Partybrot
Wed, 19 July, 2017
This was a real puzzle. I was debating the plans for my next bread exercise, trying to think of something I’d not baked yet when The Weather Man suggested ‘those little white and wholemeal things baked together’ that I apparently baked once or twice in the distant past.
He’s good like that, is TWM. He’ll casually throw a hint of an idea in the air, making me spend half a day trying to remember what the dish or recipe actually was and how I could get hold of it again. Like the time he said he really enjoyed ‘those pasta shapes with the kind of tomatoey sauce, only it was peppers’. Right – go figure. He meant veggie lasagne, incidentally.
This time I did have a vague recollection of the pull-apart, tear and share, chessboard bread which consisted of rolls shaped from white and brown bread dough. Having googled all the above search options it proved infuriatingly impossible to trace. Of course, you might say I could have just made some basic brown and white bread dough, I’m capable of that. But my obsessive nature refused to give up until I found precisely the original recipe.
Which I did – via a maze of websites featuring bread, message boards in various languages and a stroke-of-genius look into my oldest Bread Machine (Jennie Shapter) handbook. There it was: Partybrot. Traditional German or Swiss sharing bread, perfect for potluck as no one will ever think to bring bread to those dos. Well done finding that – and very easily baked, by the way.
partybrot
Servings: makes 19 small rollsTime: 3 hours
INGREDIENTS
- For the white rolls:
- 225g (2 cups) strong white bread flour
- 1 ½ tsp caster sugar
- 1 tsp fine salt
- 5g fresh or ½ tsp fast action yeast
- 15g (1 tbsp.) butter
- 145ml (scant 2/3 cup) warm milk
- For the wholemeal rolls:
- 175g (1 ½ cup) wholemeal bread flour
- 75g (¾ cup) strong white bread flour
- 1 ½ tsp caster sugar
- 1 tsp fine salt
- 5g fresh or ½ tsp fast action yeast
- 25g (2 tbsp.) butter
- 175ml (¾ cup) warm water
- For the topping:
- 1 egg yolk beaten with 2 tbsp. cold water
- 1 tbsp. poppy seeds
- 1 tbsp. oat or barley flakes
METHOD
1. Place all the ingredients for the white rolls in a bowl; and all the ingredients for the wholemeal rolls in another – crumble or sprinkle the yeast directly over the flours. Mix each to a rough dough using an electric mixer with a dough hook attachment or your hands. Turn each dough out onto the worktop and knead it in turn, until smooth and elastic, 5 minutes each. Return each to its bowl, cover with cling film and leave in a warm place for 1 hour.
2. Prepare a round tin or baking dish about 25 – 30cm (10in) in diameter; brush the sides with butter and line the bottom with baking parchment.
3. Turn both portions of dough onto the worktop and divide the wholemeal one into 10 pieces (46g each) and the white into 9 (45g each). Roll each piece tightly into a ball.
4. Place 12 balls evenly around the outer edge of the tin alternating the white with the wholemeal ones. Next place 6 balls in the inner ring and the final wholemeal one in the centre. Cover the tin with cling film or place it in a plastic bag and leave to prove in a warm place for 40 minutes; until the rolls have doubled in size and are all touching each other. In the meantime preheat the oven to 200C/400F/gas 6.
5. When the rolls have risen, brush them all with the egg wash and sprinkle the poppy seeds on the white ones; and the oat or barley flakes on the wholemeal ones.
6. Bake for 30-35 minutes until golden. Cool in the tin for 5 minutes, then carefully turn out onto a wire rack.
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