So long as they taste good! I think the milk and a touch of bicarb in mine help keep them softer?
Yes. think I will try that. I see every part of Italy has a different version. Mine was heavy on olive oil and no milk, bicarbonate or yeast. Makes it hard to fold. There’s none left though!
This recipe is most similar to mine when one of my pals asked what they were. I use some of my bread making tips though - leaving it for 10 minutes after mixing and then giving it a good knead before I leave it for the 30 minutes they suggest.
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looks good to me. It reminds me I have not made nan bread for a while. must make some soon.
These posts have really inspired me to make some of these. The recipe says lard or olive oil. I imagine that the results would be quite different, but in what ways different? As it happens, I have some lard that I bought for Cornish pasties that never got made. Also could I use plain white flour or does it have to be strong bread flour?
Traditionally they were made with lard. I’ve never tried as I rarely have it to hand. I’ll be fascinated to see the results!
The entire cook and prep time is only about an hour so there’s minimal gluten development. I think you might well be ok with plain white flour.
The great thing is that you can size up or down the recipe and as it’s quick, there’s room to experiment.
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Now you have done it!! I now crave a chic chip cookie.
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Here’s today’s attempt at beer bread, straight out of the oven. Albeit not very straight. A bit squiffy looking really. This happened with my last (and first ever) attempt too. So this time I tried an almost Paul Hollywood recipe (I had to change some ingredients) and I’m relieved to see from the photo in his book that Paul’s looks a bit lopsided too. Though not as drunken as mine.
Today I used Guinness I had left over from last night’s beef carbonnade. Paul’s recipe called for dark brown sugar … I only had muscavado, but I guess that’s close enough. And I didn’t have any buttermilk but I had a 2 kg tub of mascarpone, which I had bought by accident. so I used the liquid from that, mixed with fresh milk. Now I read that if liquid starts to come out of mascarpone that means it’s gone off! So I’m a bit worried I’ll poison us.
Anyways, here’s mine and Paul Hollywood’s Stout Bread.
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Yoghurt is a great idea, though I mix the whey back in and use the whole thing. You probably already know this, but a great alternative for buttermilk is milk mixed with lemon juice (or vinegar) and left to stand for five minutes. I base it on one cup milk to 1 tbsp juice.
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I did know about the lemon juice thing - and I have some really nice lemons in the fridge - but I forgot about that! I just saw this huge tub of mascarpone and drained it off. Do you think it’s safe to eat? The mascarpone smells ok but has shrunk away from the sides of the tub. I don’t understand about the yoghurt. Is it just that my mascarpone has turned to yoghurt?
Sorry. Some time in the brief moment in reading your post and responding to it I replaced mascarpone with yoghurt. BTW… yoghurt is great for bread.
My rule of thumb with dairy products is if it looks okay and doesn’t smell bad, it is still good to eat. In fact better if you are cooking with it. If I threw out every tub of creme fraiche because it was past it’s date I’d be throwing out a lot.
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Do you know why my beer bread’s splitting like that? I don’t mean the cut in the top - I did that when I put it in the tin. I mean why the attempt of the top part to split away from the bottom part? It’s done that on both my attempts at beer bread, but it doesn’t happen on my other bread. It’s small comfort that something like that (though not as bad) happened to Paul Hollywood too.
I think that is supposed to be a sign of over proofing but I have never made beer bread…
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Sorry. No idea. I’ve of the opinion if it tastes good who cares. If I want perfection get someone else to do it.
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Thanks @starman and @Foresthillnick. I didn’t work it hard at all, just mixed it all together and shaped it. Put it in the tin and slashed the top, because it had done that same splitting thing when I made my only only beer bread attempt that I referred to and I thought cutting the top might help prevent it this time.
I only proofed it for about 30mins in a warm place, where it appeared to do nothing. But then I put it in a very hot oven for the first 10 min of baking and it shot up. I used 300ml of slightly warmed Guinness mixed with about 200ml of my milk/marscarpone “juice” mix, 2 teaspoons of bicarbonate of soda and 2 tablespoons of muscovado sugar. 1lb 2oz of wholemeal flour (which was all I had) and 6ish oz of plain white flour (not strong bread flour).
It’s better than my last attempt. Maybe I shouldn’t have the oven so hot to begin with.
I think yours look almost identical to Paul’s - the one in the book looks like it’s got a similar pattern in the corner. I’m rubbish at timings on yeast cookery as I primarily play with sourdough but 30 minutes with little work does feel like gluten might be under-developed so it can’t cope with the oven spring? Like Starman, I would work on the principle that if it tastes good, who cares how it looks!
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It’s actually not a yeast recipe as such, in that Paul’s recipe had no yeast other than the beer, plus bicarbonate of soda and buttermilk (in my case a buttermilk substitute).
Something similar happened with my previous attempt at beer bread and that time I didn’t add bicarb/buttermilk and I kneaded and proved it for a long time that time. Paul’s recipe says just to mix it all together, no kneading as such, and let it sit for 30 mins or you can put it straight into a very hot oven. So that’s what I did this time and it didn’t rise at all in that 30 mins.
I ate some since I last posted and it’s a nice flavour but I prefer my usual wholemeal. The crust on this is really tough and the bread heavy. I’ve had indigestion ever since!
I’ve made soda bread before and not had these problems.
Homemade bagels for the first time! They tasted AMAZING
Hope this isn’t too cheeky but would any Forest Hill bakers be up for sharing some sourdough starter, if I picked it up at a safe distance? Would be happy to do an exchange and bring you round a tomato seedling or similar. Let’s start a Forest Hill barter economy!
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I can give you some starter mate - I have mine out today so all I need do is to add a bit of flour to some and stick it in a pot…
I have a lot of seedlings so no exchange required!
By the way those bagels look excellent…
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