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Baking genuine Russian-style black bread in a “Yankistani” kitchen: Can it be done? Posted by on Jun 4, 2012 in language

Выпечка настоящего чёрного хлеба на “пиндостанской” кухне: возможно ли это?

In one of her Easter posts, Yelena mentioned the challenge of making baked goods — such as the sweet Easter кулич — from дрожжевое тесто (“yeast dough”). And indeed, yeast loaves can take a bit more practice, and are more labor-intensive, than “quick breads” raised with пищевая сода (“baking soda”) or пекарский порошок (“baking powder”).

But her comment reminded me of my own опыты (“experiments”) with reverse-engineering чёрный хлеб (“Russian-style black bread”) at home.

This is something I’ve been tinkering with for years, and I’ll say right up front that although I’m very pleased with the latest results, my рецепт (“recipe”) is still only a хитроумное подражание (“cunning imitation”) of the original — so maybe I should’ve put the word настоящий (“genuine; real”) в кавычках (“in quotes”)!

In Part 2 of this post, I’ll take you through the recipe шаг за шагом (“step by step”). But to explain why perfectly duplicating Russian “black bread” outside of Russia ain’t so simple, you first need to understand what чёрный хлеб is — and what it is NOT. As I was surprised to learn when I bought my first loaf from a Moscow булочная (“bread store”), the color, flavor, and texture have virtually nothing in common with American pumpernickel!

American-style pumpernickel is dark as bitter chocolate, but the texture is often слишком пышный (“too fluffy”) to be a satisfactory substitute for Russian black bread, which is quite плотный (“dense; closely-textured”).

It turns out that most of the pumpernickel we buy in U.S. supermarkets — although much “blacker” than чёрный хлеб — is merely American-style rye bread with artificial coloring added. And American-style recipes for так называемый “ржаной” хлеб (“so-called ‘rye’ bread”) sometimes contain as much as 75% wheat flour and only 25% rye flour! This is because пшеница (“wheat”) is quite rich in глютен (“gluten”), the elastic белок (“protein”) that helps dough rise –while рожь (“rye”) is comparatively gluten-poor.

In contrast, industrial-scale пекарни (“bakeries”) in Russia have always made their black bread with 100% rye — apparently with the help of a special закваска (here: “sourdough starter-culture”) that’s optimized to compensate for the lower levels of gluten in rye. (Something I learned from Википедия!)

Black bread in the “Borodinksy” style, made with a 100%-rye sourdough and studded with coriander seeds.

However, sourdoughs can be slow, fussy, and unpredictable — and to be honest, I have very little experience with them even though I make my own bread all the time. Besides which, there are different formulations of закваска and I don’t know exactly what Russian bakeries use. Maybe in the future I’ll try to do an all-rye, sourdough version — когда-нибудь, но не сегодня (“someday, but not today”).

So, beginning на основе (“on the base”) of an all-wheat white bread recipe from a cookbook, I aimed to create an adaptation with mostly rye flour but raised by good ol’ надёжные дрожжи (“reliable yeast”), not a temperamental закваска. And just recently I found a solution: Adding a few tablespoons of ultra-concentrated “vital wheat gluten,” which can be found in many U.S. supermarkets under the Bob’s Red Mill or Arrowhead Mills brands. Using the gluten powder let me make a 75% rye dough that would rise sufficiently with ordinary yeast.

Adding about a tablespoon of gluten powder for each US cup (~120 grams) of flour improves the rising and texture of many homemade yeast breads.

With the gluten problem solved, the rest of the adaptation was rather easy. I added some cracked bulgur-wheat for texture and moistness; whole coriander seeds, which are obligatory in the popular style of black bread called бородинский; plus some coffee, cocoa, and molasses — for their bitter/sour notes and also for color.

The finished bread is medium-brown inside, похож по цвету на картон (“resembling cardboard in color”) — close to the Russian original, but much less dark than our American pumpernickel. The texture is плотный (“dense”) and жёсткий на ощупь (“coarse to the touch”), though somewhat different from my memories of the “real thing,” which may be the unavoidable result of using дрожжи instead of закваска. And the flavor is, dare I say, крепкий (“robust”) — strong, кисловатый (“sourish”), earthy.

In other words, quite непригодный (“unsuitable”) when you’re craving sweet, fluffy French toast with strawberry syrup — but absolutely perfect to slice thin as a sturdy base for бутерброды (“open-face sandwiches”) topped with something salty and savory: cheese, salami, ham, smoked fish, pickled mushrooms…

Tomorrow: the рецепт!

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Comments:

  1. Alexis:

    Whenever I ask my (Russian) husband if I should try to make black bread he tells me it is way too complicated. I am excited to see your recipe, though I don’t know if I dare try it! 🙂

  2. Mark:

    Who dares, wins.

  3. Rob McGee:

    Alexis: I think (hope) that my recipe is a good compromise between authenticity and simplicity!

    I’ve looked on Russian recipe sites and although one finds many recipes for other baked goods, I certainly get the impression that Russians don’t generally make black bread at home — not even experienced Russian housewives who can whip up a basic yeast dough for a пирог crust with their eyes closed.

  4. Rob McGee:

    As I said, you can use a хлебопечка (“bread machine”), which makes this recipe even easier.

    For “typical” machines, you would put all the liquid ingredients in first — and as a general rule, machine-kneaded dough should have 1 or 2 tablespoons more water than hand-kneaded dough.

    Then the flour and other dry items (EXCEPT the baking soda) go on top of the liquid; the yeast goes in last of all.

    Select the “Whole-wheat / Multigrain” program if your machine has this option. And add the presoaked coriander and bulgur to the dough after the “Raisins/Nuts” signal.

    If you like, you can brush on the baking-soda solution when the bake-cycle begins, but this is optional. The щёлочность (“alkalinity”) of the soda helps the bread loaf to develop a darker crust, but too much alkalinity can slow down the yeast. This is why the baking soda shouldn’t be mixed into the dough itself, but only brushed on top.

  5. Stas:

    Is baking powder just a мука?..

    • Rob:

      @Stas Is baking powder just a мука?

      Baking powder is a mix of пищевая сода (“baking soda”, an alkali) plus some form of dry acid — often “cream of tartar” (кремор тартари or битартрат калия). Мука, by definition, is made by grinding зёрна (“grains”). So baking powder wouldn’t be a type of мука.