Home › Bread › Graham Bread (One bowl soft bread sponge one)
Graham Bread (One bowl soft bread sponge one)
One bowl soft bread sponge, one half cupful brown sugar, three tablespoonfuls butter, very little soda dissolved in warm water; stir to a thick batter with graham flour; put in tins and let rise until very light; then bake.
This is a shorthand recipe written for a cook who already had a yeast sponge working on the back of the stove. Nearly everything unstated depends on that sponge, so read the book's soft bread recipe first.
- "One bowl soft bread sponge"This appears to refer back to the white bread sponge set earlier in the section: flour, liquid, and yeast beaten to a batter and left to ferment until foamy. The quantity is genuinely ambiguous, since "one bowl" tells us nothing about the size of the bowl. Judge by the finished batter rather than by the bowl.
- The soda is a corrective, not a leavenerThe soda is chiefly a corrective -- "very little soda" is there mainly to neutralize the sourness a long-risen sponge develops, though the reaction does give some lift as well. A scant quarter teaspoon dissolved in a tablespoon of warm water is a reasonable outside limit; more risks a soapy taste and a grey crumb.
- Graham flourCoarse, unsifted whole wheat, named for Sylvester Graham and still sold under that name. Modern stone-ground whole wheat is the closest match; standard whole wheat flour is finer and will absorb liquid faster, so add it gradually.
- "A thick batter"This is the hinge. It should be a heavy batter that drops from the spoon in sheets, not a kneadable dough. Graham flour drinks liquid slowly, so let the batter stand five minutes before deciding it needs more flour.
- ButterThree tablespoons, softened or melted and cooled. Beat it into the sponge with the sugar before the flour goes in.
- "Let rise until very light"In a warm kitchen this will likely take somewhere between three quarters of an hour and an hour and a quarter in the pans, but go by appearance rather than the clock: the batter should crown just above the rim and quiver when the tin is nudged. An over-risen whole wheat batter is liable to sink.
- OvenThe book assumes you know a bread oven. Bake at 375F for 40 to 50 minutes; the loaves are done at an internal temperature of 200 to 205F. If the tops darken early, tent with foil.
- YieldUnstated, and it depends entirely on the size of the sponge; grease your pans and expect one or two loaves. Turn out onto a rack immediately or the sides will steam soft.
Graham flour takes its name from Sylvester Graham, the Presbyterian minister and temperance lecturer whose 1830s campaign for coarse, unsifted, home-milled wheat flour set itself squarely against the fashionable white bread of the day. By the later nineteenth century graham flour had become an ordinary pantry item with a slightly virtuous reputation, sold by grocers alongside white flour and cornmeal. Recipes of this kind, which borrow a bowlful from a white bread sponge already working and stiffen it with graham, turn up regularly in American household cookbooks of the period. Brown sugar and butter are common in such loaves; coarse bran flour makes a drier, tighter crumb, which fat and sugar help keep palatable a second day.