Life-Changing Bread (or you can hope)

Life-Changing Bread

Adapted from Sandrine Sharbani by Blue Heron Kitchen

The name is problematic. This is how it arrived in my email. The bread has already changed my life because I'm hyphenating wherever I can grab a dash.

The bread: A gluten-free, oated, seedy loaf that’s dense, satisfying, ridiculously good for you, makes fantastic toast, and instead of laying like a lump in your gut, as do most breads, this will stimulate your digestive track while it absorbs all the goodies that the ingredients are shooting out. Life-changing? Well, for some, who eat baguettes slathered with butter (oooooh), this may prove to be just that. It couldn’t hurt.

Every ingredient here (not sure about the brown rice syrup) can be bought at Trader Joe’s. Well, almost. As of this date, Trader Joe's has pulled raw sunflower seeds from their shelves because of stuff growing on the seeds due to how they're processed (pasteurized and then blasted with something) prior to packaging. This is what customer service representative told me. It sounded potentially dangerous and kind of gross. I may try the roasted/unsalted ones to see how it goes. Or, I may go to another market. Now I'm wondering if all "raw" sunflower seeds are potentially .. sigh.

If you don’t like hazelnuts, use almonds. I’ve used both, but hazelnuts are my favorites. To remove skin from hazelnuts, toast them on a baking sheet at 350º F. for about 6-8 minutes until the skins are darkened (but take care that they don’t burn.)  Remove from oven and rub them in a dish (tea) towel. You can use the ones that are stubborn and hold on to their coats as long as almost all have no skin. The skins are a little bitter. Hazelnuts are majestic.

Some recipes add salt and some use clarified butter (ghee) in place of coconut oil. I haven’t used butter, but I like to add a little salt. Try throwing in some dried fruit. Fool around. You’re the boss.

No yeast.

Allow for time. Once you’ve mixed it, it rests on your counter for at least 2 hours before baking. Mix it before you go to work and pop it in the oven that evening. Or, the loaf can sit overnight and be baked in the morning.

Try: toasted with excellent butter or a replacement like “Earth Balance.” It’s fantastic with some almond, sunflower (my new fave), peanut or other nut butter and jam. If you eat cheese, try it with a soft cheese. Try it with goat cheese. Drizzle some truffle honey on top and you’ll groan. Thinly slice some gruyere and place under broiler. If you’re a meat eater, add ham. Avocado! Your turn.

Spring is for renewal and change. Try this completely different angle on bread, just for the equinox of it. It's hard-earned and well-deserved.

peace, love and change,

jane

Life-Changing Bread

Dry ingredients:

1 cup of raw sunflower seeds

½ cup flax seeds*

2 Tbsp. of chia seeds*

3 Tbsp. psyllium husk or powder

½ tsp. kosher salt (opt.)

½ c. of hazelnuts, skins removed or raw almonds

1 ½ c. Old-fashioned oats

Wet ingredients:

1 ½ cup water (room temperature)

3 Tbsp. coconut oil, melted (you can do this in your microwave)

1- 1 ½ Tbsp. brown rice or maple syrup (or other comparable liquid sweetener such as dark agave)

Procedure

Mix all the dry ingredients together in a bowl. (You can do this by hand, or in the bowl of an electric stand mixer, like a Kitchen Aid.

Add all the wet ingredients and add to dry ingredients, mixing well.

Transfer the mixture into a loaf pan lined with parchment paper or if you have a silicone loaf pan, directly into the silicone pan. Smooth the top.

Let sit on counter for at least 2 hours or overnight.

Preheat the oven to 350º F. and bake in the middle of the oven for 20 minutes in the pan. After 20 minutes, remove the loaf from the pan (and its parchment), and gently place upside-down directly on the oven rack for an additional 35 minutes. (Having done this both ways, do this. The loaf browns and bakes much better upside-down.) (Like all the hyphens? I'm growing fond of them.)

Remove from oven and cool, right-side up (stop smirking), on a cooling rack. Cool completely before slicing. Wrapped well, this will keep for about 5 days. You can slice and freeze the loaf and pull out slices and toast them on a regular basis.

*If flax/chia seeds are gut-busters (and I feel that flax seeds are better absorbed when ground or at least partially ground), grind them in your Vitamix or in a powerful blender or food processor.