Bread Baking Babes bake a bread with beets!

This month for the Bread Baking Babes a bread from our super Bread Baking Babe Cathy ("Bread Experience") who baked a bread with beets!

If you go to her blog you can see that she tried out some different versions, made with raw, roasted and cooked beets. I used cooked beets and adapted the recipe below to how I did it. I thought the bread would be more red in colour, but it has a nice pinkish colour. I used a little less sugar and omitted the vanilla, cause I didn't want a sweeter bread.
It is perfect for lovely sandwiches without it, but I might try it again with the sweet hint and then use the roasted beets. It was a lovely recipe to make, love the braiding and fun to bake a bread with beets for the first time! Thanks Cathy! You wanna bake along right, real fun to make and

eat your own pink bread. Cathy is our Kitchen of the Month, so you can send your bakes to her, well a picture of it. Here is what she said on her blog about you coming a Bread Baking Buddy: Just bake some beet bread and post about it on your blog and on the Bread Baking Babes FB page by the 30th of this month. If you don’t have blog, please post a photo of your bread on the BBB FB page.

Send an email to breadexperience at gmail dotcom with BBB December Beet Bread in the subject and Cathy will send you the Buddy Badge to display on your blog. Have fun baking!

Beet Bread

(makes 1 large loaf)

(PRINT recipe)

starter

30 g sourdough starter (or 1/2 teaspoon instant yeast)

80 g bread flour

40 g water

Put the sourdough starter in a small bowl and pour in the water.  Mix to break up the starter.  Add in the flour and mix until thorough incorporated.  Cover and let it rest at room temperature for 8 -10 hours.  If your house is cold, it might take longer. To test if the levain is ready to use in the dough, perform the float test by taking a little bit of sourdough and dropping it in a bowl of water.  If it floats, it is ready. If not, let it rest a while longer and try the test again.

final dough

700 g bread flour (divided 500, 200)

2 TBsp sugar

1 tsp fine sea salt

3 TBsp oil

135 g sourdough starter

60 g water

¼ tsp instant yeast

2 ½ large eggs, lightly beaten

230 g cooked beets, turned to a puree

Poppy seeds, optional

Egg wash: ½ left over egg, beaten

Puree the beets in a blender, adding the water gradually. Puree until the mixture is completely smooth.

Mix the flour (reserving 200 grams), sugar and salt together in a large bowl.  In a separate bowl, mix the pureed beet mixture, beaten egg and oil.  Add the wet ingredients to the dry ingredients and mix well.  Add the sourdough on top and mix thoroughly.

You can mix by hand or using a stand mixer.  Gradually mix in up to 200 grams of flour.  Let the dough rest for 30 minutes.  

Remove the mixture to a lightly floured surface and knead the dough. Add a little more flour if necessary to form a supple and workable dough.

Clean out the bowl, and grease it lightly with oil. Shape the dough into a ball and place it back in the bowl. Cover with a kitchen towel.  Let it proof for 2 -3 hours.  Perform a fold after the 1st hour, place back in the bowl. Repeat at the 2nd hour.  You can let the rest for the final hour or place it in the refrigerator overnight

After the bulk ferment, at room temperature or in the refrigerator, divide the dough into 3 equal pieces and shape them into a ball. Let them rest a few minutes, then divide each ball into 3 equal pieces.

To make the braids, shape them into a batard and seale the seams.  I let the batards rest for a few minutes before rolling out the strands. Roll into strands, and braid the loaf

Place the braided loaf on a parchment-lined baking sheet and brush with egg wash. Cover gently with oiled plastic wrap so it doesn't stick to the braids and let them proof about 1 1/2 hours, until they have grown to about 1 1/2 times their original size.  If your kitchen is cold, it may take longer.

Preheat the oven to 180ºC and place the oven rack on the middle shelf.

Brush the loaf again with egg wash and sprinkle the top with poppy seeds.

Bake the loaf for 15 minutes, rotate the pan for even baking, then bake an additional 15 minutes depending on the size of the loaf. It should register 96ºC in the center.

Transfer the loaf to a wire rack and let it cool for 1 hour before slicing.

(adapted from the adeption from 'The bread bakers' apprentice' - Peter Reinhart)