Rye is probably the most misunderstood grain. To begin with, much of the rye bread found for sale contains only a tiny amount of rye, and most of these loaves also contain caraway and molasses, so many people think that a rye bread tastes like a mixture of wheat, caraway and molasses, and don’t know what real rye tastes like. The misunderstanding further deepens when baking with rye – it just does not behave at all like other grains!
Rye contains large amounts of pentosans, a type of carbohydrate that absorbs a lot of water and retains moisture. The more pentosans in a loaf of bread, the longer it needs to rest before it can be sliced. If you cut into a rye loaf too early, the texture can be gummy. Pentosans also help rye breads (and breads made with some rye) taste fresh for longer.
Rye is one of my favourite grains to bake with. I love the taste and texture of dense rye loaves, and I also enjoy a hint of rye mixed through a wheat loaf. I often bake a 50/50 or 40/60 mixture of rye and wheat, or a 75/25 mixture for a denser, more rye-filled loaf. Adding between 10% and 20% rye to a wheat loaf adds a little special something, especially when baked as a boule.
To work with rye, it’s best to understand how it works in relation to how much wheat is in a loaf – up to around 18% and the loaf will still behave mostly like a wheat loaf. Further and further beyond this, the structural character of rye shows itself more, with denser textures and more rye flavour. Experiment with using different percentages of rye - 40 to 50% rye gives plenty of rye flavour, while still keeping the crumb fairly open and wheaty, more rye than this gives more rye flavour, and more of a dense rye texture.
Rye is best baked with steam, to encourage oven spring. For loaf pans, I achieve this by putting a cookie sheet over the top of the loaves when they first go into the oven, removing it for the second half of baking. For free- form loaves, the dutch oven method provides the perfect amount of steam.
About rye flour
Whole rye flour is sometimes called dark rye flour, and is simply the whole rye grain, ground up. Light rye flour is the same thing as refined wheat flour - it’s rye with the germ and bran removed. For the best rye taste, choose whole rye flour.
Rye benefits from fresh milling even more than wheat does. Because we don’t pay much attention to gluten in rye baking, we don’t need to reduce the amount of gluten-weakening enzymes by aging the flour. Milling rye as fresh as possible for the best possible flavour always makes sense. There is no reason at all to age rye flour so feel free to use flour fresh from the grain mill if you can and your bread will be better for it.
Rye starter and wheat starter
Baking with a rye starter or pre-ferment brings out the best in sour rye flavours. Baking a rye bread using a wheat starter or pre-ferment brings out more of the sweet flavours of rye. Choosing which starter or pre-ferment to use for a rye loaf is often just a matter of using whatever one you have available. There is no need to keep a separate rye starter, if you usually work with wheat and want to convert it to rye, simply take a small spoon of it, feed it with rye, and it will become a rye starter.
Handling rye
Rye is sticky! There are two ways I handle this:
• With a wet dough and loaf pans, I simply spoon the dough into the loaf pans.
• For loaves with lower hydration, or for anything you want to bake as a freeform loaf, throughly wet your hands and shape the loaves with wet hands, working in a similar way to shaping a wheat loaf, building some tension as you shape. If you are shaping more than one loaf, re-wet your hands in between loaves. Your hands will still probably end up with some dough stuck to them, but it’s worth it.
Rye dough is not as stretchy as wheat dough. Loaves with high amounts of rye can be a bit like clay in texture, and sometimes just need to be moulded with wet hands as if they were clay. Smaller amounts of rye can make for a dough that needs less tension than a typical wheat loaf, so be careful not to let it tear when shaping.
A few more rye tips
Rye contains high amounts of soluble fibre, and also significant amounts of pentosans. Both these characteristics make rye flour absorb a lot of water and retain moisture. When boiling water is added directly to rye flour, as it is for scalded flour breads, the fibre and pentosans cause it to form a gel-like consistency, adding strength to the dough without gluten. If you would like a stronger, bendier rye bread, feel free to take any of the rye recipes in this chapter and scald up to 20% of the flour with an equal weight of boiling water. Next week I’ll be sharing more about the benefits of scalded flour and how to do it.
Some rye flours need more water than others. When making a rye recipe for the first time, you may want to hold back a small amount of water, in case your rye needs less water.
How to add caraway
If you like caraway in your rye breads, feel free to add 2 teaspoons of whole caraway seeds to a normal-sized rye loaf recipe.
May your rye bread always be delicious. Floury regards,
Kate
P.S. If you'd like to access an archive of all previous Floury Friday emails, simply visit http://katedownham.kit.com.
P.P.S. If you are enjoying these emails, please feel free to share the signup page with friends and family. Here’s the link: https://katedownham.kit.com/779eefc56e
600 1st Ave, Ste 330 PMB 92768, Seattle, WA 98104-2246
Unsubscribe · Preferences
