Picture
The story behind Anadama Bread is wonderful: "A fisherman who had a lazy wife came home one day and was tired of the same old porridge made of corn mush and molasses. He decided to take matters in his own hand and added yeast and flour into his meal and baked delicious bread in which he declared: 'Anna, damn her!' "
This bread turned out beautifully. It rose higher than almost any other bread that I'd made, and the taste-- absolutely delicious molasses flavor. Because I am baking exclusively with wild yeast, I knew there would be a bit more rise than expected, but the oven spring was incredible!
The crumb had a lovely crunchy but soft texture. This is an excellent sandwich bread-- especially for PBJ!

Picture
Adam-- My Wild Yeast
First, I add the yeast and flour and water and let stand for overnight to get the yeast to activate. In the meanwhile, I soaked the cornmeal overnight also.

Picture
Mixing all the ingredients
I next use the dough hook and knead the remainder of the flour and other ingredients together until dough is very elastic, about 10 minutes, or so.

Picture
1st bulk rise
So, the dough has now doubled in bulk

Picture
Divided dough into 3 pieces
The actual recipe said the divide in two and make 2 loaves, but, my bread was so risen, I thought I could get 3 loaves out of it.

Picture
Proofing in the loaf pans
After going into the bread pans I thought I made a mistake in dividing it into 3 pieces. (they looked a little puny)

Picture
Ready for the oven
No mistake-- they rose nicely. :)

Picture
Finished bread
Wow! what a beautiful spring from the wild yeast.

Chardo
3/2/2010 11:48:39 am

Ana-damn-a thats some good bread! Thought the natural yeast was going to make the bread a little sour, but the molasses covers it up with a good subtle flavor but not overpoweringly sweet. PBJ tested and palate approved. Good bread Sis, thumbs up.

P.S. thanks for being such a lazy wife Ana....

Reply



Leave a Reply.