Yearly Archives: 2011

April 3rd, 2011

Vierkorn-Joghurt-Brot

Vierkorn-Joghurt-BrotSlowly I bring the recipes on the blog up to date again. In the last two weeks I was extremely busy again so that I manage to bake bread and other things but did not have the time and energy to blog about it.

I work at the moment again fulltime on our paper like in last autumn, to add some data the referees asked for. And like always in life (or lab) if you working under time pressure something will not do the job as you planed it. That’s the bad thing when working with living plants. I am pretty sure that they giggle very meanly when I enter the lab! Zwinkerndes Smiley

And then there was also a bad cold, a broken fridge and the preparation of a talk I had to give. But this weekend I take a break from lab work and everything else is fine again, too and started to post all of the things I  bake.

The four grain yoghurt bread I bake last weekend. Due to a little spring cleaning in my grain storage it is loaded with healthy grains and tasty seeds. It has a nice dense crumb because of all the grains and has a nice nutty taste because of the roasted seeds. Continue reading

April 2nd, 2011

Korvapuustit – Finnish cinnamon rolls

Finnische ZimtbrötchenMy colleagues are the best colleagues in the world and so I protested when they claim that I would NEVER bake cinnamon rolls for them. That is just partly true, but in the last month I bring nut triangles or cookies for our morning coffee break. And so its been a really long time since I bring cinnamon rolls.

So I promised to better myself Zwinkerndes Smiley and looked at the internet for a interesting recipe. A recipe that hooked me directly is the one for Korvapuustit – a Finnish cinnamon roll with a very nice shape. And I like cinnamon rolls with a nice shape! They remind me of Hamburger Franzbrötchen, who knows, maybe they are distant relatives?

Because two of my colleagues are lactose intolerant I create a recipe without dairy, similar to my lactose free challah, but with an additional Water roux to make the rolls more fluffy.  And I included a for me  essential spice for Scandinavian cinnamon rolls: cardamom.

When you serve them still oven warm with a cup of coffee then everyone will be happy! Smiley Continue reading

March 26th, 2011

Cream puffs with raspberry cream filling

Windbeutel mit Himbeer-SahneA colleague of mine served at her birthday delicious cream puffs filled with raspberries. When she told me the recipe of the filling I realized that it is so simple that I did not need to write it down: Mashed raspberries folded under whipped cream.

On last Sunday afternoon I longed for a cup of coffee with some sweet treat. Luckily I found some frozen raspberries so I could bake some cream puffs with raspberry filling.

I posted the recipe for pâte a choux before and baked it since then often. This time I decided to bake the cream puffs a little bit bigger so I baked them a for a longer time.

Something I learned since I baked cream puffs for the first time is that the convection mode in the oven is really helpfull, especially when you open the oven a little bit to early and the puffs start to collapse. Then close the door  fast and switch on convection mode. That let them puff again and saved on of my batches! Continue reading

March 20th, 2011

Curd rolls

QuarkbrötchenLike Lutz I like to vary the basic recipe of the yoghurt sesame rolls very much. The Hazelnuts rolls were my first variation and a very delicious one!

When my mum asked me if she could bake the yoghurt sesame rolls with curd instead of yoghurt because she like the more sour taste of curd. I told her directly “What a great Idea” and go to the kitchen to create a recipe with curd.

Like in the recipe for this no knead wheat bread I added a poolish and fold the dough three times before fermenting over night. To fold the dough is a easy method to develop the gluten network which creates a nice crumb without kneading. Because curd contains not so much liquid as yoghurt I added some milk to the recipe.

The curd rolls taste aromatic and slightly sour and the crumb is soft and moist. The crust is nice but not as crisp as the crust of rolls just made with water, flour and yeast.

Because the rolls are not kneaded they fit perfectly for the theme of the 38. Bread Baking Day which is “no knead Bread”. I send the entry also to Yeastspotting, Susans weekly showcase of yeast baked goods. Continue reading

March 13th, 2011

Sweet Hörnchen

süße Hörnchen

When I was small I loved to eat “Hörnchen” for breakfast. This crescents made of a sweet dough are still a favourite treat when we sometimes have breakfast at the cafe that is attached to my favourite bakery.

I don’t know why I never baked them at home. Somehow this idea did not occur to me. But last weekend I changed this sad fact and baked “Hörnchen”. They are so easy to do!

I decided to prepare a sweet yeast dough with pâte fermentée for more aroma and structure and water roux for a soft crust and a fluffy cumb.

And when I drew them out of the oven I knew that they are success. The crust is soft, the crumb fluffy and the taste is great. I love them for breakfast on Sunday, spread with honey from a local beekeeper. Continue reading

March 6th, 2011

Nut triangles

NusseckenSometimes the simple things are the best. For me Nut triangles belong to this categorie for sure  – the only time comsuming part is dipping the edges in molten chocolate. Who – like me – loose the patient after dipping half of the triangles can decorate the triangles with graphical patterns. That looks nice, is much faster and taste as good as the one with the nicely dipped edges.

I based my variation on the recipe I found in “Handbuch fürs tägliche Backen”. I doubled the amount of dough and filling because I never menage to fill a whole baking sheet with the amount given in the recipe andI reduce the over all sugar amount.  Instead of using chopped nuts I ground half of the using the coarse grater of my kitchen machine. And the greatest change is that I used quince jelly instead of apricot jam something that tastes very good. Continue reading

March 4th, 2011

Yoghurt Rolls with caramelized Hazelnuts

Haselnuss-Joghurt-Brötchen

The Yoghurt Whole Wheat Toast, a Variation of my Whole Wheat Sandwich-Bread that Lutz baked make me longing of a Yoghurtbread or Roll. Yoghurt in bread is something delicious. As a Breakfast roll we like the yoghurt sesame rolls very much. But always the same kind of rolls is boring and so I decided to bake some similar rolls but this time with whole spelt flour, some honey and caramelised hazelnuts – that is a delicious mixture.

When you prepare the caramelized hazelnuts I can recommend to make more then the recipe asked for. Then you can snack some and put some in the dough. I had to struggle with myself not to eat all of the nuts at once – they are so good! I roasted the nuts in the oven instead of roasting in a pan to get  more even roasted nuts.

The rolls are as delicious as I hoped for, slightly tartish from the yoghurt with a distinct sweetness from the honey and the nuts.

Continue reading

February 27th, 2011

Spelt Buckwheat bread

Dinkel Buchweizen BrotThis bread has a  “black spirit”. Black beer, dark molasse and “black wheat” (aka Buckwheat) create a nearly black crust and a deep brown crumb. The crumb looks much darker then you would guess from the amount of about 50% whole grain.

The recipe is a kind of using up leftovers. Breadcrumbs made of dried stale bread slices, some dark beer leftover from weekeend cooking and some leftover buckwheat flour which I broughed home from the summer holidays in the Lüneburge Heath (where buckwheat is still grown).

Buckwheat is an old crop, that grows well on low-fertility soil, thats why its often found to be grown in regions like heath. From the botanical view it is no grain but the fruit of a plant from the “knotweed family” (Polygonaceae). The flour contains no gluten so it should added in a low amount to bread doughs. Continue reading