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In search of seed bread
20 May 2005 by Fiona Beckett

One of the things you learn as a journalist: you go for one story, you
come back with another. Well, usually several others. You can't help
it. It's virtually impossible to be a writer and stick to the point.

So it was when I came to South Africa recently ostensibly to do a story about wine. And what happened? I got obsessed about bread. Now you guys may take your bread for granted but believe me it's something special. Just go to the newly opened Goatshed at Fairview and you'll see it lined up - white bread, brown bread, glorious butternut squash ciabatta and, most irresistible of all, seed bread.

I came across this seed bread everywhere. Fairview's was admittedly particularly stylish, having three vertical lines of seeds - poppy, sesame and sunflower - down the top of the loaf. The bread itself was so moist and crumbly but fabulously light too. How on earth did they do it?

I became a bread bore. Everywhere I went I asked for a recipe. The picture at first looked gloomy. It was, I was assured, the flour - Snowflake Nutty Wheat - not available in the UK. Recipes were promised and never materialised. Then I cracked it, thanks to Alicia Wilkinson of the Silwood Cookery School. (What was I doing there on a wine trip? Don't ask - long story.) It was, she said, based on the Grant loaf, a miraculous wholewheat loaf which doesn't need kneading. Funnily enough, the first bread I ever made from a Delia Smith cookbook.

Within days of coming back the recipe arrived. I tried it, using an organic wholewheat flour from an excellent British flour mill called Shipton Mill. And fiddling about with a few of the other ingredients. Here is the recipe. You should try it with some proper farmhouse cheeses and homemade pickles as they do at the Goatshed. With a glass of their Caldera or Bruce's new Mary le Bow. (Like I said, I did originally go for the wine)

Credit, I gather, should also go to the Olympic Bakery at Kalk which I subsequently found out had trained the Goatshed's bakers and which is a heroic institution in its own right. (Where else in the world would serve you 'chippo and scram'? Or sausages and scrambled eggs as they obligingly translated it for me)

There are other obsessions in the pipeline, prompted by that trip. Olive oil. Warthog. What causes those weird cloud formations? The ultimate springbok rub (thanks to Margot Janse of Le Quartier Francais I'm working on that one). The high alcohol content of modern reds - now there's a hot issue. Carpaccio. Melissa's. Vineyard picnics. The possibility of world domination by women called Fiona. But they'll have
to wait their turn . . .

Tribute to South African Seed Bread

450g organic malthouse or granary flour
50g bran
50g sunflower seeds + extra for topping
15g each poppy and sesame seeds + extra for topping
1 rounded tsp fine sea salt
1 1/2 level tsp easy-blend yeast
2 tsp barley malt extract (available from health food stores) or honey
1 tbsp organic sunflower oil + extra for greasing the tin.

You will need a large oblong bread tin, preferably non-stick Tip the flour, bran, seeds and salt into a large bowl and mix together well. (If your flour is cold warm it in the microwave for 30 seconds). Measure out 500ml of hand-hot water and stir in the barley malt extract or honey. Sprinkle the yeast over the flour mix and pour over the oil and half the liquid. Start mixing it together, gradually adding as much extra liquid as the flour will absorb. (The consistency should be wetter than a normal loaf - more like that of a fruitcake, as Alicia Wilkinson of Silwood describes it.) Keep stirring until the dough begins to come away from the sides of the bowl (about 2 minutes). Tip the dough into a well greased bread pan pressing it down evenly. Sprinkle a row of sunflower seeds (about a third of the width of the loaf ) down the centre of the loaf and press gently into the dough. Sprinkle a row of poppy seeds and sunflower seeds on either side. Cover the loaf lightly with clingfilm and leave to rise for about 25-30 minutes until the surface of the loaf is about 1.5cm from the top of the tin. Meanwhile heat the oven to 200 C/400 F/Gas 6. Bake the loaf in the oven for 40-45 minutes or until well risen and browned. Using a round bladed knife loosen the sides of the loaf away from the sides of the tin then carefully ease it out and return the loaf to the oven for a final 5 minutes for the base to crisp up. Take the loaf from the oven and leave on a cooling rack until completely cold before slicing. Makes the ultimate egg mayo sandwich (with cress)