Something Out of Nothing IV: Bottom of the Bag Brown Bread

Every year at about this time I will make up a batch of something to empty out whatever peysekh-hostile flours are still infesting in the pantry, and every year this turns out to be more wonderful than even I would have guessed. Have a look at Bottom of the Bag Pancakes, Bottom of the Bag Muffins and Bottom of the Bag Cookies from previous years, and Lindy’s Something out of Nothing roundup.

Somehow this year has just flown through my fingers and I find myself with lots more flour than usual at a much later date, so a big bread seemed to be just the thing.

Bottom of the Bag Brown Bread

1 pound (3 1/3 cups) all-purpose flour (yes, I reall had exactly one pound left!)

12 ounces (2 1/2 cups) chapatti flour

10 ounces (1 cup) semolina

10 ounces (2 ½ cups) whole wheat pastry flour

½ ounce (2 tablespoons) rolled oats (why did I have this? I have no idea)

¼ cup peanut oil

6 ounces ( ¾ cup or 1 ½ sticks) butter, melted

¼ cup coconut oil

2 ½ tablespoons dry yeast

3 tablespoons salt

¼ cup agave

1 cup yogurt

2 1/3 cups cooked rye berries (1 cup rye berries cooked in liberally salted water for about an hour)

one egg for eggwash (optional)

sesame, poppy, caraway and/or coarse salt (optional)

Combine the flours and oats in a large mixing bowl. Mix in the melted butter and oils and mix to combine. Dissolve the yeast in a cup and a half of warm water. Add salt, agave, and yogurt, and mix into the flours to form a soft sticky dough. Knead for about ten minutes by hand or in a mixer, and then knead in the rye berries by hand.

Leave the dough to rise covered in a lightly oiled bowl for about an hour. Punch down and allow to rise a second time:

(wow this thing rose like the dough that ate Cincinnati)! Wish I had taken a before picture for y’all).

Heat the oven to 375. Punch the dough down again and divide into five or six loaves. Place the loaves on parchment-lined baking sheets and proof for about twenty minutes.

If desired, beat an egg with a teaspoon of water to make an eggwash and brush the surfaces of the loaves. For extra shine, allow the wash to dry and brush on a second coat. Sprinkle with seeds and coarse salt if you wish. Bake for forty minutes, rotating the pans top to bottom and front to back after thirty. The finished loaves should be a gorgeous golden brown and provide that satisfying hollow thump when you tap them on the bottom (my favorite moment in bread baking).

Since this bread is milkhik, I should have made it into some special shape to warn folks of the dairy products lurking within. Maybe little skulls with crossbones, something like that.

There is so much butter in here that it is fine as is, or װי עס שטײט און גײט vi es shteyt un geyt (as it stands and walks), but if you want to slather on yet more butter I have no argument with you whatsoever.

Tremble before me leavened grain; I am the fearsome khumets-bane!