This is my favourite recipe for a German Roggenmischbrot.

Roggenmischbrot

  • Bulk: 3 to 4 hours, Proof: 2 hours
  • 1 loaf @774g
  • Difficulty: Easy 70% hydration.
  • Ingredients
  • 200g whole-grain rye flour
  • 150g white flour
  • 50g bread flour
  • 265g water
  • 9g salt
  • 100g active, mature sourdough starter
  1. Instructions
  2. Mix everything together.
  3. Cover and let rest for 3-4 hours of bulk fermentation.
  4. “Shape” it (think Play-Doh).
  5. Cover and let proof for about 2 hours. Or retard.
  6. Score your loaf. Rye bread is great for elaborate patterns!
  7. Bake at 240C/470F.

This bread is not at all difficult to make. The only challenging part is mixing everything thoroughly. I often make dough for 3 loaves at once. Hand-mixing this much rye sourdough can be a workout. A mixer can come in handy! Below is the write-up plus pictures. I’ve also filmed a bowl-to-bake video of how I make this bread and put it up on YouTube.

1. Mix everything. 

Mix the water and starter first, then add the flour and salt. In the end, the dough should be homogeneous. The starter and salt need to be evenly distributed and you should see no dry bits of flour. Cover your bowl.

2. Let it rest for 3 to 4 hours.

The bulk fermentation time depends A LOT on the temperature and the strength of your starter. But rye sourdough is less delicate than others, so don’t worry too much about it. I found 3 to 4 hours to get the dough to rise nicely at 23C/73F.

3. Shape it.

Turn the dough out onto your floured work surface. Divide it, if you do more than one loaf. Then form it into a nice round loaf. It’s as easy as forming play doh into a ball. Forget what you know about shaping wheat loaves. Rye is much easier. Flour your loaf generously and put it into a banneton. 

4. Proof for about 2 hours, covered. Or retard.

The exact timing depends on the temperature. Wait until the loaf has grown considerably in size. 

Or you can put it in the fridge and forget about it.

The two images show the loaf before and after final proofing. The loaf on the right is much bigger than the one on the left. It looks a little deflated, that’s because it had to spend some time in the fridge before the oven was available 🙂

5. Score.

Take your loaf out of the banneton and put it into some parchment paper. Put a little bit of flour on top of the loaf and then have fun scoring! You can do some really nice and intricate scoring on rye loaves. Since you don’t get a lot of oven spring, the pattern tends to stay intact. It works even better when the loaf is cold. 

Nerd Tip: Use some dental floss to mark the lines you’d like to score before you start!

6. Bake.

Preheat your oven and your Dutch oven to 240C/470F. Flour your loaf, score it and put it into your Dutch oven. Leave the lid on for the first 15 minutes of baking. Bake for 45 to 50 minutes.

I’ve retarded this loaf for up to 10 days before baking. I often make enough dough for several loaves at once, shape them, and then put them in the fridge until I need a freshly-baked bread. That’s quite the lazy-baking hack, I would say 🙂

  • 50% rye sourdough