Friday 26 September 2014

Lékué Bread Maker

Lékué are a Spanish cooking aid company, based in Barcelona, who have developed a number of interesting products for cooking in an oven while retaining steam (which encourages a better crust). They claim that their bread maker is a single tool for mixing, kneading and baking bread in, so I decided to buy one (£19.99 from Lakeland) and try it. Although it comes with an instruction and recipe book, feedback from people who had tried it was to use your traditional recipes.

The bread maker is a slightly floppy silicone bowl that fastens at the top to form a rugby ball shape (see illustrations below).  While it proved fine to mix the ingredients in and to bake the bread in, it did not prove that easy to knead the dough in (it really is too floppy), so I decided to try it out using the low effort (no knead) method so I really could do everything in the bread maker. This also meant I could go for a wetter dough for a more open crumb. This is how it worked out.

Recipe
350g strong white bread flour (or a mixture of white and rye/wholemeal)
1 teaspoon sea salt
100ml sourdough starter
240ml water


The Method

Got the starter out of the fridge and brought it up to room temperature for two hours.

Put half the flour in the Lékué, mixed the sourdough starter and water in a jug, then mixed it in to the flour in the Lékué, as illustrated on the left, 

Closed the Lékué, covered it with cling film (see illustration left) and left it to prove overnight.

In the morning the sponge was fermenting nicely (thick and bubbly). I mixed in the other half of the flour (but not the salt), closed the Lékué, covered it and left it to rest for 30 minutes.


Then I dissolved the salt in a small amount of water, added it to the dough, mixed for 15 seconds, closed the Lékué, covered it and left to rest for another 15 minutes.

Once more mixed the dough for 15 seconds and left to rest for another 15 minutes.

Then gave the dough one final 15 second mix, shaped it roughly into a sausage in the Lékué, closed the Lékué, covered it and left it to prove in a warm place (the oven with the light on) for around 2½ hours until nearly doubled in size.

Once risen, I uncovered the Lékué  but left it closed, put it in the centre of a cold oven and baked for 30 minutes at 230°C (190°C fan).

Then removed the loaf from the Lékué and baked it for another 20 minutes until golden.

Then turned the oven off and left the loaf in the cooling oven, with the door slightly open for another five minutes, then placed on a rack to cool.


The loaf had a nice crisp crust so the Lékué lived up to its promise in that respect.

Once cooled I sliced the loaf.

The crumb was nice and open and had an excellent sourdough taste and feel. So the low effort method had paid off as well.

Well done Lékué.

While I was about it I wondered how it would work out with my soda bread recipe so that was what I tried next.

Once again I did everything in the Lékué using 200g wholemeal + 150g strong white + 1tsp soda + 1tsp salt and 350ml buttermilk. Mix together adding a little more milk to get a soft, sticky dough, shaped it roughly and baked for 25 minutes + 10 minutes out of the bread maker.

It produced an excellent loaf of soda bread, nice crisp crust and a lovely texture crumb. I decided to name it 'Hedgehog Soda Bread' as that's what it reminds me of. Well done again Lékué.


19 comments:

  1. Hi, Don't know what I'm doing wrong. The mix seems really wet, and when cooked, it is very crunchy on the outside and sounds hollow when tapped, but when I cut it it is still really moist and stodgy inside. I tastes a bit like a crumpet.

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  2. Try reducing the amount of water/increasing the amount of flour: I'm currently using 400g flour + 250ml water + 100ml starter I also bake the loaf for 30 min in the Lekue, then 25 min out of it and leave it in the cooling oven for another 5 min.

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  3. Thank you for this. Were you mixing by hand or with a hand held electric mixer?

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    Replies
    1. By hand, it really takes very little effort.
      John.

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  4. Just tried this a wow I am impressed thank you and thank you Leslie ☺️

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  5. Thanks Leslie, always good to get positive feedback, John.

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  6. Just made this bread and it's the first successful loaf I've made. Your instructions are so clear and easy to follow. Thank you.

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    Replies
    1. Thanks for letting me know, hopefully you will have many more successes to follow. All the best, John.

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  7. Just made another loaf and it turned out perfectly again. If using a mix of wholemeal and white flours what ratio of would be best?

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    Replies
    1. I think 25% wholemeal gives the best result, I call it a rustic loaf. You might need to increase the amount of water slightly, as wholemeal takes a bit more that strong white.

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    2. Thank you for the prompt reply. Just reading your book and finding it very interesting. I'm definitely hooked on sourdough!

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    3. I feed my sourdough with white whole wheat, then use either bread flour or AP flour for the loaf. I have been making sourdough ciabatta rolls for years this way. I just tried using the same recipe, cut in half in the Lekue baker and was quite happy with the result.

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  8. This is the easiest and surest way to make sourdough. I'm using this method and producing successful loaves each time. I've tried using a banneton but despite preparing it by misting and flooring the dough sometimes sticks. Using a Leuke is so much easier.

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  9. Made second loaf using less water, more rise, softer crust. I am getting crust that is too dark. I am using a multigrain flour, very strong white, wholegrain, spelt and rye.
    How to change recipe or process to get the crust to be less dark and crisper?

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    Replies
    1. I'm have had probelsm with getting too dark a cust (maybe it's the weather :-) try 220C (180C fan) Dileep and keep on experimenting, it's the best way to learn.

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  10. question....on the first loaf you mentioned you put it in a COLD oven and then baked it at 230c(190c fan). so I don't pre-heat the oven and just let the bread bake as it gets to temperature? also I assume fan refers to convection oven? thank you

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    Replies
    1. Hi Gator, yes as I don't wait for the dough to rise completely (until nearly doubled in size), so it finishes rising as the oven comes up to temprature. It basically shortens the rise time and uses the heat in the oven while it comes up to temp. You need to use a lower temp for a fan oven so the other temp is for a regular convection oven yes. Cheers, John.

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    2. You are awesome! Thank you for the super fast reply!

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    3. My pleasure, sorry about the misspelling of temperature.

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