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This golden grain transforms ordinary crusts!
Published 18 days agoΒ β’Β 4 min read
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Potato focaccia, pane Siciliano, and more
This week has had me baking often with durum wheat in focaccia Pugliese (focaccia with potato), pizza, and even sourdough discard biscuits.
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Durum wheat is one of my favorite grains to work with. This hard, amber-colored wheat brings a beautiful golden hue to your loaves and a slightly sweet, nutty, truly distinctive flavor. The high protein content creates a very strong dough. The final dough can range from chewy (great for large loaves) to crispy (great for pizza and focaccia), depending on how it's used in a formula.
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When coarsely milled into semolina, durum's characteristic yellow crumb and crisp crust really shine through. I've found that incorporating even just a small percentage of durum adds complexity to the flavor and texture profile. If you want to expand your sourdough repertoire, durum offers that perfect balance of workability and unique character that will have your baking friends asking for your secrets.
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Where can you buy durum? I've actually seen it in my local market from time to time, but usually, I order a few bags online and keep them in the fridge for when I want to play.
If you don't have durum and don't want to place a specialty order, use Khorasan or whole wheat in its place!
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In this week's newsletter:
Recipes: focaccia Pugliese, pizza al taglio, pane Siciliano
Baking Help: What's wrong with my starter feeding ratios?
Sourdough Links: Bakers on TASTE
π Focaccia Pugliese (Focaccia w/ Potato)
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This special focaccia has cooked and mashed potato added to the dough alongside a hefty percentage of durum. What you get is a yellow-colored dough that's super soft, chewy, and incredibly flavorful.
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I dare say, once you try this focaccia, you might never bake another without potato π
Cooking pizza in a pan in the home oven is the ultimate pizza hack. Once you get the dough into the pan, you can take your time to top it, and there's no complicated transfer into the hot oven.
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Plus, once cooked, if it doesn't all get eaten straight away (how could it not, though?), it reheats incredibly well.
This beautiful golden specimen is made with 100% durum flour. The crumb is tighter than a modern wheat-based loaf, but gosh, the color and flavor are absolutely stunning.
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This bread makes incredible sandwiches and the nutty flavor from the sesame crust is captivating.
Here's a great example of a dough that includes a small percentage of durum (only 5%), but it's enough to taste and see the impact: a golden crust that has an unmistakable crispness.
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I cooked this in my wood-fired oven outside, but you'd get the same effect in a ripping hot home oven on a baking surface.
Using The Perfect Loaf's sourdough discard biscuit recipe, I swapped out 20% of the wheat flour for durum for an extra golden biscuit with a lovely flavor and texture boost.
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You'll love this simple swap: substitute 50g of the all-purpose flour for durum "extra fancy," a.k.a. semolina rimacinata.
Hey there, fellow bread enthusiast! When you join our TPL membership, you'll immediately unlock my comprehensive baking spreadsheetsβthe exact tools I use to track hydration, temperatures, and fermentation timesβplus the complete archive of past recipes, detailed quicksheets, and my exclusive 100+ page eBook filled with recipes you won't find anywhere else.
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But what I'm most proud of is our vibrant community where you can post photos of your latest naturally leavened masterpiece, troubleshoot that tricky high-hydration dough, or simply connect with fellow bakers who understand why you're checking your starter at midnightβwe're all here, geeking out about bread together π€
My starter is 17 days old, and I started with whole wheat and am now incorporating some AP flour. I feed a 1:1:1 ratio once a day. I feed around 5:30 pm. When I go to bed around 9:30, there are some bubbles but no rise. By around 5:00 am, it has doubled/tripled in the last 3 days. It has a very strong acetone smell right now, and Iβm being told that itβs hungry; feed more, and Iβm also told not to change anything.
Yes, feeding it 1:1:1 once a day will likely not be enough. I usually feed mine with 10g leftover ripe starter (the carryover), 100g flour, and 100g water. That's a much larger ratio! This lasts me only 12 hours before it needs another feeding. Try doing your feeding ratio at least twice daily, or switch to something more like mine. This depends on the temperature in your kitchen, though, so it will need some adjustment through the seasons. β
βSourdough Myths Debunked, Love For the Bread Machine with Richard Hart & Lucas Volger (TASTE; iTunes). Hosted by my good buddy Matt Rodbard at TASTE, this episode is just so great. Richard Hart goes into his history as a baker, starting at Tartine, then to Hart in Copenhagen, and now to his new venture in Mexico City (this might be one of the funniest episodes yet). Then, Lukas dips into the dark arts of using a bread machine and how they can help you make great bread daily.
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Happy baking!
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Maurizio Leo
P.S. See how I've been using durum over at Instagram (tap the little right arrow to scroll through).
Want to make bakery-quality sourdough bread from home? Subscribe for the best sourdough guides and recipes to take your bread from ordinary to incredible.
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