Vitalbrot Recipes

VITALBROT

Steps:

• Mix whole wheat flour and white flour together with 2 teaspoons salt, 30 gr. flax seed and 1/2 teaspoons coriander.
• Mix milk and joghurt together in a saucepan and warm. Add yeast and sugar, stir until completely combined.
• Pour milk mixture, little by little into flour and knead thoroughly. The dough will be very firm. (I ended up adding about 50ml more milk).
• Let dough rise, covered, in an oven set at 30°C for 2 hours. After 2 hours punch the dough down and knead once more. Form into a round loaf.
• Brush the loaf with water and sprinkle with the remaining flax seed. Press softly into dough.
• After you have shaped the dough into a loaf preheat the oven to 200°C Bake the bread on the middle rack for 50-60 minutes.
• This bread is very crusty.

VOLLKORNBROT

Steps:

• Soak the rye berries in about 6 cups of the hot spring water, or at least enough to cover berries by 1-inch. Let stand 8 hours or overnight (if the water becomes completely absorbed before soaking time has ended, add more hot spring water to cover). Drain and reserve the soaking liquid. Add enough fresh room-temperature spring water to the reserved soaking liquid to measure 6 cups total. Reserve. Combine the starter, rye berries and reserved 6 cups water in a 6-quart bowl. Break up the starter well with a wooden spoon and stir until it loosens and the mixture is slightly frothy. Add 1 cup (5 1/2 ounces) of the rye flour and all the cracked rye. Stir well until combined. Add the salt and remaining flour. Stir until combined and the mixture is wet and sticky. Take the dough's temperature -- the ideal is 78 degrees. Cover with a clean damp towel and put in a moderately warm (74 to 80 degrees) draft-free place.
• Note: If the dough temperature is higher than 78 degrees put it in a cooler than 78 degree place, like the refrigerator, until the dough cools to 78 degrees. If it is lower than 78 degrees, put it in a warmer than 78 degree place until the dough warms to 78 degrees. The point is to try to keep the dough at 78 degrees during its fermentation. If you have to move the dough, be gentle and don't jostle it, or the dough might deflate.
• The dough will become spongy but not springy, distinctly sour-smelling and increased in volume by about 1/4. Generously grease 2 (5 by 9 by 3-inch) loaf pans with vegetable shortening and dust with rye flour. Turn the dough into the prepared pans. Smooth the tops with a wet thin flexible cake spatula. Cover the loaves with a clean damp towel or plastic wrap and put in a moderately warm (74 to 80 degree) draft free place until the dough has domed slightly and increased in volume again by 1/4. Bake on center rack of a preheated 300 degree oven until the loaves have shrunk from the sides of the pan and the tops are dark brown and a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean, about 2 1/2 to 3 hours. Remove the loaves from the pans and hold the loaves upside down. Strike the bottoms firmly with your finger. If the sound is hollow, the breads are done. If it doesn't sound hollow, bake 15 minutes longer. Cool the pans for 10 minutes, then remove and cool completely on wire racks. Let the bread rest 24 to 36 hours before eating. It is very moist in the center when removed from oven, but as it cools the moisture distributes evenly throughout the bread. It will keep for weeks at room temperature wrapped tightly in plastic wrap.

WORLD'S GREATEST VEGETABLE BROTH

Steps:

• Preheat oven to 450 degrees F (230 degrees C).
• Remove leaves and tender inner parts of celery and set aside.
• Toss onions, carrots, tomatoes, bell peppers and turnips with olive oil. Place vegetables in a roasting pan and place them in the 450 degrees F (230 degrees C) oven. Stir the vegetable every 15 minutes. Cook until all of the vegetables have browned and the onions start to caramelize, this will take over one hour.
• Put the browned vegetables, celery, garlic, cloves, bay leaf, pepper corns, Italian parsley and water into a large stock pot. Bring to a full boil. Reduce heat to simmer. Cook uncovered until liquid is reduced by half.
• Pour the broth through a colander, catching the broth in a large bowl or pot. The liquid caught in the bowl or pot is your vegetable broth it can be used immediately or stored for later use. Although the vegetables are no longer necessary for your broth they are delicious to eat hot or cold, don't waste them!