We were watching a program on TV the other day and Victor mentioned Black Bread. He mentioned a restaurant in Philadelphia where he would get awesome sandwiches back in the day. I said the best rye bread I ever had was when I worked at David’s Delicatessen in San Francisco back in the ’70s. (It wasn’t a black bread – just really good rye!)
Anyway… I decided we needed a loaf.
I had a recipe from King Arthur Flour I had made around 7 or 8 years ago, so I decided it needed to be revisited…
The beauty of writing this is I have a record of things we have made over the years. I think I write it more for myself to remember what we’ve had… The old gray cells they ain’t what they used to be…
But regardless of reason, the end result was a pretty darn good loaf of bread!
It’s a wetter dough than I’m used to making and it took a lot of restraint to keep from adding more flour. The end result proved the recipe to be right!
It went great with our dinner last night, but was perfect this morning toasted and topped with cream cheese!
Russian Black Bread
adapted from King Arthur
- 1 1/8 cups (255g) water, lukewarm
- 2 tablespoons (28g) cider vinegar
- 1 cup (106g) Dark Rye Flour, plus more for dusting
- 1 1/4 teaspoons (8g) table salt
- 2 tablespoons (28g) unsalted butter
- 2 tablespoons (43g) molasses
- 1 tablespoon (14g) brown sugar
- 3 tablespoons (18g) cocoa powder
- 1 teaspoon espresso powder
- 1/4 to 1 teaspoon fennel seeds, to taste
- 2 teaspoons instant yeast
- 2 1/2 cups (300g) Bread Flour, divided
Place all of the ingredients in a large bowl, reserving 1 cup (120g) of the bread flour. Mix to make a thick batter-like dough. The dough will be wet at this point; it’ll become more dough-like when you add the remaining 1 cup (120g) of bread flour.
Mix in the remaining cup of flour and knead for 7 minutes, or until the dough becomes soft and elastic, but may still be somewhat sticky to the touch. Cover the bowl and let the dough rise until doubled, 45 minutes to 1 hour.
After the first rise, shape the dough into an oblong loaf. Place in a greased 9″ x 5″ or 10″ x 5″ bread pan, cover with greased plastic, and let rise until almost doubled, about 60 to 90 minutes.
While the dough is rising, preheat the oven to 375°F. When the dough has almost doubled, brush or spray the top with water, dust with rye flour, and score the top.
Bake the bread for about 35 minutes, until it sounds hollow when you thump the bottom. Immediately remove from baking pan and allow to cool completely before slicing.
It really is a nice loaf. It has a very soft crumb – perfect for sandwich-making!
Hopefully, it won’t be 8 years before I make this, again.