marbled rye - bread baker's apprentice challenge #19

I should start off by saying that bread 19 in the bread baker's challenge had me a little nervous. While enjoyable in small amounts, rye breads never became a must-have at the homestead. I can't help but think with rye having such an overwhelming taste, when compared to regular white bread, it just didn't appeal to my young boy taste buds.

Yet as I grew, both in size and palette, rye bread seemed to all but disappear. I have some memories of getting rye and pastrami sandwiches at the Deli in Ottawa, but really that's about it. So, staring down page 10092 in Peter's book had me wondering; how long has it been? Isn't rye harder to work with? Will it be overpowering? Will it go good with peanut butter? So many questions in these man's mind.

Thinking I would get a jump on the bread, and maybe give my taste buds a head start into liking this recipe, I baked off a few loaves a month or so ago. The result, surprisingly delicious. No, actually, it was damn good. Light, airy, and fluffy. I think the first two loaves I pulled from the oven were almost perfect in every way. The oven spring was phenomenal, and the marbling made this bread one of the prettiest yet. Hot Damn Chris, where has this been your whole life!

So where does that leave me now? A marbled rye fan, is where. I think I've pulled 8 of these delicious loaves from the oven in the last month. Each one, as delicious as the next and baked to perfection. And to answer my initial concerns, the bread does go surprisingly well in most situations. It obviously makes a mean deli meat sandwich, but I love having it with tuna as well as turkey with cranberry.

It does a solid job of being toasted with jam or in a fried egg sandwich. My only hesitation would be the peanut butter. Don't get me wrong, it works, but there is nothing like a slice of no-knead or french or straight up white bread for that delicious pb/banana or pb/honey sandwich.

I tried every version of marbling as well.

Either way, at the end of the day, I know this bread will continue to make regular appearances in the bread box. Thank you Peter for this one!

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