Malted Sourdough Bread

I bought some malt extract from a health food store and it has been sitting in the fridge and I don't really use a lot of it, so I decided to look for a bread recipe that uses it.

Everyday Malted Brown Bread Recipe (from here)

700g brown or wholemeal bread flour
200g white bread flour
80g malt extract
80ml sunflower or vegetable oil
4 tsp dried active yeast
30g demerara or light brown sugar
3tsp maldon sea salt, crushed (if you use regular table salt you will need to add more - try 4tsp)
540ml water

I did a few changes to the original recipe. The above recipe uses yeast but I am more keen to use my rye sourdough starter. I also halved the recipe to make a smaller loaf. As I don't have brown or wholemeal bread flour, I used normal bread flour and whole wheat flour instead.

Malted Sourdough Bread Recipe

340g bread flour
100g whole wheat flour (to be used in the levain)
260ml water (divided 100ml + 160ml)
20g sourdough starter (100% hydration = 10g rye + 10ml water)
40g malt extract
40ml vegetable oil
15g light brown sugar
9g salt (Baker's percent: 2%)

Total flour = 450g (including the flour in the starter)
Total water = 270ml (including the water in the starter)
Hydration = 60% (270/450*100)

Levain
Add 100g whole wheat flour and 100ml water to 20g rye sourdough starter. Mix well and ferment for 12 to 16 hours.

My sourdough starter is normally in the fridge hibernating if I am not baking. A few days before using it, I will take it out of the fridge and feed it daily to wake it up and strengthen it. Sourdough starters are different from commercial yeast. Because it is natural, it tends to take a longer time for the bread to ferment and proof unlike using those hyperactive commercial yeast. There are some advantages of eating sourdough bread which you can spend some time reading if you are interested.

Levain created with sourdough starter

I left mine for 21 hours due to work commitments. As seen below, the levain is now very bubbly and has raised in height. If you give the sourdough a sniff, you can detect traces of fruity smell with some sourish tang as well.

Doubled in height and bubbly

Lots of bubbles

Main Dough
Using a mixing bowl, mix the levain with the rest of the water (160ml) to dissolve it. Add in all the other ingredients except the salt and mix well. Leave it covered to autolyse for 30 to 60 mins.

After that, add in the salt and mix well and knead the dough.

Shaggy mass after adding all the ingredients

You can knead the dough using a stand mixer or by hand until gluten is developed. Let it rest in a covered bowl for 2 hours to bulk ferment at room temperature.

Dough that has been knead and left to rest

After 2 hours, shape the dough into a boule and placed it in a oiled and floured bowl. I floured the bowl with semolina which is why it looked so grainy. You can use corn meal or rice flour as well to prevent sticking. Cover it with cling film and put it in the fridge overnight. That will allow slower fermentation and proofing which will result in nicer flavours in the bread.

Dough is shaped and placed seam-side up in a oiled and floured bowl

The next day, take it out and leave it at room temperature until the dough has proofed enough for baking. If your bread proofed overnight in the fridge and is ready to bake, you can bake it straight from the oven, there is no need to wait for the dough to come to room temperature. You can score the dough to help get a better/more even rise in the oven.

Preheat the oven to 210C, transfer the dough to a baking sheet/stone and bake for 30 mins. You can use steam for the initial 15 minutes.

The end result - Malted Sourdough Bread

I could have baked the bread at 230C instead of 210C, that might result in a better rise. Also, maybe increase the hydration of the dough to 65% instead of just 60%.

If I were to use this recipe again, I would replace the water with Guinness and make a Malted Sourdough Guinness Bread. :)

Savory Bacon Jam

I was introduced to bacon jam by a colleague one day. Being a lover of unhealthy food (tasty food is usually unhealthy, haha!), I went to a local cafe (Jewel Café+Bar) that serves homemade bacon jam to try it out for breakfast the very next morning with my significant half, Esther.

Bacon jam doesn't taste like the typical fruit jam at all. It tasted like a fusion of bacon, bak kwa (a type of Chinese BBQ pork jerky) and caramelised char siew (a type of Cantonese BBQ pork). Don't get me wrong, I absolutely love the taste of it. It is oily (bacon fat, duh!), sweet, salty, spicy and has a tinge of sourness with an underlying coffee aroma. In the cafe we went to, it was served with chunky slices of baguette (the dish is called Fat Soldiers, haha!). I think bacon jam goes well with everything, but that's just me...

"Fat Soldiers" from Jewel Café+Bar

On the way back from the cafe, I was already googling for recipes of bacon jam. I didn't know that it is so popular yet very simple to make as well. And as a bonus, there can be many variations to it. You need something sweet (sugar/maple syrup/honey), something salty (comes with the bacon), something sour (apple cider vinegar/balsamic vinegar/Worcestershire sauce), something spicy (mustard/hot sauce/paprika/chili powder/pepper) to give some heat and coffee. Most recipes include aromatics as well such as garlic, shallots and onions. You can add whatever ingredient you want as long as you stick to the above criteria. Some recipes even add a touch of alcohol like bourbon.

Being the experimental me, I looked for the most appealing recipe, and added extra ingredients from other recipes to round up the taste. The only "difficult" part of making bacon jam is the simmering and stirring to reduce the mass into semi-solid sludge. You can use a slow cooker for the simmering stage.

Without further delays, I present to you, our experimental bacon jam...

Ingredients
2kg bacon, (we used 1kg bacon back and 1kg streaky bacon)
3 big white onions (sweet variety), peeled and roughly sliced
7 to 10 shallot, peeled and roughly sliced
5 garlic cloves, peeled and roughly chopped
250ml pure maple syrup
60ml balsamic vinegar
2 tablespoons Dijon mustard
2 teaspoons Worcestershire sauce
100g brown sugar
freshly ground black pepper to taste
salt to taste (you can use the drained liquid obtained while cooking the bacon, see below)

120ml strong brewed coffee (how strong you want it to be is up to you, I actually used 2 tbsp of instant espresso)

Water if the jam is too dry during simmering
Alcohol (optional, maybe during festive seasons)

You have to cut the bacon into thin slices and cooked them over medium high heat until the fat is rendered and the bacon bits are brown and crisp. Do not over-cook them at this stage or you will get very tough bits.

Half-way through, there will be a lot of liquid released by the bacon. Drain it out to reduce the saltiness. You can always add some of the fluid back later on. If there is a lot of oil released when the bacon is crisp, you can drain it into a separate bowl as well in case you want to add back some at a later stage. Because we used half bacon back and half streaky bacon, it wasn't that oily.

Sliced bacon in frying pan

Once the bacon is crisp and you can add in the aromatics (garlic, shallot and onion). Cook using medium heat until the aromatics are softened. During this time, you can mix the brown sugar, maple syrup, vinegar, Dijon mustard and Worcestershire sauce in a bowl and stir to mix.

Cooking the bacon with the aromatics

We had to transfer the contents into a HappyCall pot since it is bigger than our frying pan and is non-sticky as well.

Once the aromatics are softened, pour in the prepared sauce and mix.

Add in black pepper and the salty liquid collected previously. Adjust according to your taste and preference.

Pour in the coffee once you are satisfied. Bring the whole mixture to a boil then reduce the heat to simmer. Cover the pot with a lid to prevent it from drying up too fast. Stir occasionally. You can use a slow cooker at this stage. If the mixture is too dry, don't add any more of the salty liquid or you might end up making it too salty. You can add some water and continue simmering. We simmered ours for about 4 hours. During that time, we were making macarons, so it wasn't that boring. ;)

Once that is done, off the heat and let it cool down before using a blender to blend it. Before blending, if you find the bacon jam not oily enough, you can add in the oil you collected previously when you were frying the bacon.

You can decide on the consistency of the bacon jam. We prefer ours to have some bits and pieces in it so we only blended it slightly instead of blending it into a paste. If you like to drink it like a milkshake, then by all means, blend it at full speed for a few minutes. :p

Bacon jam with garnishing

I think our version looks nicer and tastes better than the cafe's version. But I may be bias.  :) 

The bigger bacon bits were added in just for the photo shoot. But you can actually fry up extra bacon bits and add them after the bacon jam has been blended. There is no hard and fast rules to this recipe.

Bacon jam to complement Eggs Benedict or is it the other way round? :)

Esther cooked up something just for the bacon jam photo shoot. I noticed the Eggs Benedict tasted even better with the bacon jam! She dressed it up so well that she managed to trick her sister into thinking that this photo came from a cafe. LOL!

During the festive seasons, instead of adding water to simmer, try using red wine. We will be doing that and will post how it taste after that.

PS. All things (good or bad) must come in moderation. Please don't eat this everyday and end up with a heart attack!