As
I mentioned in this previous post, we moved home recently and left our
rented house with its nice tidy white kitchen behind. The house we
bought is a fixer upper
and most of it is still a building site, covered in plaster dust, with
half of the upstairs bathroom missing and no flooring anywhere other
than in two bedrooms. Most of our belongings are still in boxes (and
have been since the start of June), and the novelty
is wearing off very quickly – I just want it to be finished dammit!
I’ll be sharing photos of my “new” kitchen soon, and bragging about my
husband’s recently-acquired DIY skills.
Soft-focus food porn?
I actually made these bread rolls way back in June for a Jubilee picnic, but the memory card with the photos has been packed away since then and I’ve only just managed to find it. Plus our broadband has been all over the place due to the move, and I’ve just managed to get my iMac set up again. So I have a bit of catching up to do!
First assemble your ingredients, Delia style
I
made these to try out some new spelt flour from Sharpham Park, who have
a lovely range of products made from organic spelt, including breakfast
cereals with various
flavours like bran flakes with berries (which I also tried, but it
didn’t even make it as far as the blog because I scoffed the lot very
quickly – it’s delicious), speltotto (like risotto – obviously – but
using spelt instead of rice, which I do intend to
try as I love risotto but like the nutty flavour of spelt) and of
course the range of flour, which I was rather impressed with. I get
genuinely excited when I try out a new flour. Is that a bit weird? I’m
sure I’m not the only one.
This recipe is adapted from one by Nigel Slater.
Fennel & Cumin Spelt Rolls
Ingredients:
250g
Sharpham
Park wholegrain spelt flour
250g strong white bread flour
250g strong white bread flour
350ml
warm water
Heaped tsp dried yeast
1 tsp Maldon salt, crushed in a pestle & mortar
1 tsp Maldon salt, crushed in a pestle & mortar
1 tsp fennel seeds
1 tsp cumin seeds
First
add the yeast to the warm water and give it a bit of a stir about.
Leave for 10 minutes or so till it starts to foam up.
Toast
the fennel and cumin seeds in a dry frying pan over a high heat for a
couple of minutes – keep them moving around with a wooden spoon to stop
them burning. Pour
the toasted seeds into a pestle and mortar and bash them up a bit.
A great stress reliever.
Now
throw everything into a big bowl, give it a really good mix around
until it all comes together, turn it out onto a worktop* and knead,
knead, knead until you have
a lovely smooth stretchy dough, which you then want to roll into a
tight ball, place into an oiled bowl, cover with a piece of oiled cling
film or a floury tea towel, and leave for an hour or so until it doubles
in size.
Proving...
Now preheat the oven to 250 degrees C, and put a roasting tin or something similar in the bottom of the oven.
Turn
the dough out, gently push all the air out of it, give it a quick knead
and divide into 8 pieces. Roll each piece into a little ball, place on
a floured baking
tray quite close together, and cover with a tea towel. Leave for
another 40 minutes or so until they’ve puffed up and have probably stuck
together. In the meantime, boil the kettle.
Now
put your little rolls in the oven, and pour some water from the kettle
into the roasting tin and shut the oven door. The steam will give your
rolls a lovely crust
and help them rise.
Bake
for about 15 minutes, or until they sound hollow when tapped
underneath. Cool on a wire rack for a bit, but do try and eat them
while they’re still warm, preferably
with some strong cheese and some cold meat like slices of pepperoni or
chorizo.
---
I
have to say I really did like these little rolls. They are somehow
chewier than bread made entirely from wheat flour, and despite being
small are really quite substantial.
Yum.
Sharpham Park products are available from selected Sainsburys and
online at their website, and the bran flakes have been on my shopping
list several times now.
