Buckwheat Bread

Want a bread that ticks all the boxes?

Since discovering this recipe on a friend’s fridge, I’ve said goodbye to ever ‘kneading’ any other!

This is not a yeast bread, it isn’t made with flour, and while it takes ‘a day and half’ to complete, in reality the steps are simple and just takes a little planning ahead. While not a great contender for sandwiches in my opinion, for toast or toasted sandwiches, it’s a clear winner. It only has 3 basic ingredients – buckwheat, water and salt – but you can add your own twists as you prefer.

Ingredients:

3 – 4C Buckwheat Groats

1C Water

1t Salt

• Soak the groats in plenty of water overnight.
• Drain in the morning. This will take about half an hour at most. You do not have to rinse the soaked buckwheat.  
• Now the soaked groats are blended with salt and water. If you started with 3 cups dry buckwheat, you’ll add 1 cup water and 1 teaspoon of salt. This is the time for adding any dry ingredients that need really good blending, such as Turmeric. If you make more than one loaf, or bigger loaves, remember to increase the salt…it really is necessary to a good flavour.

But wait!

Read on….

• You will end up with a creamy mixture similar to a thick pancake batter that you pour back into a clean bowl. This blended mix is now covered with a clean cloth or plastic wrap, and left for another 12 – 24 hours. This depends greatly on how warm the environment is. It will go through a natural fermentation process and begin to rise. Too warm for too long, and you won’t like the smell that emerges – although it’s still quite edible and the smell is mostly gone once cooked, you don’t want to put people off trying it, especially those already predisposed to reject anything new or too healthy…
• There is a sweet spot, when it’s risen to about one third bigger than it was. It will have a nice soft ‘frothiness’ almost, and this is when you pour it into a greased bread tin, and bake for 70 minutes, at 180 degrees Celcius. If you’re too busy to bake, and you’re worried about it going too far, put it in the fridge until you can. The change to a colder environment will slow down the fermenting process.
• Just before baking is the time to add other ingredients. After I’ve blended the buckwheat and put it aside to do it’s fermenting process, I also start soaking a bowl of Pumpkin seeds and Sunflower seeds, about a ¾ cup of each. (This is to ‘activate’ the seed). I rinse and drain these seeds, and stir them through the buckwheat just before baking. At that point I also add some smaller seeds that I don’t worry about soaking – like Sesame, Linseed etc.
• Once your bread comes out of the oven, remove it from the tin, leave it to cool for an hour or so, then slice it all at once. It’s much easier at this stage than if you leave it till later, so you can get lovely thin slices – and then we immediately eat the still warm, fresh crunchy crusts!! I make two loaves at a time, one goes in the fridge to use up first, and one in the freezer. When you end up with just enough slices to last the next two days, you know it’s time to get more buckwheat soaking.

All the best to you and your buckwheat, as you embark on this new relationship! It’s fun to have connection with live food, and you will no doubt invent your own favourite flavours as you work with it. If at first you don’t succeed, toast it and turn it into croutons! And try again. Someone in your family isn’t convinced? Make a fruit loaf version! Replace the savoury spices with sweet – like Cinnamon, Cardamon, a touch of Ginger – and add soaked dried fruit for little sweet bursts. Lashings of butter and honey, and who could resist?

Ideas for additions, approximately:

¾C each of Sunflower and Pumpkin seeds

1C Whole hemp seeds

¾C mixed smaller seeds, e.g. Sesame, Linseed, Chia

Spices: Turmeric and Black Pepper for savoury, or Cinnamon/Clove/Cardamom/Ginger etc for sweet

1C soaked dried fruit: Raisins, Currants, Dates, Feijoa, Chopped preserved Ginger

Serving Suggestions:

Avocado, Hemp seeds, Salt and Pepper, a squeeze of Lime or Lemon

All the usual toast toppings: Honey, Marmite, Peanut Butter, Tahini…

Great with soup! Especially rubbed with garlic

Cheese and Chutney, grilled

Beans, beans, beans – like Nachos on toast

Open Sandwiches: Whatever you like to have with Salad – Haloumi, Chicken, Smoked Salmon, Fried Tofu

Add your favourites in the comments!