult to learn how to bake rye bread from. He showcases rye breads at their most diverse and complex - meaning many recipes have something "unusual" about the ingredients or the preparation, and that there is no unifying "system." Not good beginner material!
As an alternative I started looking into more German-language baking information - they are enthusiastic home rye bakers and there is a lot of information on the internet. (There are also very nice German baking books for beginners, though these are of course harder to use with Google Translate). This is an example of a "no-nonsense, just rye flour" recipe that I like a lot:
https://www.ploetzblog.de/2019/10/19/jacobsbrot/
Regarding the rye sour: just follow any wheat sourdough starter recipe (@ 100% hydration) using rye flour instead (or seed a culture from your wheat starter if you have one already). My personal experience is a rye starter is less "fussy" than wheat in terms of feeding times and the "window" in which they are OK to use.
Cheers,
Mike
Both I and a few others here really like Rus Brot for rye bread recipes (search on youtube). A lot of them are not simple, but the results are consistently excellent, and he provides very detailed video instructions. Just another source to explore.
(A lot of recipes are in Russian, but he has a separate playlist with English subtitles/descriptions)
Hi MikeV,
I would say your loaf is indistinguishable from the picture in the book. Very nice! I, too, have had some frustration posting images on this forum, but I appreciate the advice I receive.
I went to the German site you suggested. It brings back memories of reading German scientific literature with "recipes" to make chemicals. Even though my German was basic, I learned enough of the specialized words to repeat procedures. I feel that way about this site—I could probably manage once I knew the baking terms.
Thank you for the advice on the rye sour. The build instructions in The Rye Baker are clear but I'm still trying to understand the maintenance refresh. The initial culture after 7 days is about 210 g. For the maintenance refresh, is only 7 g of the initial culture used and the rest discarded? Is this done every time it is used? That seems like a waste. How have you approached this step of the maintenance?
Thanks!
I've been bread baking for about a year now and at first The Rye Baker's instructions seemed way too complicated. But as I've gotten used to using rye, his formulas have started to make sense. I don't iwn the book, but I've baked a number of recipes off the blog and they've been lovely.
Rye is a whole different concept than wheat -- so, for instance, pulling a windowpane on a 100% rye dough is pretty much futile. Go ahead and try and see if it tells you anything. I dare you.
Also, I don't own a mixer, so I make all my breads by hand. Any dough that's more than about 30% rye is gonna be sticky. I don't mind getting my hands coated with paste. Most rye doughs will ultimately come together and get kind of smoothe-- but it's taken me a full year to begin to understand them with my hands.
The bread that convinced me was the Rye Baker's sourdough Auvergne rye: http://theryebaker.com/sourdough-tourte-de-seigle/ My version came out looking just like the photo in the post, and tasted excellent.
Regarding starter, I made mine through a combo of the methods outlined by Tartine Bread Experience and The Perfect Loaf. It's taken about six months to begin to understand the starter. I generally use a little more starter than most recipes call for bc I'm sharing my bread with someone who dislikes overly sour loaves and I've found, counterintuitively, that more starter yields less sour.
The important thing is to keep baking -- which is the only way to learn -- and to keep reading the blog posts on The Fresh Loaf that give you the most inspiration. This site rocks.
Rob
Nice suggestion Rob, in fact the Plötzblog recipe I linked above is quite similar to this recipe - just rye flour, water and salt leavened with a 2-stage sourdough. Both seem like a good starting place to get a feel for how rye works, before starting to also worry about dairy, seeds or other "fancy" ingredients/preparation steps.
There are many different strategies for sourdough culture maintenance, lots of info on this forum as well as on other sites/in books.
Personally: now that my starter is well-established, to minimize waste I keep it in a small jar at room temperature and feed it 10g whole rye flour + 10g water daily. (Each feeding time I discard everything except "leftover bits" at bottom of the jar). I store up the discard in the fridge and eventually use it in pancakes. It works for me.
Diving into rye breads from wheaten breads involves a certain amount of cognitive dissonance. There's quite a bit that we take for granted with wheat-based breads that simply doesn't fly with rye breads; especially as the rye content heads north of 50% of the flour in the bread. Windowpanes, for example, are pretty much out the window. Rye just doesn't play that way. "Fluffy" and "open" don't show up very often when describing rye loaves or crumb. "Brick", on the other hand, is a pretty common descriptor; all the more so as the rye content approaches 100%. You'll also see "dense" used quite often.
The best thing you can do when working with rye breads is to treat them as rye breads; i.e., set aside what you know about wheaten breads. Rye is to wheat what cats are to dogs; an entirely different animal with entirely different behaviors.
Given your ingredient and process departures from the recipe in the book, I'd say you achieved a very predictable outcome. And, frankly, that's not a bad looking loaf of bread, considering its 50% rye content and considering that you did not allow it to ferment as much as required.
When you try it next, use the specified ingredients and allow it to achieve the prescribed degree of fermentation. Let the dough expand to double its original volume during bulk fermentation, even if it takes longer than the estimated duration mentioned in the recipe. After shaping, let the dough rise again to match the recipe's description, even if it takes longer than estimated. The finished bread will be airier and have a more open crumb than this bake.
Best of luck as you navigate further into the world of rye bread.
Paul
Thank you for taking the time to respond.
I'll have to take off my cowboy hat and put my production chemist uniform back on. I should have used the recipe as written the first time. I was overconfident in my abilities and have been chastened by the requirements of rye.
I'll have to start the recipe earlier in the day. I started this one in the late afternoon and the bread had to go in the oven at a reasonable hour. However, the dough seemed to have stalled in the bulk fermentation after 2 hours and certainly during the proof. I saw essentially no change after 1.5 hour in the proof. Both fermentation and proof were at room temperature (70 °F) as per the recipe. Is it possible that the yeast was exhausted or inhibited somehow?
Thanks!
Stan lists room temperature as 68-72F. Given his location east of San Diego, that's probably what he sees a lot of in his kitchen. Mine, in northern Michigan, runs cooler than that at least 6 months of the year. For the estimated times given in the recipe, I think that a 75F temperature for fermentation would be more appropriate. Or longer times at the given temperatures.
It's important to note that the recipe calls for 105F water, which will warm the dough. And there's a 10-15 minute sponge before the final mix. Both of those will give the yeast activity a boost.. Although the recipe doesn't mention it, allowing the yogurt to come to room temperature before using it in the recipe will also help.
What is your method for measuring the dough's expansion during fermentation? I've found that my Mk I Eyeball isn't nearly as well-calibrated as I would like, so using a container with some sort of volume or height markings is useful for determining how much the dough expands. I'm not sure why the dough stalled during your first attempt. My first guess is that the dough wasn't warm enough to move as quickly as you expected but that is only a guess. Given rye flour's makeup, I doubt that the yeast lacked for food, especially since the yeast is only 1%.
Paul
I can try a warmer temperature for the fermentation and proof. My oven with the light on is 80–85 °F. I allowed the yogurt to warm to room temperature before use and I made sure the water was 105 °F with a digital thermometer. There is not much water for the yeast and flour to make much of a sponge but I suppose it still gives it a boost.
The bulk fermentation was in a cylindrical 2-L Cambro container with markings. My iBall 1.0 is probably less accurate than your Mk I Eyeball, so I appreciate the calibration on the Cambro. I have more difficulty estimating the doubling in the proof in a pan. I try to use the finger poke method to the best of my abilities.
I did notice that the store-brand Greek yogurt I used came from a different dairy (USDA code) and it tastes different than before. It turns out that the previous yogurt was made at the Chobani plant in New York. That explains why I like it better than the new one made by a different dairy. I don't know if that made a difference to the yeast. I getting some regular yogurt to try again.
Thanks again for your helpful and informative advice.
After reading all the comments I think the problem is hydration. Too low. No temperatures are mentioned. That might also be helpful knowledge. I haven't made this recipe or played with it. I don't use vital gluten at all and it will throw your hydration off too as it absorbs a lot of water all by itself. I tend to avoid 50/50 wheat/rye recipes unless the wheat happens to be spelt and a sourdough starter is used. The added acid was probably a good idea since the yogurt was reduced. I can't speak to butter, haven't used it in a rye bread recipe yet to my knowledge. The brick looks pretty good from here, got another photo of a slice several days old?
Handmixing. That's my favorite with rye, and a very sturdy spatula (broken many handles) and stirring at first. As the dough gets thicker and more flour is incorporated, I end up using the spoon to fold the dough/paste over onto itself into the yet dry flour bits. You might need to sprinkle a little water in at this point. If you want to use your hands into this sticky stuff, get a bowl of water or put your tap on a fine drip and wet one hand first before touching the dough. Keep one hand dry for turning and holding the bowl (and keeping your sanity.). When the dough starts to get to lovey dovey sticking and clinging to you, wet it again. It doesn't take much moisture and it is one way to bring up the hydration. After getting good with kneading with one hand in the bowl, you could try with two hands alternating wetting hands when needed. But not really necessary to go 15 minutes. My dough is lucky if it gets more than three minutes. Windowpane? Never had one with 50% rye or higher. But I sometimes look for holes in the wall to fill. Nice puddy. With more moisture in the dough, you may get a final proof and some oven spring.
Hope this helps although you've gotten a lot of good advice so far.
Thank you Mini Oven for your suggestions. Here is a slice of bread from today. Still relatively moist thanks to the rye. There was no picture of the bread in the book, so I don't know if this is what I should have expected.
The mixing was difficult because the instructions were to add the liquids to all the flour in the bowl and stir with the KitchenAid. I gave up on hand stirring and kneaded the flour in by hand. This dough was never very sticky, so you are right about the hydration. Maybe I made an error in measuring. I'll give it another try.
Thanks!
You know, you gotta wonder about the provenance of this recipe. I mean, I can trace most of the Polish recipes he gives to my collection of books and generally they are a fairly faithful representation of the originals. This one one gives me a pause. On one hand the name is very generic - Chleb Mieszany means "mixed <flour> bread", and pinpointing a particular recipe is as difficult as finding a recipe for a particular German mischbrot. On the other hand, based on what I've read, I find it very, very hard to believe that the Polish would make a bread like that without sour.
I wondered about this recipe, too. I tried to find comparable recipes on the web and never found anything with yogurt. It didn't help that the book has a typo for the Polish translation (Misezany instead of Mieszany). I had thought this bread would be a easier introduction to the breads in The Rye Baker but I should have known better than to make any changes/substitutions to the recipe. That's on me.
The yougurt part may have been derived from sour milk, but I think you will find that breads of this sort are still sourdough-leavened unless rye flour they use is white.
1. just to say, your 'problem' loaf looks pretty good inside. Most higher %age ryes are not gonna feature big oven spring or super-lofty crumbs.
2. I looked up a bunch of chleb mieszany recipes on the web and used google to translate the ingredient lists. All the ones I checked seem to be made with instant yeast as the leaven and no sourdough. None of them were more than 50% rye and some were far less.
3. pmccool and mini oven are among the many folks on TFL whose posts have most inspired me. thanks for sharing your wisdom.
The bread is pretty good, but I had expected a more open crumb based on the recipe stating that the dough should rise well above the rim of the pan. I'll find out next time when I'm more careful with the recipe.
Thanks for your advice on the Polish recipes. I wonder if there are any Slovak rye recipes out there on the web.
Yes, it's a thing.
https://duckduckgo.com/?q=slovakian+rye+bread&t=fpas&ia=web
The problem with searches like this is that it very hard to discern what is an authentic cultural tradition and what is a recipe from a bag of flour which was lifted from "My new super-revolutionary method of baking every bread from one dough, quickly and with no effort at all. Now with bread maker chapters".
I agree with your assessment. I looked at a few of the recipes from my search and most of them were just variants on a white flour loaf with some rye in it. I have a cookbook published by my childhood Slovak parish that has few breads in it, and all are white breads. The bread recipes were probably Americanized to use the readily available white flour. Or were they? Maybe white breads were more common in Slovakia. I'll have to dig some more.
Now, the recipes for poppy seed or nut roll, bobalky (honey syrup soaked ground poppy seeds over small baked bread balls), and roshky (cream cheese pastry crescents filled with sweetened ground walnuts or apricot marmalade) that are in the Slovak cookbook I believe are more authentic.
... this Bohemian rye from TheRyeBaker blog -- http://theryebaker.com/bohemian-forest-bread-bohmerwaldbrot-austria-bavaria-czech-republic/ -- might fit the bill.
I made it last night and the flavor is immense. If you go to the site, you'll see in the comments that I screwed up the hydration. I added all the soaker water, which brought the hydration to more than 100%. So the structure was messed up, the loaves frisbeed during the very short final proof and the crumb, though nice and open, is also wet and slightly gummy.
Baking is learning.
I'll have to keep the Bohemian Forest Bread in mind once I make a rye sour culture. The Rye Baker also has a Zakopane Buttermilk Rye that is said to be from the area of Poland near the border with Slovakia. I need to get some white rye flour for that one.
Yes, baking is definitely learning. But it's also fun!
Pmccool and Ilya are going on my "rye experts list" with Mini Oven. :-)
Thanks, that's flattering, but I am certainly not there yet - maybe expert at eating rye bread, but not yet at baking rye or any other bread :)
put you in the expert category, IMO.
https://www.thefreshloaf.com/node/67567/1940-borodinsky
Thank you - I attribute the success with that bread to the great and detailed recipe from Rus Brot, I am sure you or really anyone with the right flours and equipment can replicate it easily.
I found a video of Stan giving a presentation on rye (in general, not a particular formula) at a bread symposium conducted by Peter Reinhart at Johnson & Wales Univeristy (where Peter teaches.)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QuOv-v8h1L0
Stan Ginsberg's first book, Inside the Jewish Bakery, is out of print. New copies are not to be found on Amazon, not even from third party sellers. Used copies have an asking price of $100. I have not checked Ebay or Abe Books.
ITJB is available in Kindle format, but not as a whole. It is $2.99 per chapter or section.
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Amazon is out of stock of The Rye Baker, in hard-copy. New copies are available from third party sellers. New and used copies are selling for $30 and up by Amazon third party sellers. I haven't checked Ebay or Abe books.
The Kindle edition of The Rye Baker, the whole book, is $19.99. I have not seen it discounted, as I have seen bread cookbooks from other publishers/authors.
I did get the rye section of ITJB and there are some interesting recipes in it.
My colleagues and I in a chemical production lab had an understanding that after a batch failure, the chemist would repeat the batch after determining where the problem occurred. This would be part of the learning experience and was jokingly called a “redemption batch.”
With that in mind, I made my redemption batch of the Chleb Mieszany (Yogurt Rye) in The Rye Baker. I tried to follow the recipe as carefully as possible. Whole milk yogurt was used (warmed to 70 °F) and vital wheat gluten, butter, and ascorbic acid were eliminated. All measurements and temperatures were confirmed right before use. The only small change I made was to hold back some of the whole wheat flour so I could knead it in by hand (10 minutes). This also slightly raised the hydration to 83% in response to several of the comments.
The dough doubled in 3 hours at 78 °F (twice as long and warmer than indicated) during the bulk fermentation. Shaping the dough into a loaf was still difficult with some tears in the surface. The final proof was at 78 °F for 1.5 hours and 70 °F for 0.5 hours during oven preheat (recipe: 1–1.5 hours). The change in size of the dough during the final proof was imperceptible; allowing additional time for more rise would have been unproductive.
The final loaf is essentially the same as my prior effort. I think my expectations for the bread are incorrect or I’m still missing something in executing the recipe. The crumb is moist and tender as stated in the recipe, but I think it would be difficult to use the bread for a BLT as the author suggests. It would be a very small sandwich.
Yeah, that still looks pretty dense.
My recent 80% rye bread showed more rise in the final fermentation. Granted, it only had a 30-minute bulk fermentation, so expansion was more likely during final ferment.
Still, this bread has 50% wheat, or nearly so. I would have anticipated more expansion and a more open crumb, even allowing for the whole grain and more-than-whole-grain (dark rye) levels of bran in the flours. I'm now wondering if the instruction to let the dough double during bulk ferment has the unintended effect of limiting the dough's ability to expand in the final ferment. A mischbrot like this is not going to have as much gas-trapping capacity as an all-wheat dough and it is possible that shaping after doubling in bulk may disrupt the alveoli enough that compromise the structure. All supposition at this point but it does make me wonder.
All and all, it is still a lovely bread. Not sure about it's BLT worthiness but I'd be happy to give it a shot.
Paul
Thank you for your comment. Your supposition may be correct about the dough structure. After the bulk fermentation, I degassed the dough using the technique (rounding) described in Laurel’s Kitchen Bread Book. The recipe says to knead it back to its original volume. I let it rest for 10–15 minutes and shaped into a loaf. The dough structure at this point seemed weak and the dough tended to tear while forming the loaf. Maybe I should have used a different method for pre-shaping and shaping.
I have made the Rye Meteil and Limpa from Reinhart’s WGB (60/40 whole wheat/rye) and KAB’s Russian Black Bread (modified to use 46/40/14 bread flour/rye/whole wheat), and all rose better than this loaf did. I didn’t think moving to 50% rye would affect the dough as much as it did. Maybe the dark rye has more of an effect than I anticipated; I am tempted to give it the WGB epoxy treatment to see if the result is the same.
As you said, it is still a lovely bread
.
"After the bulk fermentation, I degassed the dough using the technique (rounding) described in Laurel’s Kitchen Bread Book. The recipe says to knead it back to its original volume. I let it rest for 10–15 minutes and shaped into a loaf. The dough structure at this point seemed weak and the dough tended to tear while forming the loaf. Maybe I should have used a different method for pre-shaping and shaping."
There's a possible source of the conundrum -- mixing/substituting techniques from differrent bakers. That can be as tricky as ingredient subsitutions -- not exact enough equivalents.
For example, in one of Forkish's formulas, he calls for a large proportion (80%) well-developed biga in which much of the gluten has been formed, and to use the "pincer" method to combine it into the final dough. However, a vigorous "Rubaud" mix at that point would undo/break-up the gluten in the biga.
Thank you, idaveindy for your response. At location 1255 in the Kindle edition of The Rye Baker, the author says:
"I degas my doughs as much as possible by hand-kneading them back to their original volume."
There is no other information given in the instruction as to time or dough consistency. If you are familiar with Laurel’s rounding technique, would you hazard a guess that it is more or less vigorous than what Ginsberg describes? The dough was back to its original volume after the rounding.
I found one online reference to another attempt at this recipe:
https://www.instagram.com/p/BcQPepslKD9/
There is no photo of the crumb, but judging from the loft of the loaf in the pan, it does not look too different from my effort. Maybe my loaf is the expected outcome? I have also uploaded another photo of the crumb in response to Mini Oven’s request (see below). It gives a much better view of the crumb.
Thanks again!
I just now skimmed pages 50-53 of LKBB.
It's hard for me to say how much that differs from Ginsberg's handling.
I hope Mini or others can get a "reading" on your new crumb photo and make more suggestions.
It could be as simple as adjusting the yogurt and water some.
I've tried a few bread recipes with large amounts of yoghurt, buttermilk or quark. It sounds like a nice wholesome idea, but I always found the results to be disappointing and I don't bother with such recipes now.
I'm sure the odd tablespoon or two is fine, but no more (and of course buttermilk is fine in soda bread).
Lance
How much is a lot? Hamelman's quarkbrot has 15% quark and it comes out fine. I used up to 20% of sour cream with a pleasant outcome.
Well, the recipe in contention has 52% and that sounds like a lot to me! At a guess, I would say everything is clogged up with milk proteins.
Lance
I think that's a good guess. Yogurt formulations vary a lot by brand.
My second guess would be normal hydration adjustments are needed to account for moisture in the flour used being different from what Ginsberg used.
Rye being a different animal, a beginning rye baker, even with lots of experience with wheat, is up against a new learning curve. There's a different consistency, so a different feel as you make the normal water adjustments.
Could be there is too little dough for the pan or a narrow pan might make the difference.
I caution letting the dough double during the bulk rise. Your description of shaping leads me to believe the bulk has gone too far. The dough should still feel as one and not cracking open. The feel of the dough....I sometimes compare it to soft raw hamburger or ground meat if that helps. A narrow pan helps support the sides while the dough rises and cools.
There is a nice dome on the loaf so some rising has been going on. After shaping, I would expect current volume (let's call it 2/3) to increase about a third (add 1/3 to make a whole) before baking. Anything above is more than expected.
I also caution about increasing the yeast amount should it cross your mind. A slower rise gives more volume with rye. If it rises too fast, the dough matrix cracks and leaks gas. Maybe reducing or check to make sure your yeast is not too powerful.
Tip: Save a slice or two of this bread (freeze) for the next loaf and crumble into the dough while mixing adding maybe a tablespoon of water for each slice. Slice(s) can be soaked in a little bit of water and wrung out like a sponge saving the water as part of the recipe water. That is about all the adjustments needed as a bread slice is balanced. Toasting ahead of soaking will add more flavour. The idea of addin "altus" is to give a little more supporting structure to the rising dough that can help trap gas, so key is fine crumble and not obliterate or puree.
Thank you Mini Oven for responding.
I used a 9" × 4" Pullman pan for both loaves. The recipe states to use an 8.5" × 4.5" pan. but I prefer the square shape of the Pullman pan for sandwiches loaves. The surface area of the bottom is slightly smaller with the Pullman pan and that should work in favor of supporting the dough.
I hadn't thought of adding any more yeast as I figured the slow rise was important for flavor. I had not thought about the dough matrix but that makes sense with rye. The altus sounds like a good idea. By toasting, do you mean dried out or just toasted with a toaster?
This recipe is going back in line as I have other other breads up next. But I will keep all your suggestions for the next loaf.
Thanks!
with a toaster. :)
A simple question.....how are you cutting the bread in the photos?
The knife is finely serrated, but it is not an expensive bread knife.
This loaf is a little more moist than the last; I think there might be a slight amount of smearing occurring but the knife is clean.
a very sharp thin one. :)
Might make seeing the crumb easier with a heavy crumb. (You don't have to worry about squashing it.)
I cut another slice with my 8" Henckels knife. It does produce a much better view of the crumb and I can slice it much thinner than with the other knife.
Seeing this photo of the crumb makes me think that maybe the bread is not that bad after all.
Thanks for the suggestion on knife selection.
It does look a bit moist around the inside margins so I would add another 5 minutes to the bake. :)
If I wanted a square slice I would increase the amount of dough. Try multiplying everything by 1.4
Hi,
I got this book from the library and will bake this loaf tomorrow. I will show you my results.
From what I read in the book, Stan uses his mixer for every recipe, he doesn't provide instructions for hand mixing and kneading. He says
Of course, you can do everything by hand, I just don't know how, and you would definitely have to wear gloves - it's a sticky, gluey mess that you have to work with. You would have to experiment: maybe initially mixing and kneading a stiffer piece of dough by hand or with the help of a rolling pin to develop gluten, and later add the remaining water to achieve softer final dough consistency. That would work. I usually knead anything with rye in a mixer.
Your formula seems to be OK with the only exception of wheat flour. It should comprise full 50% with or without vital gluten added.
Your crumb does look a bit dense with tiny pores. I don't know if you didn't activate your instant yeast in a hot flour&sugar slurry (is it instant yeast or compressed yeast that you used for this bread? your formula simply says 'yeast') or that your bread dough simply didn't have enough water in it.
Bloom and activate yeast for 15 min at 105F/41C and add more water to dough, as much water as necessary to obtain soft dough that easily doubles in volume in about an hour even in a cold (68F/20C) kitchen. It's a sandwich loaf with soft and moist (tender) crumb, and crispy hard crust its dough should be fairly soft and gluten - developed.
For this particular bread the dough initially should be so soft that it only comes together and stops sticking to hands, table and dough mixer walls after 10 min of kneading in a mixer with gluten being fairly well developed by that point.
This is how 50% whole rye 50% whole wheat looks by the end of kneading:
Wow, that’s going above and beyond the call of duty! I really appreciate your effort.
I used SAF Red instant yeast in the recipe; I should have specified. I made sure the water was at the correct temperature for the slurry. I did not find the dough as written to be very sticky. It was manageable in the bowl and while hand kneading with only a little scraping of hands and bench. It was not anything like the picture you show of the 50/50 wheat/rye dough. I think you’re right that more water may be necessary, but the finished loaf is moist. I wish there had been a picture of the finished bread in the book for comparison. It may be that the bread I baked is the intended outcome.
Thanks!
Maybe you are right. Maybe your bread is the intended outcome.
After all, there are no national yogurt-based bread recipes in Poland, nor dark rye flour is milled there, it is unique, a North American phenomenon, and they don't have 8.5x4.5 bread pans, so common in North America, their pans and bread loaves have completely different shapes and sizes. It's some North American recipe, maybe from ethnic Poles in the US, who knows. Or maybe he suggested yogurt instead of Polish maślanka (Polish buttermilk which is much more watery than yogurt and rich in special lecithin abundant milk fats which make bread super tender and tall) and instead of whole rye suggested medium+dark rye blend. Who knows. There is no story behind that loaf, we don't know anything about it and Google is silent about anything Polish resembling its formula, yet there are tons of Polish breads with whole rye - wheat blends, sunflower seeds and maślanka.
I am sure it's a tasty bread, why else would it find its way into this book of great rye breads?
I only mentioned the dough consistency, which should be adjusted if our flour needs more water, because he writes about it himself: use the dough hook, mix until the dough cleans the sides of the bowl, 8-10min. It means that before "8-10 min" moment it is a weak, flowing and soupy dough, sticky as mud. And he says in the introductory part of the book:
He indicates water for his flour which might be moister, sweeter, and with lower gluten content than ours and requires less water.
I will bake it tomorrow and see how it tastes and looks, what gives. I will probably use 9x4 pullman pan, just like you, because there is no way that over 2 lbs of dough will fit in a small and shallow 8.5x4.5 pan. Thanks for inspiration!
Now I'm curious about maślanka. Is it available in the US? I don't like regular buttermilk from the grocery, but I love kefir. Is maślanka more similar to American buttermilk or kefir? I've seriously thought about using some kefir in a bread instead of buttermilk, but I'm not sure the substitution would work.
I wonder if using an 8.5″ × 4.5″ pan as specified would satisfy "the dough rises well above the rim of the pan" condition of the recipe. Maybe that much dough would fill the pan and it would not need to rise much to go over the rim.
I look forward to seeing your bread.
Maybe in some Polish grocery stores? I live in Toronto's West end, here we have dozens of Polish grocery stores and people of Polish descent, so we have it even in regular grocery stores. We have authentic Polish breads, imported Polish flours, both rye and wheat, high fat Polish butters, everything. Even Polish yeast!
Yes, anything but yogurt would work, any cultured or clabbered milk, or soured milk whey (liquid left after straining Greek yogurt), kefir as well, especially homemade.
The point I am trying to make is that yogurt is made from evaporated milk: milk is boiled until reduced in half and then soured, or from milk with dry milk solids added to it, whereas maslanka has less milk solids than milk itself, it's thinner and has more water available to moisten flour. In yogurt too much water is tied up to moisten and swell milk protein and other milk solids, so little free water is available to moisten flour. That is why you would need more yogurt than simple milk or kefir to obtain soft dough.
Another point is that real buttermilk and maslanka made from it (maslanka is a cultured buttermilk) has lecithin in it, which is a serious bread improver. It softens bread crumb considerably and improves bread keeping qualities.
I wanted to bake today, but I didn't have sunflower seeds. Now I got them, so tomorrow I will bake a loaf. It's a very simple recipe: a small sponge, a one hour dough, then degas, shape, proof and bake. There is a lot of yeast in it, 150% more than in baguette dough for example, so I expect a fluffy loaf.
You’re lucky to have all those items available to you in the grocery. I have not seen maślanka in our markets here. I live close to Chicago, home of one of the largest Polish populations in the US. But not close enough.
So, I made it, more or less following the recipe.
In baking %:
50% whole rye
50% whole wheat
1% IDY
1.3% salt
1.3% sugar
50% yogurt
38% water
some sunflower seeds
Notes: I used whole rye, because it made more sense. I used plain whole milk yogurt, basically, I looked for a jar which had a single ingredient - cultured milk. I totally ignored mixing instructions, and mixed it as I would a rye bread, to a paste. Why? Because I knew i would work, and I did not want to run the mixer. I added water to what I felt is the right dough consistency, erring on the side of caution. Fermentation times were spot on - 90 min, and 60 min. I baked at 420 F. Overall, it came out about as I would expect it to. I found it to be ok, pretty good actually, considering the fact that it's a quick yeasted bread, but it's not really all that remarkable.
Your bread could not look more different than my two loaves. What a difference the higher hydration and the whole rye flour make! I wonder if just the higher hydration with the medium/dark rye flours would give a similar result; the dark rye certainly has a lot of bran in it. Maybe it just needed more water. I assume the crumb was moist and tender as described in the recipe?
The crumb is not really all that moist, but I may have baked it a bit too long. It is very tender, and falls apart in your mouth, more than anything else it feels like a bran muffin - it has this very ditinct feel of wheat bran that I do not care much for. If I were to do it again I'd probably set an overnight sponge with whole wheat.
This is what I got.
Beginning and end of 1 hr proof at room temp.
I maintained dough temp at 20C/68F throughout the process, as Stan recommends, to see if it would actually work. And yes, it doubled in approximately one hour both times, during bulk and during proof. Normally, I would ferment rye at 35C.
Baked loaf
shape of slices
I increased water about 100g more to make a normal consistency dough and kneaded it to develop some of gluten: 250g whole wheat all-purpose flour, 125g medium rye, 125g dark rye blend.
I increased salt from 6 to 7g to make it taste less watery. Still, it shows that it is a 50% rye, the crumb was soft and tender, muffin-like, melt in your mouth moist and soft crumb. I agree that it is suitable for sandwiches, because on its own it's a very mild tasting bread, maybe even more salt would help, but I would also like it to be a tad more sour.
I think I will modify it a little bit next time. I will use yogurt-rye mix portion of its formula to make a 24hr blitz sourdough starter from scratch and then proceed with the remaining part of the recipe as written. The whole process took me 5 hours from start to finish. So, I started at noon and by dinnertime we had a loaf of fresh bread.
Yippee
That is a beautiful looking loaf. I really appreciate your effort to help me understand where I might have gone wrong on my loaf. The higher hydration makes a big difference in the behavior of this dough. On the second loaf I made, I started before noon and finished 7–8 hours later.
I’m intrigued by your 24 h blitz sourdough. Could you explain your method? I would also like a little more tang in the loaf.
Thanks!
Hi,
there are two ways of making a quick sourdough starter from scratch using yogurt, a one step method and a two-step method. Both methods make about 500g starter (200g flour, ~300g liquid).
One step method
(by Beatrice Ojakangas, published in Food Processor Bread Book)
1.5 cups flour (200g) - any flour would work, white or dark, wheat or rye.
1 pkg active dry yeast (7g)
1 cup warm milk (250g, 105-115F/41-46C)
1/2 cup yogurt (125g)
Bloom yeast in warm milk, add yogurt and flour. Blend and keep it at 86F/30C for 24-36hrs until it develops sour aroma. Stir occasionally.
When the starter is ready, you can use it all in the recipe or only a portion of it and keep the remaining starter refrigerated for the future use, feeding it at least once every two weeks with equal portions of flour and milk (like one cup of flour+1 cup of milk), keeping it at room temp until it foams (overnight) and then refrigerating it again.
Two-step rye sour method
(as done in Poland, the so called Berliner method - quick rye sour using sour whey)
step one
100g rye flour
5g sugar
145g sour whey.
Blend, keep it for 4 hrs at 100-104F/38-40C
step two
add
100g rye flour
5g sugar
145g sour whey
blend, keep for 15-20 hours at 95-105F/35-40C. It will be foaming by the 12 hour mark, then it will become flat by the end of 20hrs. Its pH will fall down to 4.0, its color changes from greenish gray to reddish-brown.
m.
I keep mine inside my programmable bread machine. It maintains rye sourdough steady at 91-95F/33-34C, which is the best for rye."
"Rise 3" of my Zo - consistent temperature every time, much better than the unreliable B&T proofer. Perfect temperature for CLAS, too!
Yippee
Isn't Rise3 limited to only two hours? You reset it that often? I use Rise1 for sourdough, because it holds temperature for 12hrs., so I reset it twice a day.
What is your sourdough temperature when you keep it in Rise3 mode? My booklet says 35C, but in reality it goes up to 40-42C which is perfect for CLAS and any other rye preferments, of course.
I thought about creating a program that links all three in a sequence R1+R2+R3, this way it would make the best rye sourdough, in 24hrs of fermentation creating temperature zones which are best for sourdough yeast and bacteria, from 27-32C for yeasts to 35-42C for LABs, but never got to test it.
B&T is ok if you place your sourdough jar right on the heated surface, in slow cook mode. Otherwise, in Proof mode, with dough sitting on one of the racks, it doesn't work for CLAS, I agree.
I tried making CLAS in B&T on the rack five times (!) and never succeeded. Until my friend from Alberta advised me to use slow cooking mode. She also makes CLAS and guys from B&T told her to do it that way because of the need to maintain 40C for a week non stop.
Also, my oven has PROOF setting, it is perfect for CLAS.
Hi, Mariana,
To clarify, I don't use the Zo to make CLAS. I use Instant Pot's yogurt function to do it. I follow Rus's recipe, which takes ~24-30 hours to complete the process. A week seems very long to make CLAS, but our recipes may differ.
Since I use CLAS and commercial yeast to make bread, I don't worry about not having a good yeast population. So, I use R3 for bulk and proof to drive the LAB to create flavor. The dough temp is usually 33C-ish to 35C. I've not detected 40C or above in the dough/on the outside of the bread pan when using R3. I like Zo's flexibility of having different temperature ranges to serve distinct purposes. BTW, My Zo's R1 can last 24 hours.
Yippee
P.S. When I don't feel like using the oven, I can manipulate Zo to bake a crusty loaf, but this requires my intervention and cannot be done automatically through programming.
Ah! OK then. Thank you, Yippee.
My Zo bakes for 90 min, if necessary, since Bake setting is also programmable. So no problem with crusty loaves either. Zojirushi bread machines are amazingly good.💖
with CLAS. Thank you, Mariana.
Yippee
This is the best website on the internet. Great looking bread Yippee (I'm sure it's delicious too), and such a beautiful thread with amazing collaboration.
I made this bread today as well, also improved, Yippee. Your bread is exemplary and your dough making technique is to die for.
I tested the recipe for a quick rye-yogurt sour that I quoted above and after 36hrs at 30C I refreshed a portion of it: 20g sour -80g dark rye - 120g water.
Kept it for 24 hrs at 30C in my Zojorushi and it developed into the most fragrant rye starter which I used in Chleb, as portion of its rye and water.
Thank you to all the Fresh Loaf members (Fresh Loafians?) for your advice for this recipe. I especially want to thank @suave and @mariana for baking loaves to determine the cause of my less than satisfactory results. Based on their experimental results, my conclusion is that the hydration was too low in my loaves. I’m sure my inexperience contributed some, but their loaves are markedly different than the result I obtained. I will have to revisit this recipe in the future.