Whole Wheat Linseed Sesame Sourdough Bread

Sooooo, a couple days ago Jocelyn told me I needed to make some bread go with some awesome soup she made. So I did. It’s a little concoction of my own making. Well, partly my own making. We had some whole linseed Dad had gotten to use in the goat feed, but we didn’t use all of them in the feed, so I made use of them in some yummy bread. :) Oh, and I had about one-third a cup of sesame seeds too, so I threw them in as well. ;) I had made a sesame seed bread a couple weeks ago, and really liked the flavour of it, so I said, “Well, let’s see how it does in here.”

…first, I heated up a bit of water to proof my dry active yeast with. It’s just about ready, see the ‘ripples’ in it? Threw the yeast in the water, which had a bit of honey of in it, and waited…

…while that proofed, I mixed the dry ingredients: flour, salt, linseed and sesame seeds.

All done proofing, I made a well in the flour [which was in the mixer bowl] and then poured in my water/yeast and sourdough starter.

Now, start your engine! Uh, I mean, mixer. Sorry, got a little carried away there. ;)

When the mixer has done it’s job and mixed and kneaded it a little bit for you, take it out, and give your arms a bit of a workout. Yes, I mean knead it with those things that hang at your sides. There you go! You’re doing great! You should really do this more often. [And people wonder why I have some nice arm muscles... hmph.]

Knead it until it is nice and smooth, and springs back when you poke it. I happen to like that photo A LOT. mainly because it looks like a pro took it. I am not a pro, by any means, but it’s pretty nice, right? I like it a lot, like I said. Like a real lot. Like a whole whoppin’ lot. Like… I’ll stop there. You get my drift.

Look at the texture! I love whole grain breads!

Ready to go into the oven for rising… it looks awesome, doesn’t it??????

It has RISEN!

…loud clapping here…

Now, punch it down and divide the dough in half… right. Just like that.

Then… flatten it out and roll it up. See? I put it in steps for you! that’s the basic method of making a loaf. I rounded this one, so I could put it in the little iron skillet I just recently discovered for bread making. :)

See? Little iron skillet I just recently discovered for bread making. ;)

Do that again with the second half of dough, but don’t round it, unless you are doing free form loaves. :) I did a loaf one too. isn’t it pretty?

I didn’t get a photo of me scoring it once it rose, it is baked in this photo. It didn’t rise quite as much as I wanted, but it was super delicious! The awesome nutty flavour of the sesame, even though I put less in than the linseed, was so good! I love the flavour of the sesame seeds. I think I’ll be adding them into my breads more often. ;)

I love this bread.

It didn’t brown quite as much as I liked, but it was still a really good bread!

So now! After all of those photos and everything, I’ll give you the actual recipe to try:

Whole Wheat Linseed Sesame Sourdough Bread
1-1/3 cups warm water
1 tsp. honey
3 tsps. active dry yeast [or instant, if that's what you use.]
Mix the honey and the way together in a small bowl, then sprinkle the yeast over it. Let it set until it’s nice and bubbly. In the meanwhile, mix the following together in your mixer bowl, or a large mixing bowl, if you’re doing it by hand:
7 cups whole wheat flour
1/2 cup whole linseed
1/3 cup sesame seeds
1 tbsp. sea salt
1 cup ripe [recently fed] sourdough starter
When the yeast has done its magic and looks like it came from another planet, or is a boggy marsh, make a well in the middle of the flour mixture. Pour in the yeasty goodness and the starter and then turn your mixer medium with the dough-hook. I mixed them together for about 10 minutes. I have never been able to successfully achieve a windowpane with dough, no matter how long I knead or try, but if you can, great for you! [This is where you can pull off a small chunk of the dough you’re kneading and stretch it gently to see if you can see the shapes of things on the other side of the dough. If you can do this without it tearing, it’s ready. Me? I never could.] So I usually poke it with my finger and if it bounces back well, it’s ok. Once you got that, you can leave the dough to sit out with a towel over it for 1-4 hours to double in size, or you can speed it up by sticking it in the oven that’s warm to wait one-two hours. [mine took about an hour and a half the first rise.]
Once risen, it should be kneaded a time or two. Shape the dough however you want: free-form, loaves, or in a dutch oven. [REALLY wish I had one!] Then let it rise again until double, about an hour and a half to two hours. When risen, preheat oven to 450 degrees. If you did free-forms or dutch-ovens, score your bread. Then bake for 30 minutes, then check it. [If your oven has different heats at certain areas, you might want to move the loaves around a bit while baking Now would be a good time for that. Yeah, right now.] Then, finish it off for another 15 to 30 minutes.

You can add some oil or some butter to this too, if you want to. Olive oil would give it a nice flavour too, or some other oil.

So, anyhow, hope you enjoyed the photos and if you made the bread, enjoyed that too. ;)

shalom, mis amigos!

submitted to yeastspotting.