BBD#14 – Purple Fingerling Potato Bread

Purple fingerling potato bread

Bread Baking Day is back, and more colourful than ever.

This month’s Bread Baking Day is hosted by Boaz of Grain Power, with the theme of “Coloured Breads” as in to bake bread that has an unusual colour in the crust, or crumb, or both.

I wanted to try something different and not use sweet potato, carrots, butternut squash or pumpkin that would tint the loaves a gorgeous, brilliant orange… not that there’s anything wrong with any of those lovely choices, but I was feeling adventurous this month. Mighty adventurous.

How about purple, like an intense purple yam purple?

Unfortunately, the elusive purple yam was nowhere to be found, even at the local special organic foods grocery store close to where I live. I did spot something there that just might work though. The conversation with a grocery store worker went something like this:

Me: Hi! I was wondering, do you by any chance know if these organic purple fingerling potatoes are *purple* inside?

Grocery store worker: Um, I’m not sure. Let’s find out.

[Hacks a potato open with a knife]

Grocery store worker: Well, yup it seems like they are… but don’t worry, they lose a bit of the colour after you boil them.

Me: Oh… but you see, I actually want them to be purple like this.

Grocery store worker: …alright. [confused look]

Me: Thanks, these will do.

Purple fingerling potatoes, scrubbed clean.

Boiled and drained. Look, purple!

Mashed purple potato: I mashed it with the water (the amount used in the bread recipe) to get the consistency of a slurry. Notice the chunks of purple potato left - this will become important in the next few steps.

Eek! Where did all the colour go? Sigh. Well, at least the unmashed chunks of purple potato are still visible.

I should have known. See, purple + cream coloured unbleached all-purpose flour + light brown whole wheat flour = brownish greyish + slight hint of purple and not the intense purple I had hoped for.

At any rate, I forged ahead, dividing the dough into three portions and rolling up each like you would for a jellyroll. The dough was then left to rise for a second time in a 9 x 5″ loaf pan.

Ready for the final rise.

Here we go, fresh out of the oven! A very tender, flavourful and [maybe?] slightly purple loaf of purple fingerling potato bread.

Purple fingerling potato bread

Crumb of purple fingerling potato bread

I have to say, it made excellent toast with a bit of blackcurrant preserves.

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Purple Fingerling Potato Bread

Based on this sweet potato sandwich rolls recipe from King Arthur Flour

Ingredients

Dough
– 1/2 cup (4 oz) potato water (the water saved from after you boil the potatoes)
– 2 teaspoons active dry yeast
– 2 tablespoons (1 oz) unsalted butter, softened
– 1 teaspoon salt
– 1 large egg
– roughly 1 cup cooked, mashed purple fingerling potato (I used 3 potatoes)
– 1/4 cup (1 oz) nonfat dry milk
– 1 cup (4 oz) whole wheat flour
– 2 1/4 to 2 1/2 cups (9 5/8 – 10 5/8 oz) unbleached all-purpose flour

Topping
– 1 large egg beaten with 1 tablespoon water
– sesame seeds to sprinkle on top of the loaf

Directions

To make the dough: Place all of the ingredients (holding back 1/2 cup of the all-purpose flour) into a medium-sized bowl, and mix until you’ve form a soft, but not sticky dough. Add more flour from your reserved amount if needed to achieve the correct consistency. Knead the dough for 6 minutes, then place it in a greased bowl, cover and let rise for 45 minutes to an hour; it will almost double in size and look puffy.

To shape the loaf: After the first rise, deflate the dough and divide it into 3 pieces. Flatten each piece into a rough rectangle and roll up starting from one end of the short side.  Place the three pieces of shaped dough side by side in a lightly greased 9 x 5″ loaf pan. Cover with greased plastic wrap, and let rise for 30 to 35 minutes, until almost doubled. Brush the top of the loaf with the beaten egg, and sprinkle with sesame seeds, if you’re using them.

Bake in a preheated 350°F oven for 30 to 35 minutes, until the top is a rich golden brown (and slightly greyish purple!) colour, and the center reads above 190°F when measured with an instant-read thermometer. Remove the loaf from the oven and cool on a rack for 5 minutes, before removing from the pan and returning to the rack to cool completely.

* * *

I’m sending a slice of this bread to Boaz, our great BBD host for this month, to Zorra, the founder of BBD, to Zoë for inspiring this purple-coloured bread in the first place with her investigation of different yams and sweet potatoes, and as always, to Susan at Wild Yeast for Yeastspotting.

Tags: potatoes