Great Bread!

dronid

We have a South American lunchtime take out spot up the road from us called El Vergel (http://www.elvergel.co.uk/) which serves the best sandwiches in the area.

They use a bread which they describe as 'Village Bread' which is particularly light and delicious. I managed to get the recipe from them.

It's actually called Pan Amasado

6 cups bread flour
1 teaspoon salt
2 envelopes yeast
1 teaspoon sugar
1/2 cup melted lard - though I'll try it with vegetable oil!
about 2 cups water

Stir the yeast and sugar into 1/2 cup lukewarm water. Set aside until almost doubled and foamy. Put flour and salt into a large bowl. Make a well and add 1 1/2 cups lukewarm water, the yeast and the lard. Mix until it comes together. Add a little more water or flour if needed. Knead. Turn in greased bowl until ball is greased, then cover and let rise until doubled in bulk. Turn ball out onto floured board. Divide into pieces, form into flatish circles and place on baking sheet. Cover with damp paper towels and let rise again for about 30 minutes. Bake at 200C until brown, 15 minutes. Remove and cool on racks.

Enjoy:D

moanymoany

Thanks dronid,
What shape are the loaves? Do they look like the bottom of an old fashioned 'cottage loaf'? I like the sound of this and I'm going to make it. I need to get some lard as it has a very distinctive taste. Do you think it would work with butter? - Lard is lovely and cheap .....

I use the recipe off the box of Tesco instant yeast, but, I use value plain flour. Lovely bread and it makes lovely toast when it gets a bit stale.

dronid

They actually look like eccles cakes made of bread, about the size of a side plate. They're normally split so you end up with the top and bottom as the bread in a sandwich.

Here's a link to a pic. The ones El Vergel sells are a little thinner.
http://www.emol.com/especiales/fiestas_patrias_2005/tentempie.htm

As regards the butter/lard - as with all these things I would say experiment. The only reason I would use vegetable oil is that my partner has high cholesterol and has to watch the saturated fat intake.:(

Trow

Sounds great - will try this when I have time!

liz545

Thanks Dronid - I live in Elephant & Castle too and I love El Vergel - their bread is amazing! Will have to give this a try!

dronid

liz545 wrote: »

Thanks Dronid - I live in Elephant & Castle too and I love El Vergel - their bread is amazing! Will have to give this a try!

I have been warned by the ladies working there - you can't eat too much of it or you gain weight quite quickly.

In retrospect I probably should have asked for more detail before I had two of the sandwiches.:eek: :eek: :eek:

lil_me

How many ish does this make ? Just trying to think if I'd need to scale the recipe down a little.

dronid

lil_me wrote: »

How many ish does this make ? Just trying to think if I'd need to scale the recipe down a little.

Do you know - I'm not sure. I would guess from the amounts probably about 8 individual loaves. Once you've made the dough you can freeze it an oiled bag for quite a while and get it out a few hours before for you need it and allow its final rise.:D

dronid

Actually - if anyone can now work out a breadmaker version of this, I'd be very grateful!:D

squeaky

You'd need to halve the quantities because six cups are too much for a BM.

So try this, then set your BM to the dough program, and finish off as per the last part of the instructions.


It's actually called Pan Amasado

3 cups bread flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 envelope yeast
1/2 teaspoon sugar
1/4 cup melted lard - though I'll try it with vegetable oil!
about 1 cup water


Stir the yeast and sugar into 1/4 cup lukewarm water. Set aside until almost doubled and foamy. Put flour and salt into a large bowl. Make a well and add 3/4 cup lukewarm water, the yeast and the lard. Place this in your BM on a dough setting.

Turn ball out onto floured board. Divide into pieces, form into (approx 4) flatish circles (about the size of side plates) and place on baking sheet. Cover with damp paper towels and let rise again for about 30 minutes. Bake at 200C (Gas 6) until brown, 15 minutes. Remove and cool on racks.


HTH

nick_b

This is great, but how much yeast is an "envelope"?