Beer bread
I’ve read many times about beer bread, but I never tried that. I love beer, in particular the dark/brown ones. In this smoking hot summer my fridge is always full of beer, IPA, Belgian, Weissbier and so on. I picked up a Chimay blue, I love the flavour.
The bread came out of the oven with an incredible flavour and colour. We definitely loved it. Next step is to replace water completely (even for the poolish) and to test different beers (Guinness is the next in my list).
The recipe is basically my usual one, I simply replaced water with beer. Not completely though, for the poolish I used water.
Ingredients (make one loaf)
For the poolish
- 120 gr flour
- 120 ml water
- 60 gr rye sourdough starter
For the dough
- 170 gr high protein bread flour
- 170 gr first clear flour (Organic “tipo2” flour milled by Mulino Tre Ponti, Polverigi, Ancona – Italy)
- 6 grams barley malt flour
- 50 gr rye sourdough starter
- 180 ml Chimay blue beer
- 8 gr salt
The poolish is a batter made by a small amount of sourdough starter, in this case a rye flour starter, water and flour; it is prepared the day before because it needs 10-12 hours to ferment. Put in a bowl the rye sourdough, the water and the flour. Mix with a spoon and cover with cling film. Store it overnight in a warm place. I keep it in the oven.
The morning after you need to add the remaining flour, the rye starter and the beer.
Chimay blue
Mix in the stand mixer with the dough hook, for 1-2 minutes at speed 1. Let the dough rest for 10 minutes and then mix for another 4 minutes, at speed 1. Cover the bowl with the cling film and let the dough rest for 45 minutes (autolyse).
At this point you can add the salt and mix the dough by hand inside the bowl.
Lightly flour the working surface and stretch and fold your dough (stretch the dough and then fold it left over right, right over left, bottom over top, top over bottom). After the stretch and fold let the dough rest for 15 minutes and then stretch and fold it again for a total of 3 times.
Put the dough in a bowl, cover it with the cling film and put it in the oven (with the oven light on, to keep the oven lightly warm) for 4 hours. This is the fermentation phase. The dough will rise (about 1.5 times the original volume).
After the fermentation, put the dough on a floured working surface. Stretch and fold the dough and put it in a floured (use rice flour) proofing basket (banneton). Cover with cling film. Keep it in a warm place for 2 hours.
Put the cast iron pot in the oven and pre-heat the oven for 30-45 minutes at 250°C. Put the dough into the pot, cut the top of the loaf with a bread scoring tool, put the lid on and cook for 20 minutes. After 20 minutes, remove the lid and continue cooking at a lower temperature, 220-230°C, for 25-30 minutes.
When the bread is ready, let it cool completely on a wire cooling rack (1.5 hrs). Enjoy!
Beer sourdough
Beer bread
