Anadama Bread: one of those typically Massachusetts / New England breads. I actually revised this one — and then entered it into a contest, which I don’t think that I will win, but nevertheless, I entered — by adding a little bit of nutmeg, a very dark avocado blossom honey to go with the molasses, and then baking it in one of my dutch ovens instead of the traditional loaf pan. Came out quite nicely. It’s a lovely breakfast bread, so may become part of my standard bread making routine.
Ingredients
1/4 cup yellow cornmeal
1/4 teaspoon freshly ground nutmeg
1/2 cup water, boiling
1/2 cup molasses
3 tablespoon unsalted butter, melted and cooled
2 tablespoons Avocado Blossom Honey*
1 tablespoon table salt
1 cup warm water, between 100-110F
1 1/4 teaspoons Red Star Active Dry Yeast
1 cup 100% Whole Grain Whole Wheat Flour
2 cups King Arthur Bread Flour
You will also need a 3 1/2 – 4 quart oval or round cast iron Dutch Oven with lid.
Directions
Start with a small work bowl and a wooden spoon. Add your cornmeal and nutmeg to the bowl and add the boiling water. Let sit to soften the cornmeal, stirring every few minutes, until the cornmeal is softened, about 10 minutes. Add in the molasses and melted butter.
Meanwhile, in another, larger bowl, put both 100% Whole Grain Whole Wheat Flour and King Arthur Bread Flour and stir to combine. Make a well in the middle and sprinkle in the Red Star Active Dry Yeast. Pour over the warm water and drizzle in the 2 tablespoons of honey and let the yeast foam for a few minutes, while the cornmeal is softening.
After the yeast has foamed and the cornmeal has softened, combine the two mixtures in the larger bowl. The dough will be rough and very sticky, but that’s normal. Stir until all the flour is combined. There’s little kneading involved in this recipe, so you don’t need to be too concerned about the appearance of the dough at this point. Just make sure the ingredients are combined well and knead only until cohesive.
Cover the bowl with plastic wrap and let rise. You can put it in the fridge for part of this time; I usually do for the first 6-7 hours in the fridge overnight, and then an hour at room temperature in the morning, but you can also let it rise in a warm, draft-free spot for 3-4 hours. After the dough has risen to double in size, preheat oven to 400F. Place the Dutch oven with the lid on in the cold oven and let it heat up with the oven.
Place a piece of parchment paper on the counter and dust it literally with flour. Rub flour on your hands and scrape the dough away from the sides of the bowl, gathering it in your hands as best you can (it may feel kind of fluid and not at all like regular bread dough), kneading and forming it into a circular loaf on the parchment paper. Don’t worry if it still looks a little rough in places. This lends to the rustic look of this loaf.
Once you have it shaped, the dough needs to undergo a second rise (much shorter than the first). Sprinkle flour over the top of the loaf and loosely cover it with plastic wrap to prevent a skin from forming over the dough. The flour also prevents the plastic wrap from sticking to the dough so when you take it off at the end of the rise, it doesn’t disturb the dough and wreck the rustic shape you’ve created. Let the dough rise for about 30 minutes. Your oven will also be preheating during this time (and so will your pot).
Once 30 minutes have passed remove the plastic wrap from the dough and trim the parchment paper into a circle closely around the dough. If it doesn’t look like the dough has risen that much, don’t worry about it. The loaf will puff up a bit when it hits the heat of the oven. Remove the preheated pot from the oven and transfer the dough into the pot as carefully as possible by handling only the parchment paper. Slash the top of the loaf a few times. Place the lid on the pot and return it to the oven for 40 minutes. Then remove the lid from the pot and continue baking for another 15-20 minutes. Remove the pot with bread from the oven and place it on a wire rack to cool. Let cool completely before slicing.
* Any dark honey will do, however, avocado blossom honey accompanies the molasses very nicely, if you can find it.
