Hello bread and grain friends,
The days are finally getting a tad longer, and I’m hibernating a little less with each hour of nightfall dwindling away. Not much to report except that I am enjoying being in my kitchen.
I am loving this recipe on The Perfect Loaf website for sourdough discard granola, and I’ve been making these chocolate muffins with the Climate Blend from Chimacum Valley Grainery.
Here’s what’s going on in my kitchen when I get home this month:
Mama Bread
This month’s Mama bread is multi-grain with a bit of barley, sorghum, and buckwheat and a lot of spelt. In these loaves, I’m using buckwheat and spelt flour from Chimacum Valley Grainery, and Bob’s Red Mill Sorghum. I’m thinking more about the diversity of each of my loaves and this one packs in the many grains.
Sesame Einkorn
These loaves haven’t left my side for many years. These days, I’m making them with Anson Mills Sea Island benne seeds. My three favorite sources for einkorn flour are Bluebird, Carolina Ground, and Maine Grains.
Challah Rolls with Chocolate Chips & Orange Flower Water
I love making Challah on Fridays and putting it out reverently on the dinner table, watching it whittle down as my family joyfully takes bites with our Shabbat dinner. This past October, I had the pleasure of visiting Hagay Bread in Tel Aviv, which is one of my favorite bakeries in the world. He made these fragrant olive oil & dark chocolate brioche, and I absolutely couldn’t get enough. It served as inspiration for these rolls in my kitchen.
Tu B’Shvat Loaves
This one uses a starter I made for Tu B’Shvat a few years ago when I was musing about how to get all seven species—wheat, barley, dates, figs, grapes, olives & pomegranates—into one loaf of bread. The grains were easy, of course; the olives could be oil; I could use dried fruits for that part, but pomegranates…hmmmm…how to get those in there…? And then it hit me! I could include pomegranate molasses. I tinkered and tinkered until I finally even made a starter with the molasses, and so the Tu B’Shvat loaves were born. These have become some of my favorites.
Other news from the world of grain:
-The Kneading Conference has been announced for July 22nd-24th. Check it out and register here.
-My friend Sonya who hosts the Food Friends Podcast (one of my favorites!) is also the most fun person in the world to walk around a farmer’s market with. She knows who has what and which time of year. She recently started doing tours of two markets in Portland and I couldn’t recommend it highly enough. I took my dad and family recently, and although I go to the market regularly, I learned a ton!
-My new book Einkorn Made Easy is out!