Dakota Bread

The perfect accompaniment to your favorite chowder, chili, or bowl of oyster stew.

Ready for a home spun treat? High on my list of comfort foods is a steaming bowl of Janice & Dawn’s Clam Chowder* and a warm slice of freshly baked bread, slathered in butter. And none better to highlight island chowder than a slice of Dakota Bread.

Dakota Bread is a recipe that Jackie and I learned back in the early 1990's during our two year stay in South Dakota where I completed my doctoral studies. As starving college students living off a scholarship and an assistantship that paid $300 dollars a month, we were hard pressed to make ends meet. Nonetheless, the experience afforded the opportunity to exercise significant epicurean creativity as we harvested from the flora and fauna to put dinner on the table.

As luck would have it, we rented our little one bedroom house (the basement doubled as the neighborhood tornado shelter) from a local farmer who allowed me to hunt pheasant and deer on his property. He often left us with sacks of corn, fresh from the fields on the back porch while I was off at school or buried in books at the library.  With fellow neighbors also attending graduate school and pretty much in the same boat, we frequently teamed up for pizza, or, when the hunting was good, a dinner of Jackie's famous French Burgundy Venison Stew, accompanied by Dakota Bread.

Dakota Bread is a recipe created by the Dakota Wheat Commission and featured in several South Dakota publications. It is a light, nutty bread that merges varieties of wheat flour, oats, rye and sunflower oil, and a hint of sweetness. The recipe to follow was published in the wonderful heartland cookbook Something Wild by Richard M. Gauerke. In addition to Dakota Bread, this cookbook features excellent culinary treats using wild game, berries, and other goodies. Try Dakota Bread alongside a tasty summer salad at your next crab feed or salmon barbeque. Or better yet, try Dakota bread with a bowl of chowder, chili, stew, or similar crock pot creation. I guarantee that Dakota Bread will become a top candidate among your recipe favorites.

Dakota Bread Recipe

Ingredients

1 package active dry yeast
1/2 cup warm water
2 tablespoons sunflower oil
1 egg
1/2 cup cottage cheese
1/4 cup honey
1 teaspoon salt
2-1/2 cups bread flour
1/2 cup whole wheat flour
1/4 cup wheat germ
1/4 cup rye flour
1/4 cup rolled oats
cornmeal

Mix the yeast in 1/2 cup warm water and dissolve. In a large bowl, mix the sunflower oil, egg, cottage cheese, honey, and salt. Add the dissolved yeast and mix again.  Add 2 cups bread flour and mix until it is well moistened.  Gradually stir in the wheat flour, wheat germ, rye flour, and oats. Add enough bread flour to make the dough soft and pliable.

Turn out the dough on a floured surface and knead for about 10 minutes or until the dough is smooth. Place the dough in a greased bowl; cover loosely with lightly oiled plastic wrap, let rise in a warm place until the dough doubles in size (about 45 minutes). 

Punch down the dough, shape into one round loaf, place in a greased glass pie pan sprinkled with corn meal. Cover with lightly oiled plastic wrap and let rise until double in size (about 60 - 90 minutes). Remove the plastic wrap and brush the dough with egg white. Sprinkle the top of the loaf with wheat germ and sunflower kernels. Bake at 350 degrees for 35 - 40 minutes.

- By Tim Wittman

*Old Fashioned Clam Chowder, San Juan Classics Cookbook, Janice Veal and Dawn Ashbach, Island Publishers.

(Dakota Wheat Commission; cited in Something Wild Cookbook, 1992, p. 123; Richard M. Gauerke, Adventure Publications, Cambridge Minnesota