When we went through our store of beer bottles and cans, we discovered that we still had some Moosehead Grapefruit Radler from a visit to that Canadian’s stalwart’s brewery in Saint John, New Brunswick (89 Main Street West, Saint John, NB; 506-635-7000, ext. 5568, moosehead.ca). That’s the brewery taproom at the top of the post. We remember the radler as a powerful warm-weather thirst quencher, but old beer is usually stale beer, so we decided to cook with it.
Moosehead is known in the U.S. mainly for its export lager, a nicely balanced but hardly surprising beer for all-day drinking. The grapefruit radler was an anomaly. Even in Canada, the most popular Moosehead fruit-infused beer is the Blueberry Radler. But the grapefruit tang and slight bitterness persisted in the stale beer and the resulting whole wheat bread had a nice zingy overtone similar to a caraway seed rye. Here’s how we did it:
BEER BREAD
A variation on the no-knead overnight bread that we were all making during the pandemic shutdown, this rustic wheat bread combines the nuttiness of whole wheat flour with the fermented, slightly sour tang of beer. It works thinly sliced for sandwiches or thickly sliced and cut in squares for croutons or in slabs to mop the bottom of the bowl when you serve soup or stew. We made this with a grapefruit radler and added some grated orange peel for a nice citrus note.
INGREDIENTS
- 250 grams whole wheat flour
- 250 grams white bread flour
- 2 teaspoons instant yeast
- 1 1/2 teaspoons sea salt
- 1 tablespoon EVOO
- 12 ounces (341 ml) beer at room temperature
- olive oil for greasing bowl
- extra flour for dusting
- cornmeal for dusting
DIRECTIONS
Stir together all the dry ingredients. Add olive oil and beer and stir quickly to form a shaggy dough.
Turn out dough onto unfloured pastry mat and knead until dough comes together. Continue kneading until dough develops a soft earlobe texture, dusting with flour as necessary. Form into a ball.
Grease mixing bowl with olive oil. Place dough ball in bowl and turn to coat lightly. Cover bowl with clean towel and set aside in warm place to rise until doubled — about 2 hours.
When dough has doubled, punch down and turn out on counter. Flatten dough, then roll up into a ball again. Pinch seam closed. Place ball seam side down in greased bowl. Cover and let rise about 45 minutes until doubled again.
While dough is on second rising, place 3-quart Dutch oven and cover in oven. Set thermostat for 450°F.
After dough has risen, remove hot Dutch oven from oven. Dust top of dough ball with cornmeal and tip into Dutch oven, seam side up. Dust with cornmeal and place lid on Dutch oven. Return to oven for 25 minutes.
After 25 minutes, reduce oven to 375°F and remove lid. Bake another 5-10 minutes until crust browns.
Remove from oven and tip onto rack to cool before cutting.