Blue Cheese and Nut Bread

Ingredients

• 1 kg plain flour
• 2 tbsp provençale herb mix
• 30 gr instant yeast
• 200 gr mixed nuts or a single kind of your choice - I used hazelnuts, almonds and walnuts
• 75 gr soft butter
• 2 tbsp liquid honey
• 20 gr salt
• 500 ml milk
• 200 ml water
• 175 gr blue cheese

Method 

Note : I only add the walnuts near the end as they can give off a very bitter aftertaste when they get mixed in at the start.

• In the bowl of your mixer, put the flour, yeast and mixed herbs
• Mix them well with a spoon
• Add the softened butter, honey and salt

• And the nuts (except the walnuts) and the milk

• Start the kneading process and add as much water as necessary to get a supple dough. I do this in stages, as sometimes the flour absorbs more liquid than other times.
• Knead for about 8 minutes on a low-ish setting

• Leave the dough to rise until doubled in size.

• When it has sufficiently risen, you will see the texture has lots of air bubbles, like in the picture below

• Divide the dough as you see fit onto a floured surface. I had one large tin and two small ones.
• Gently press the dough out so that you have a flat surface. 
• Sprinkle the walnuts over it and the crumbled cheese

• Lift up one of the edges of the dough and start rolling it up on itself, enclosing the cheese and walnuts as you go.

                                                   

• You should end up with a loaf shape like below. Tuck the ends in to prevent too much cheese escaping.

• Put them in the bread tins seam side down. Dampen the loafs with some water and make some cuts diagonally with a knife.

• Leave to proof for 30 minutes, while you preheat the oven to 210°C (fan assisted) 
• Bake the bread for about 45 minutes. The bread should sound hollow when you tap it from the bottom (you'll have to take it out of the tin before doing that, obviously)
• Leave to cool on a wire rack.

Never mind the holes. You can always stuff them with butter ;-) The cheese hasn't gone anywhere. It has just seeped into the rest of the bread.

Will you be having pumpkin soup this weekend ? This bread makes an excellent accompaniment. It also goes well with Celeriac Soup

Enjoy a Freaky Halloween Weekend.
Patricia xxx...x