Normally the recipes that I post in my blog are my own. This recipe though, comes from my wife. I do all of the cooking in our household but she is the baker in the family.
She makes a really good roasted garlic and cheddar cheese bread, which is what I'm going to share with you here today.
She started making the bread a few years ago while we were still living in Canada but she has pretty much perfected it here in France and can do the whole process by memory now.
It's cooked in a ceramic pot and has large chunks of cheese and roasted garlic throughout and is quite delicious. The garlic and cheese are optional but it really adds to the flavor and is what makes the bread so special.
So without further ado here is the recipe. I hope you enjoy!
One of the nice things about bread is that there are very few ingredients for it. It really just comes down to the process of how you mix the basics together.
• Flour (450 grams)
• Salt (10 grams)
• Yeast (1 sachet)
• Water (300 ml warm but not hot)
• Sugar (1 tsp to bloom the yeast)
Optional
• Roasted Garlic (pre-roasted)
• Cheese (we used aged cheddar)
Notes: You want to pre-roast the garlic before making the bread in order to save yourself some time.
Any cheese will do for the recipe but my wife tends to use medium hard cheeses like cheddar, guyere and gouda.
These cheeses don't fully melt during the baking process so you get chunks of them in your slices of bread.
Bloom the yeast by adding 1 sachet of bread yeast to 300ml of warm water and 1 tsp of sugar. This process takes only about 5 minutes. Don't make the water too hot though or it will kill the yeast. 30°C seems to be the magic temperature.
Add 10 grams of salt to 450 grams of flour.
Put the flour on top of the yeast water and mix with a dough hook in an electric mixer until its all fully incorporated.
You can do this by hand as well with a wooden spoon but the mixer will save you some time.
Put a cloth over the bowl and let the dough proof in a warm place for about an hour. She likes to set it next to the radiator, mainly because our house is freezing.
A side note on proofing for those who are not familiar with this process. Proofing is similar to fermenting. It's when the yeast eats the sugar in the dough and produces carbon dioxide, which makes the dough rise. It basically puts air into the dough and makes it grow, making the bread airy after it has been cooked. It's possible to over proof the dough as well. This occurs when the dough rises too much and then deflates, which makes the bread very dense after it is cooked. The general rule is that the dough should double in size.
Cut up the roasted garlic and cheese into chunks.
After the dough has done its first proof...
knead the garlic and cheese into the dough and form it into a circle (or sphere I suppose since it's a 3 dimensional object).
Put the ball into a fresh clean bowl and let it proof for another 30 minutes.
Put the Le Creuset, Dutch oven or ceramic pot into the oven at 240°C to heat it up.
After the dough has finished its second proof, put it into the heated pot and cook with the lid on for approximately 30 minutes.
Note: This part may vary slightly depending on your oven. The overall cook time is 45 minutes - 30 minutes with the lid on a 15 minutes with the lid off to expose the bread to the direct heat and create a crust. If you take the lid off too soon the bread can burn a little so you may have to adjust the times slightly based on your oven. My wife actually leaves the lid on for 33 minutes exactly and takes it off for 12.
Take the bread out and tap the bottom with a knife. If it sounds hollow, it is done. If it doesn't sound hollow it means that it hasn't cooked through entirely and may need to go back in the over for a few more minutes. This part will rely on your own judgment and deductive skills.
Slice and enjoy your bread. We usually toast it and add butter as well, for extra goodness.
