Multigrain Struan

Wow, this is tasty. The oats give it such a good flavor. I love the mix of grains and the different textures they offer. Definitely a winner!

Preheated the oven to 425°F.

The loaves proofed for an hour, and right before baking I cut a slit down the middle of each loaf with a serrated knife. When they went in the oven I lowered the temp to 350°F. They baked for a total of 40 minutes, rotating the pan after 20 minutes.

The dough fermented for an hour, then I shaped it into two smaller round(ish) loaves. I placed them on a parchment-lined baking sheet (also sprayed the parchment with cooking spray). Brushed the tops with water and sprinkled with poppy seeds.

I've decided not to take step-by-step photos this time because the process is basically the same as before.

Ingredients:
multigrain soaker
14 oz starter
2 oz whole wheat flour
5/8 tsp (5 g) salt
2 1/4 tsp yeast
2 oz honey
.5 oz canola oil

Extra flour needed: 4.5 oz

Combined as before (except I didn't have to cut the soaker into smaller pieces - it poured).

My soaker this time was pretty goopy, not at all like my last one, which had a consistency more like an actual dough. It took about a cup of extra flour to make up for it.

I decided to make a multigrain bread next. The whole wheat was good, but a little boring. I'm following the recipe for Multigrain Struan and there isn't a specific combination of grains suggested. I went with steel-cut oats, millet, quinoa, amaranth, flax seeds, and sesame seeds. The steel-cut oats, millet, and quinoa needed to be precooked to soften them up. I cooked the millet and quinoa together, 2 tbsp of each simmered with 1/2 cup of water until the water was absorbed. Then I cooked about 1/4 cup of the oats with 3/4 cup water for about 15 minutes, stirring occasionally. The recipe calls for 6 ounces total of any combination of grains, and my cooked grains ended up weighing more than that (between 7 and 8 ounces). I used about 5 ounces of the grains I'd cooked, then added flax seeds, amaranth, and sesame seeds to bring it up to 6 ounces.



The grains are mixed with 2 ounces of whole wheat flour, 6 ounces milk, and 1/2 tsp salt.



My resulting mixture is much thinner than my last soaker. I wonder if the partially cooked oats had too much extra moisture in them. Hopefully they'll absorb a lot of the liquid. All the grains I used were pretty coarse, so that probably has something to do with it too. I guess I'll just need more flour in the final dough.

My last loaf started to get moldy a couple days ago. I've noticed that homemade bread never lasts long enough for me to go through it all, so I've decided to make two smaller, free-form loaves this time and freeze one of them.