1 2/3 cups all-purpose flour
2/3 cups whole wheat flour
1/4 cups granulated sugar (plus more to sprinkle)
4 tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. salt
1/8 tsp. grated nutmeg
1/3 cup unsalted butter, cold
1/2 cup raisins
3/4 cup mashed potatoes
2 eggs
3/4 cup milk
Preheat oven to 450 degrees F. In a large bowl, mix all-purpose and whole wheat flours, sugar, baking powder, salt and nutmeg; combine well. With a pastry cutter or 2 knives, cut in butter until mixture is the consistency of coarse cornmeal. Stir in raisins. Separate 1 egg and lightly beat the white. In a medium bowl, combine potatoes, 1 egg, 1 egg yolk and milk. Whisk until no lumps remain.
Make a well in the centre of dry ingredients; add potato mixture all at once. Stir with fork to make a soft, sticky dough. Press lightly into a ball and knead gently on a floured surface about 6 times. Roll or pat out dough to 1/2-inch thickness; cut into triangles or rounds. Place on ungreased baking sheet. Brush with lightly beaten egg white and sprinkle tops with sugar. Bake 13 to 15 minutes or until golden.
Mix well into a VERY HARD dough. Crumble it between your fingers, and sprinkle onto the cakes before baking.
Gem Loaves from the Caves by Rodia
1kg flour
7 dag soft fresh yeast
1 litre milk
~30 dag sugar (can be more.)
10 dag butter or margarine
3 yolks
pinch of salt
vanilla sugar or flavouring
lemon skin
Put the yeast and the sugar in a large bowl or pot and 'smear' it around with a spoon so it becomes liquid. Add milk, 25 dag flour and mix.
Cover with linen and leave to grow. An hour should do, but try to wait until there is at least twice as much of the stuff.Make sure the bowl is large enough so the mixture doesn't climb out of it.
Mix the yolks and sugar until fluffy.( a fork is enough)
Melt the butter.
When the stuff has grown, pour it into the remaining flour (which you should put into an even larger bowl). Add the salt, vanilla, lemon skin...
Fold, then add the yolk &sugar mixture.
Fold, mix, knead, play around with the dough to get a lot of air bubbles into it. Otherwise, the bread will be rather heavy. Still edible, but heavy.
Pour in the melted butter, and finish mixing.
When the dough looks like dough , is light, well aired and comes off your hands (it should, eventually, but you can help it with flour. Just be careful about not adding too much.), cover it with linen and leave to grow.
Again, an hour is the minimum, but if you leave it too long it can overgrow and flop. It will also flop if you keep peeking at it.
Form little or big rolls, as you wish. You can plait them, or make small, roundish pebbles. Paint them with egg and sprinkle with the Gems. Bake them at at least 250 C (best check yeast packet for advice) until golden. Poke them with a wooden stick to see if they are dry inside if you're not sure.
They stay fresh for a few days, and are delicious with butter.
