Last week I made Sherry Raisin Bread (Rolls) with Nancy. (The recipe for these is available if you click here.) This is a Dan Lepard recipe (although I had to make some changes for ingredients on hand), Nancy and I are both big fans of Dan Lepard's bread recipes and have made several together. They always turn out well and the method he uses for mixing and kneading could not be any easier. If you haven't made any of his breads, pick one and give it a go soon, I'm sure you will be a fan as well.
Ingredient list: sherry, milk, marmalade, bread flour, rye flour, raisins, yeast, almonds, and salt.
I made a full recipe which made 16 rolls (3 ounce dough balls). While Nancy wanted the bread for toasting, I thought maybe the roll option would be nice to have as we seem to have better luck with Mark eating rolls rather than bread these days.
I hadn't intended to make them when she mentioned the recipe as I had other things going on, but the day came when baking bread sounded like a good thing to be doing. Since I didn't have all the exact ingredients, I had to do a bit of subbing. First, I didn't have sherry so I substituted equal parts rum and water (I thought rum would go nicely with raisins), which turned out lovely, just a hint of something and not boozy at all. I didn't have raisins so I used currants. I didn't want quite so many currants or almonds, so I used a half measure of each. That's it...the rest is all as stands.
The recipe goes together very well, is extremely easy, and the results
are delicious. The rise times were spot on correct for my dough. I
baked them at 390 degrees for 5 minutes, then turned down the oven to
350 degrees and baked them an additional 27 minutes, switching the pans
halfway through, up and down, back to front.
They taste a little sweet
from the currants and marmalade, but not too sweet, definitely more
savory than sweet. The almonds added a nice nutty taste and a little
crunch inside. It all worked very well together. I want to make this
recipe again when I get cream sherry and try it as a loaf as I can just
tell that this is going to make excellent toasting bread. Definitely a
repeat. Delicious.
