Purple Potato Bread

I have gotten in a bit of a bread making rut lately. I bake a mean loaf of crusty, tangy, mostly whole grain bread in a free form boule shape, and it's very good. But sometimes I get bored.

I used to make a potato bread that was notable for being tender, quick, and rich tasting with a deceptively simple recipe. I had gotten out of the habit, because of the extra step of boiling up potatoes. Looking at the haul of purple potatoes from our garden, an idea begins.

Purple potato patch, summer 2012

Just over 675 grams

I tell my kid I want to make purple bread out of our potatoes. He says this would be awesome. I mention the real possibility we will end up with grey bread instead.

 He says "that's OK. It will still taste good". The bitter sweetness of a child becoming mature.

The recipe:

1 1/2 pounds (700 grams) of potatoes, scrubbed
4 cups flour (or a little more)
1 1/2 t salt
2 T olive oil
4 t baking yeast
1/4 cup lukewarm water
A handful of cornmeal






Place potatoes in a pot with cold water to cover. Bring to a boil and then simmer until a knife inserted in meets little resistance, about 20 minutes depending on the size of the potatoes. Drain, and return to hot pan to steam. A cut open potato shows a dark purple center and a very pale band around the skin.

Boiled and cut open

 Mash potatoes with olive oil and salt. Let them cool to lukewarm. At this point my purple potatoes were an amethyst color, with tatters of dark skin throughout. Because they were mashed without added liquid, they didn't get fluffy and creamy. They were just crumbled up.

Mashed purple potatoes

Mix yeast and water to dissolve.

In a stand mixer, with mixing paddle, combine potato mixture with yeast, and add 3 cups of flour. Set mixer on low and mix to combine.

Change to dough hook and add the remaining flour. The dough will be weird. It starts out as a shaggy mess, and then as the water in the potatoes gradually combines with the flour, it will form a heavy, soft dough. At this point it's clear the bread will be a soft shade of purple at best. All the vibrancy of the potatoes is merged with the pale flour.


Mix on low for 8 minutes, until a soft dough forms. Even after eight minutes, my dough was still not uniform, but rather a very light colored background with flecks of different purples scattered about.

Let the dough rise until doubled in size, one to two hours.

Dough with flecks of purple

Once the dough is doubled in size, gently deflate it by pressing it down. Break or pull it into two equal sized pieces, and knead them briefly and gently. I kneaded too much and started losing flecks of potato. A few moments should be enough.

Shape each half of the dough by stretching it slightly and then tucking the outside edges in so they all meet in the center, forming a ball. Pinch the seams together, then roll the ball between you hands to slightly elongate it. I found the dough to be a bit strange. It felt like children's play dough, and was perhaps the least sticky dough I have ever worked with. I barely had to wash my hands after shaping it.

Shaped loaves

Set each loaf on a sheet of parchment paper, and cover with a damp kitchen towel. Set them in the warmest part of the kitchen to rise for 45 minutes or until doubled in size.  

When the loaves have been rising for 15 minutes, place an oven stone, a cast iron griddle with the smooth side up, or an inverted cookie sheet on the middle rack of the oven, and preheat to 450 degrees.

Once the loaves are doubled in size, remove the towel. Sprinkle the baking stone with a bit of cornmeal and gently life one loaf at a time from the parchment paper. Set it down, upside-down, on the stone or sheet in the oven. Bake for 30 minutes, then check the loaves. If they are deep golden brown and sound hollow when you tap their underside, they are done. If they are pale or sound solid, put them back for another fifteen minutes. 

Not grey. But not really purple either

I could tell from the golden exterior of the bread that it wasn't dark enough to be truly purple inside. What I got was a pale lavender bread, flecked with darker purple and maroon. 

The texture was velvety, tender and dense. I tasted olive oil, and just barely a hint of the potato, but I wouldn't call this a potato dominated bread. 

The main flavors were yeast, toasted grain, and a slight sweetness, although no sweeteners were used. This bread would make great cinnamon rolls with a bit of brown sugar added to the dough.

It's also pretty good just the way it is. 

Shared on little house in the suburbs , farm girl blog fest

Grapenuts: Lembas and Manna

First a disclaimer. It may not shine through in every post, but we are no mere farmers. At Several Gardens Farm, we are low level geeks and scholars as well. We love us some Tolkien, and we love reading or retelling some of the more family appropriate portions of Scripture.

Any time this can be accomplished using home made breakfast cereals, I see it as a bonus.

Last night, I made a batch of grape nuts.

First, I baked a wholemeal "cake", then crumbled it and roasted the crumbs until  golden, perfectly dry, and faintly caramelized.

I couldn't resist serving part of the cake, uncrumbled, for dessert.

An austere dessert it was - lightly sweet, faintly flavored of honey, with a firm, nourishing texture.

However you dress it up, it's never going to be poundcake.

Nasty Elvish food! It burns us. 

David commented that it reminded him of Lembas, the Elvish way bread from Lord of the Rings. Coincidentally, I had been thinking the same thing.


Lembas was described as unexpectedly good but not awesome tasting, supremely nourishing, and easy to preserve.

The elves made if for long journeys, wrapped it in leaves from the Mallorn tree (I had to look that up), and gave it to valiant hobbits.

The longer you have nothing else to eat, the better Lembas becomes at keeping you alive - and the more you like it, although eventually the hobbits started to miss home cooking.

I experimented with wrapping our version in leaves and stuffing it in a backpack. If one took this recipe when one simply walked into Mordor, one's Lembas would crumble.

And speaking of crumble...

Grapenuts. Sort of reminds me of the surface of Mars

The majority of the lembas did not get eaten, but was pulsed to crumbles and toasted into grapenuts.

When I served them the next day at breakfast, Noah said this was how he had imagined the Manna given to the Israelites. I had been thinking that, too!

Manna is portrayed as a sustaining, palatable, nice, but not exciting food. Manna is small and white, looks "like coriander seeds", and tastes like cakes made with honey and oil. Manna, with a weekly bonus of quails, kept the twelve tribes alive for forty years as they became ready to be a free and autonomous people. By the end of their time in the dessert, they were thoroughly bored with the food.

We started a lively discussion about why, with all the foods in the universe, it was necessary to subsist on one substance for so long. We had some great ideas, and I'd love to hear yours.


And now, the recipes:

Lembas (AKA healthy cake)

Lacking a Mallorn tree, I used sunflower leaves

6 Cups whole grain flour (we used spelt)
3 Cups buttermilk
1 Cup sugar
1/2 Cup honey, molasses or maple syrup
1 TBSP baking soda
1 1/2 tsp salt
Optional: Vanilla , Pumpkin pie spices, Gingerbread spices or other flavorings to taste

Preheat oven to 325

Line 2 cookie sheets with waxed paper

Mix dry ingredients till thoroughly combined. Mix together honey and buttermilk, and stir in to dry ingredients. Mix until well blended and no lumps remain.

Pour out the batter onto the sheets and bake for 30 - 40 minutes until the center springs up when touched.

Cool, and remove waxed paper.  Process into grapenuts or serve with whipped cream, fruit, frosting, toasted with butter, or dipped in milk or tea. Wrap in unsprayed, non-toxic leaves for travel purposes:)

 Manna (AKA Grape nuts)

Epic with milk and honey

1 Recipe Lembas

Preheat oven to 200

Break the Lembas into chunks about 2" square. Drop them by batches into a food processor and pulse several times to process into uniform crumbs.

Turn the crumbs out onto the cookie sheets. Bake for 2 hours or until completely dry but not burnt.

Cool completely and double check that it is completely dry. Damp grapenuts are a disaster. Store in an airtight container.

Serve as a breakfast cereal.

Endnote:

As stated, we are not high level geeks, and I am aware of at least some innacuracies in this story. Lembas and manna are both light colored; ours, using whole grains and honey, turned out more golden/tan. Lembas is purpose made for long treks, and appears to keep indefinitely.  Manna goes bad rapidly if you horde it - the Israelites were being taught to trust in their Provider. Our cake and grapenuts are reversed in their keeping ability. Oh well.

Also, David says the epic "walk into Mordor" quote is not even in the book!

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