07/04/07

Semolina Raisin Fennel Bread-II

I had originally intended to do Tom Cat's Semolina Filone but when I saw the percentage of Semolina Flour called for in the recipe, I changed my mind. I did not have the real Durum flour. I only had the gritty Semolina flour which might have worked for a smaller percentage. In the end, I decided to do something that Amy's Bread in NY is famous for, its Semolina Raisin Fennel Bread. I did not have the recipe on hand so I made one up with 25% semolina flour. In the past, I had used Atta flour which some sources said was Durum flour. However, I am now not so sure about that.  Apparently, 10% of wheat planted in India is Durum wheat. This is called Macaroni wheat. However, regular wheat is also planted in India and Atta is just whole-wheat. The Durum wheat is milled into two grades, the coarser grit is called Rava while the finer grit is called Suji. However, the milling is still not fine enough to called flour. Those milled fine enough is called patent Durum. So although Atta is cheap enough here, it is doubtful that it is made from Durum wheat. Atta is mainly used for making Chappati, an unleavened wholewheat cooked on a griddle and it is likely to be just regular whole-wheat flour.

Anyway, I thought it was worth making the Semolina Raisin Bread with my lazyman's method. Again. the amount of yeast used was really, really tiny and the following day, it was sufficiently raised. I should have trusted my initial judgement but in the end, I lost confidence and decided to add in a teaspoon of yeast as I thought the dough was insufficiently raised. The next time round, I am going to stick to my guns and not make it with the original quantity of yeast. I am quite sure that the bread would have turned out better if I had followed my original procedure and not changed course halfway out of diffidence.

However, I am heartened by the performance of the lazyman's method. Despite the small amounts of yeast, it was still able to leaven a dough laden with so much fruit. The method suits my schedules really well. I can soon tell people that I make my breads lazing in the living room couch. :)