Hearth Cooking Recipes
Three-Grain Bread
Original Recipe
“It is more difficult to give rules for making bread than for anything else; …. Some like to have it half Indian meal and half rye meal; others prefer it one third Indian, and two thirds rye…. Put the Indian in your bread-pan, sprinkle a little salt among it, and wet it thoroughly with scalding water. …. When it is cool, pour in your rye; add two gills of lively yeast … About an hour before your oven is ready, stir in flour into your sponge till it is stiff enough to lay on a well floured board or table. Knead it up pretty stiff, and put it into well greased pans, and let it stand … Some people like on third Indian in their flour. Others like one third rye; and some think the nicest of all bread is one third Indian, one third rye, and one third flour …”
Source: The American Frugal Housewife by Lydia Maria Child (1832)
Modernized Recipe
Note: Dedicated to those who are not ashamed of Economy Twelfth Edition (Boston: Carter, Hendee, and Co. 1833) pp 75–78. An adaptation of Child’s approach to bread-baking is included in Caroline Sloat, ed., Old Sturbridge Cookbook, 2nd edition (Guilford, Conn.: The Globe Pequot Press, 1995) p. 204. Both sources were used to arrive at the following recipe for our hearth-cooking evening
Ingredients
- 2 cups cornmeal (“Indian meal”)
- 2 teaspoons salt
- 4 cups boiling water
- 2 tablespoons dry yeast
- 1 teaspoon sugar
- ½ cup luke-warm water
- 2 ¼ cups rye flour, divided use
- 1 cup white flour
- 3–4 cups whole wheat flour
Steps
- Combine cornmeal and salt in a large bowl.
- Add the hot water and mix well. Let stand until luke-warm.
- Mix yeast and sugar in half a cup of luke-warm water and wait for it to become foamy.
- Add the yeast mixture and one cup of rye flour to the cooled cornmeal.
- Let it stand at room temperature for 2–3 hours while the yeast is working.
- Stir in the remaining rye flour, the white flour, and some of the whole wheat flour.
- When the dough is stiff enough, turn it out onto a floured board and knead it for at least ten minutes, adding more flour as necessary until it feels elastic and ready to rise.
- Divide the dough into three greased pans, cover with a cloth, and let rise in a warmish place for about 2 hours.
- Bake 45–66 minutes in a preheated brick oven or in a modern oven at 350–375°F. Optional: Place a small dish of hot water in the oven during baking to give the bread a nice crust.
