Clear Bread

by Barry Lewis

Ingredients

Ingredients

650g still mineral water

20g kuzu flour

20g potato starch

Sunflower oil for brushing

To serve on top

Sour cream

Slices of prosciutto

Truffle (if you like?!) or chopped cooked mushrooms

I have always enjoyed attempting transparent recipes, including the clear lemon meringue pie and clear tacos to name a few, but this one seemed a little different. Based on a restaurant called El Bulli this transparent ‘bread’ or clear bread or even crystal bread – whatever you want to call it, got a few requests from you guys over the last few Months and I was keen to give it a try. It’s supposed to taste like bread once done, as the video shows, itt wasn’t easy and there was no way my first experience of tasting truffle was to be on this thing so I made some tweaks… anyhow, enjoy and if you want to try it the write-up has some suggestions based on my findings! Good luck!

Homemade Clear Bread

Ok so this takes a long time! If using a jug / ml like me weigh the water out onto scales to get the 650g! Into a saucepan add the water, kuzu and potato starch and whisk gently until dissolved. It will look quite cloudy, add it onto a hob and turn to a medium low heat, whisk constantly as it warms up.

At first it’ll feel like it’s doing nothing at all and look gloopy, the closer it gets to simmering it starts to get clearer, once it’s simmering keep on a low heat whisking again continually for 3 minutes then take off the heat.

Pour into silicone rectangular moulds two thirds of the way up them. Try to get it all out of the pan or it is a nightmare to clean! Bake in a pre-heated oven for 90minutes at 150fan/170c/325f/Gas3. I personally believe you need a fan oven for this to work from my experience in the video. Do not open the oven and bake it for 90 minutes. It should rise and bubble as it bakes and go clearer.

After the 90 minutes, do not open the door, lower the temp to 120fan/140c/290f/Gas1 and keep baking for 45 minutes longer, this is a more gentle bake that helps to set the ‘bread in place’

Remove from the oven and allow to cool, which won’t take long. Pop them out of the silicone mould carefully, then brush with a little sunflower oil and bake for 10 minutes at 150fan/170c/325f/Gas3 again. I’m not sure if this added anything to it other than maybe a little more crunch, but they are strong once set and it doesn’t really risk them shattering.

Serve with a small dollop of sour cream on top, then a little strip of prosciutto and then the chopped mushrooms or porcini on top if you don’t want to use truffle. You can just omit it entirely if you like! A fun, pretty crazy project that I really enjoyed, I don’t think I’d make it again, it’s just baked starch really, but it was fun!