Most people know little about the cuisine of Finland: it is famous for neither air croissants, nor fragrant sausages, nor rich borsch. Ask someone you know about Finnish national dishes, and the answer is likely to be confused silence. Nevertheless, one of the products, beloved in this northern country, is well known not only abroad. This is the national rye Finnish bread.
Bread is the head of everything
Without exaggeration, we can say that bread is present on the table of any civilization in the world. In France, they eat crispy tender baguette, in Italy - ciabatta, in America - bagels, in Turkey - pita. Despite the fact that the shape and composition of bread in different countries can radically differ, it still remains one of the most important components of nutrition.
In Finland, they are very sensitive to their traditions. Due to the climate, wheat cultivation here has been difficult for a long time. Therefore, rye bread, unlike other countries of the world, was not only on the tables of the poor, but also on the rich feasts of the rich.
Modern technology allows you to grow any volume of all kinds of cereals, however, like many centuries ago, the Finns prefer their traditional rye bread with yeast or sourdough. The first has a more airy structure, crumbles less, the second is more dense, knocked down, seeds and nuts are often added to it.
Buns, loaves, loaves
Despite the processes of globalization and industrialization, the Finnish bread market is still owned by small bakeries: bakeries can be counted on the fingers of one hand, even supermarkets prefer to buy their products from private bakers.
But the number of tiny bakeries tends to infinity. The Finns themselves pack up bakery products exclusively in the neighborhood: in the morning they take large bags of buns, have lunch with rye cakes or bread, and buy a large loaf for the whole family for dinner.
Such bakeries are not just shops. Here you will be served, as they say, with a soul: in the mornings, the baker or his deputy personally meets each client, does not fail to say a few words, and he knows the regular visitors by their names. Many establishments serve breakfast or offer hot coffee.
Pride of any hostess
Despite the availability of bread and the opportunity at any moment to buy it in a shop around the corner, each Finnish housewife carefully stores the recipe for bread dough, and sometimes the sourdough passed on to her from her ancestors. On holidays, aromas of fresh pastries are heard from every home.
However, it is not necessary only on holidays: after all, leaven is a very tender substance, and the best way to preserve it is to use it. Previously, two furnaces were built in every Finnish house: one for heating, and the second for baking bread. It was difficult and expensive to drown it, and therefore they baked a lot right away. The traditional form of Finnish bread is not at all familiar to us loaves or loaves. The rye cake from this country is round, flat, with a large hole in the middle. It is called reykaleipya. This was done so that the finished products could be easily stored in suspension under the ceiling.
Modern housewives do not have to hang garlands of bread all over the house; moreover, they no longer need to heat the stoves: all this has been successfully replaced with modern bread makers and ovens. However, the tradition is strong and Finland’s most delicious buns can be tasted by rare bakers engaged in traditional pastries. They say they have a very special taste.
Sourdough against yeast
Today there are endless debates about the dangers of yeast. Adherents of this theory claim that the fungus, getting into the human intestines, begins to multiply there exponentially and, thus, acidify the body, “steal” useful substances and upset the natural balance of microflora.
Their opponents are of the opinion that bread yeast dies at high temperatures, and therefore can not cause serious harm in the finished product. None of the theories have yet been scientifically proven.
National cakes, those that the Finns ate for centuries, baked without the use of yeast, because it had to be stored for a long time. The sourdough of the family was cherished, and the knowledge of how to bake bread from rye flour was passed down from generation to generation. Today, ancient recipes are stored only in families of hereditary bakers.
A simple recipe for the perfect sourdough
Before looking for a recipe for bread dough, you should take care of the raw materials from which it will be baked. This primarily relates to leaven: after all, not every housewife has a familiar Finnish who is ready to share a “live” mixture of flour and water, and therefore she will have to cook it herself.
Growing rye sourdough is much easier than wheat: it is not so whimsical and even beginners get it. Do not be discouraged, even if it does not work out the first time: continue to feed your brainchild, and if not on the fourth, then on the seventh day it will definitely work.
In the glass jar, mix the same amount of flour and water. Do not take large volumes: such a sourdough will require a lot of top dressing, but this is not necessary for us. However, too small a quantity can make the growing process almost endless.
The ideal proportion is 30 g of flour per 30 g of water. Leave the future yeast for a day at room temperature. And the next day, feed her again with the same amount of water and flour. Continue in the same vein for 3-4 days, and then throw away half and feed again.
On the 5-7th day, bubbles will appear in the leaven and it will begin to increase in size faster. When it will increase 3-4 times in 4-5 hours, it will be possible to bake bread.
Simple roll on dough
The Finnish bread recipe is very different from region to region and from home to home. Somewhere they use a mixture of whole wheat flour and rye, and somewhere exclusively rye. Adding seeds is also not necessary: during the first samples it is advisable to refuse them, because they make the already doughier batter heavier, which can lead to bread roll falling and a damp middle.
Start experiments only when you are confident in the quality of your yeast.
So, how to bake rye bread from flour, water and salt? It is amazing that such a fragrant and tasty bakery product includes so few ingredients.
Prepare the starter, put 50 g in a separate jar, feed it and leave it on the table for a day before baking. Leftovers can be safely stored in the refrigerator. Take 250 g of flour and 375 g of water, add to the sourdough and mix thoroughly: this is the basis for the future dough. She should stay in a warm place. If everything is done correctly, then by morning you will find a bubbling mass that has increased in volume.
Add another 250 g flour and 10 g salt. Knead thoroughly until smooth. It’s not worth zealous: we have dough made from rye flour, not wheat flour, there is no gluten in it, and therefore we can forget about gluten.
In a large bowl, add a little vegetable oil, evenly distribute, form some kind of cone from the dough, cover with foil and leave the future Finnish bread for 2 hours to ferment.
After that, pour out the dough again, sprinkle with flour, place in the molds and send to a warm place for proofing for 1-2 hours. Constantly monitor the condition of your future bread: if the loaf has already risen well (2-3 times), then it can be sent for baking.
Heat the oven to 250 degrees, reduce to 230, place the form with the dough there, cover it with an iron bowl and bake for 30 minutes. Remove the cap and bake the bread for another half an hour. Leave to cool on the wire rack.
Ripening
Perhaps, one of the most important points in the recipe for rye bread on the sourdough in the oven is the maturation stage. Many people know that fresh baking is unhealthy and has an extremely negative effect on the health of the liver and gall bladder.
But yesterday does not pose any danger. However, in the case of rye bread, ripening will not only help to reveal the taste and aroma, but also finally stabilizes the condition of all ingredients.
Freshly baked bread is often crumpled if you start cutting it too early. In the case of Finnish rolls, you can not only ruin the structure by premature cutting, but also find a moist center. Due to the characteristics of the dough, Finnish bread should be kept in a cool, dry place for at least 12 hours.
Giant finnish bagel
Reikäleipä is somewhat reminiscent of American bagels: the same tortilla with a hole in the middle, only huge, like ordinary bread and made from rye flour. They eat, generously spreading butter, adding salmon or bacon and drinking milk.
For baking, take 50 g of yeast, feed it in the morning and leave it overnight in a warm place. In the morning, add 200 g of rye flour to it (or a mixture of rye and whole grain in any proportion), 10 g of salt and knead a smooth supple dough.
Form a round loaf and make a small hole in it. Gently twist the future bread on your finger so that the hole enlarges and becomes smoother. Send it for proofing for 40-50 minutes. And then bake in an oven preheated to 250 degrees for 20-25 minutes. Let the bread ripen for 12-15 hours and can serve.
More delicious, more healthy
However, as in most European countries, the assortment of a Finnish bakery is not limited to two types of bread. An ordinary rye loaf can and should be made even tastier and healthier: just add nuts, seeds, bran or even oatmeal to it.
Here are the top useful ingredients that you can pour into the dough without a twinge of conscience and without harm to the figure:
- Sunflower seeds will enrich the final product with useful oils, vitamins A, B, C and D, as well as zinc, magnesium and iron.
- Pumpkin seeds will lower blood sugar, relieve parasites and help restore youth.
- Poppy will improve sleep and improve digestion.
- Olives have antioxidant properties, increase hemoglobin and give the bread a spicy taste in Mediterranean cuisine.
- Flax seeds or chia seeds are useful for gastrointestinal problems.
- Sesame improves the nervous system.
- Spicy herbs and other seasonings.
Add correctly
Inexperienced bakers often encounter the problem that bread, according to the usual recipe, when various seeds are added, suddenly sags, remains raw, or vice versa, quickly turns stale and leaves dry. How to deal with this?
The main trouble of beginning housewives is that they do not know some of the secrets that experienced kneading machines use. First, any seeds should be soaked in water at room temperature with the addition of salt for 1-2 hours before adding them to future bread. Secondly, all additives should be introduced before the main batch: it will be easier to adjust the amount of water or flour necessary to obtain the correct consistency.
The last point does not apply to dried fruits and large nuts, such as walnuts: here, they just need to be put the very last, otherwise they will lose their structure and spoil the final product.
Bread box against cellophane
And now a little about how to store finished bread. Birch bark and wooden bread bins are best suited for this: they provide an optimal flow of air, preserving bakery products from drying out and mold. There you can put an apple slice or a small piece of sugar: this way your bread will live a few more days longer.
If the bread box is not at home - use paper bags or linen napkins. Cellophane bags are best suited for storing homemade bread: they do not allow air to pass through, promoting moisture condensation and mold and the growth of harmful microbes.