Let's Talk Bread: Chocolate Sourdough

Sometimes life gets you down. You begin your day just fine, going about your usual activities, anticipating the moment when you get to release from the stress of the day and enjoy yourself, until suddenly--no--there is no release, everything has changed, and the moments before are now so long ago, and so strange.

This week has been a whammy of emotions. I made this sourdough last week before I got caught up in the panic of time. I had wanted to make this bread on Valentine's Day but it never worked out. I've been having an issue recently with all of my sourdough breads coming out too dense. You can see in the pictures that the dough is what I call "tight": little to no airbubbles, with the insides compressing together. Although the particulars of the bread are not perfect, the flavor is spot on.


I love a chocolate, crusty bread. It's like two worlds melting into one, where you want to say that it shouldn't work but somehow it does, and it tastes so good.

The dough is not sweet. There is no sugar in this recipe. The slight sweetness comes from the occasional chocolate chunk or cranberry, but other than that, it is just dark, rich chocolate with a tang of sour.

Because I used cocoa powder, I added instant yeast. Cocoa powder can inhibit the natural yeasts in your starter, so the instant yeast helps it along. Fold in the chocolate chunks and cranberries at the end, do not do so during kneading or you will tear your gluten.


Bake this and be prepared for your house to fill up with the aroma of warm, melting chocolate and dark crusty bread.

Chocolate Cranberry Sourdough

1250g Bread Flour
.75L Starter
112g Cocoa Powder
36g Salt
11g Instant yeast
65g Coffee, cool
500g Old Dough
500g Chocolate Chunks
500g Cranberries
add water to right consistency (window-pane).

Mix and knead all of your ingredients together. I chill this overnight and then let it rest the next day before baking. Bake at 450 with steam until dark.

Let's talk bread: Rye Bread

Lately, I've been in a rut. Mostly because I'm stuck in the endless cycle of work/sleep. My days off fall during the week when no one is available. And baker hours suck. I get in these ruts of hating my job and the habits it puts me into.

While I may not like all aspects of my job, there are a few things about it that I enjoy. The main one being bread. I get to make some awesome bread. I sometimes forget how much I have learned in the past two months, and how much of it I have had to teach myself. 

I work by myself. Everyday, at 5 am I come in, turn on the ovens, get my mixing bowls, and start measuring out all the breads I have to make that day. Baguettes, brioche, white toast, rye baguettes, ciabatta, the list goes on. It's stressful, but I like the product I am making. While the world is just rising, I am in my small bakery creating dough that will eventually turn into bread others will eat.

I cannot stress enough how important time is when bread baking. It is your number one ingredient. You have to have the patience to let your bread be. For this rye bread, time is all it takes to let it fully develop and come out tasting great. 

While I may not have a recipe for this rye bread (mostly because the recipe isn't mine to share), I can offer a few words of advice.

-As I said earlier, rye bread needs caraway. Its something you can eyeball. I mix my caraway seeds in with my bread, but you could top it with the seeds instead.

-If you do choose to put seeds in your bread, make sure you wait till the last few minutes of mixing. Otherwise, the seeds will tear the gluten and create a tough bread. 

-Use old dough in your recipe. Old dough creates flavor. If you don't have old dough, don't worry about it, but if you do, use it!

So while I go on being in my rut (and getting over myself), bake and enjoy some rye bread. Rustic and nostalgic, rye bread is true comfort.