Simple walnut tin loaf

[Dan Lepard]

Simple walnut tin loaf

This will get applause rather than prizes as it relies on a big walnut flavour rather than complex baking techniques. Still, you end with a moist tender purple crumb studded with big chunks of walnuts encased in a tender crust.

200g strong white flour
100g strong wholemeal flour
1 tsp fine sea salt
1 sachet easy-blend yeast

for the blender:
1 glass red wine (125ml) plus water to make 200ml
50g walnuts
2 tbsp olive oil

Additional 100g coarsely chopped walnuts

Lightly mix the flours, yeast and salt in a bowl. In a blender wiz the water, wine, walnuts, and oil until smooth then pour this into the flour. Add the chopped walnuts and stir briskly to make a soft, sticky dough. Cover and leave for 10 minutes. Rub a spoonful of oil on the worksurface and a bit on your hands. Remove the dough and knead on the oiled surface for 10 – 15 seconds. Return to the bowl, cover, and leave another 10 minutes. Finally repeat the light knead, replace the dough in the bowl and leave it for 45 minutes, or until almost doubled in height.

Oil and flour a 1lb loaf tin. Lightly flour the worksurface and roll the dough to roughly 15cm x 20cm. Roll it tightly from the narrow end into a tight sausage and plonk this seam side down into the tin. Press it down firmly, cover then leave an hour until doubled again. Heat the oven to 200C/gas 6. Lightly dust the top of the loaf and make criss-cross cuts with a small knife. Bake for 40 minutes until the loaf pulls away from the tin and is a good brown colour. Remove from the tin and leave to cool on a rack.

[minisato]

I made this loaf last Monday. That was my first trial of Dan’s recipe.
To be honest, I was rather sceptical about the unusual method of “kneading only 10 seconds a couple of times with interval”. The result was not bad but I wasn’t entirely convinced.
As usual, I had frozen some leftover and a few days later made sandwich for my weekly walking. Then I noticed the difference. This loaf tasted really NICE!!
I found the texture remain lighter and flavour was better compared with the one made by normal kneading method even after being frozen.

Actually, I added some modification into the original recipe combined with the method used for “White Vienna loaf”, which was featured in the current issue of Waitrose Food magazine.
There was one thing I wasn’t happy. A crack appeared on the side of dough and because of this, the bread looked somehow tilted.
According to the blog site of a Japanese baking enthusiast, the crack is due to either lack of humidity in the oven or imbalance of stretch-ability within the dough. To improve this matter, she recommends either making coup or using fat to help the dough stretch more easily.
I am not particularly sure about the authenticity of these tips but when I make this again (quite certainly), I’ll coat the top of dough with tiny amount of olive oil, just to experiment it.