I used to bake for our good friend, Gert, who very unfairly died last year back in the Netherlands (full story here). One reason he was fun to work with was every week his menus changed countries and even continents and the bread was supposed to reflect that week’s culture.
Amongst his papers he found a collection of bizarre (from my point of view) Dutch sourdough recipes which he eventually translated for me. The detail was a little skimpy and they all began “1 liter sourdough” ….
This sauerkraut formula was the first one I attempted for him back in 2013. Original post here
Original recipe translated from the Dutch:
Sauerkrautbread
1 liter sourdough
500 g wholemeal flour
and
2 chopped and fried onions
200 g raisins
300 g sauerkraut
1 tbsp herbes de provence
200 g grated cheese
My version:
No, That’s not a misprint, the starter is 188% of the flour weight.
The onions were left-over confit (red onions braised in sherry vinegar); the sauerkraut was a home-made Christmas present from our friend Richard Hopewell.
I treated the dough the same way I would handle a wholemeal rye – mixed all the ingredients, kneaded them a bit in the bowl with a plastic scraper, shaped with wet hands, dropped straight in an oiled bread tin, smoothed the top.
Very slow rise; about ¾” after six hours.
Baked at 250C for 10 minutes and a further 50 minutes at 180%C. Turned the oven off, de-tinned the loaf and returned to the oven for 20 minutes with the door wedged open.
Moist, cakey crumb; interesting flavour (in a good way); good with cheese.
If you are interested in more crazy Dutch breads you can find Banana Bread here and Cheese bread here, both back in 2013.
The PArtisan Baker 