Abe's yeast water semolina bread, first try
Very rarely do I get excited enough by a recipe that I find myself making it at one of the earliest opportunities. But this semolina bread recipe from Abe was just too exciting a read to pass up on and I found myself making it the next night.
I didn't even have enough semolina or the proper kind, only 450g and this is the kind of 'wheat semolina' that I had to hand. So this is not a 'semola rimacinata' although it is finely ground I guess I must assume this is wholegrain and not sifted.
Next time I'll choose a more upright and smaller pan as think this ended up making too high a ratio of crust to interior, especially since semolina makes an extra crusty mouth shattering crust. Interior was lovely and soft and springy, must be from the great recipe.
This one needed a long bake - 72 minutes at 180°C (356°F) with the first 20 minutes under a foil tent. Perhaps some of this difference is because it wasn't a rimacinata? Took a long time to get darker even with 40 minutes out of the tin and even after the long bake it still ended up with a lighter coloured and thicker crust than Abe's pictures.
What a lovely bread for thick slices of mozzarella and salad! Great recipe Abe, thank you.
-Jon
That's a nice crumb Jon and if you use a pan that has more depth than length you'll get a taller oaf.
I don't think we used the same flour though. While semolina is often understood as durum it doesn't necessarily mean it is. Cream of wheat is the semolina from common wheat. So first of all does it say durum on the packet? And even if it is durum, semolina will give different results to re-milled semolina aka semola rimacinata. You had very nice results but rimacinata will be a game changer.
Glad you enjoyed the recipe. It is worth tracking down the right flour and repeating.
Edit: https://www.ubuy.za.com/product/7QRU6S-semola-di-grano-duro-rimacinata-semolina-flour-bag-all-natural-dough-for-fresh-pasta
All said since you didn't have semola rimacinata that is a wonderful bake Jon. As well if you had more dough or a smaller pan as you've identified you'd have a taller loaf as well. But that looks wonderful and probably tasted great. I'm thinking it is time for me to use some of my semola rimacinata I've had for a while now.
Benny
I love the brand of Rimacinata that Abe posted . I grind my durum from Breadtopia pretty fine but it’s a hard grain so can only get so fine. Not sure about the baking time and browning but that crumb is outstanding!
Lovely pale yellow color and nice crumb. Nice work! (I haven't seen Abe's bake yet but that will be my next stop.)
Semolina makes a nice bread, doesn't it? I recall a semolina CB a while back in which a lot of good bakers were extolling the virtues of semola rimacinata. There must be something to it.