This is another iteration of my 12-grain bread for sandwiches. This week, I adapted King Arthur’s Rustic Olive Roll recipe, omitting the olives and substituting a cup of 12-grain flour for bread flour in the starter. This is the first recipe I’ve made with a more unusual rising method, namely rising in a floured towel. I’ve always been wary of doing this because I would fear that the dough would stick to the towel and make a mess, but this worked without a hitch.

The recipe begins with an overnight starter, which as you can see here has expanded and is nicely bubbly.

The starter goes in with the rest of the ingredients, and it’s all mixed together.

Last time my dough was really heavy; this week it was just really, really dry. I thought I might have to add more liquids, but before making the final judgment I thought I would knead it a bit to see if I could get it to come together.

And come together it did, though this dough was really thick. My poor hand mixer was straining trying to knead it. But it survived and the dough turned into a smooth, slightly tacky ball.

The dough is stretched into a roughly 9×8″ rectangle. The recipe calls for cutting it into six even pieces, but I wanted to get more sandwiches out of it, so I cut it into 9 rectangles.

The rolls do their second rise on a floured (cotton, not terry cloth) towel that has been folded such that their sides get floured as well. After the second rise the rolls get flipped over onto a parchment covered baking sheet, flour side up, and baked.

The top of the rolls comes out all floury and it contributes to a chewier, slightly more substantial crust.

My crust wasn’t very thick, but as I mentioned before it had a good chewiness to it, and it worked well with the sandwiches. The bread had a good flavor, similar to a ciabatta, but the interior wasn’t as chewy.

Rustic Sandwich Rolls (adapted from King Arthur’s Rustic Olive Rolls)

Ingredients

Starter

• 1/2 cup cool water
• 1/16 teaspoon instant yeast
• 1 cup 12-grain flour blend

Dough

• All of the starter
• 2 tablespoons olive oil
• ½ cup lukewarm water
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 2 cups unbleached bread flour
• 2 teaspoons instant yeast

Directions

1. Mix the water, yeast, and flour, stirring till the flour is incorporated. Cover and let rest at room temperature for about 14 hours or overnight. Tthe starter will be bubbly
2. Combine the starter with the remaining dough ingredients, and mix and knead—by hand, mixer, or bread machine set on the dough cycle—to make a soft, smooth dough.
3. Place the dough in a lightly greased bowl, cover, and let it rise for 1 hour; it should have become puffy. Gently deflate the dough, and transfer it to a lightly greased work surface.
4. Pat the dough into a 9×8″ rectangle. The more careful you are to make the corners of the rectangle square, the nicer your rolls will look (my corner pieces were pretty triangular). Cut the dough into six or nine rectangles.
5. Take a cotton dish towel (not terry cloth), and sprinkle it heavily with flour, rubbing the flour into the cloth. Set the cloth on a baking sheet.
6. Space three pieces of dough onto the floured cloth, placing them tight against one long edge of the baking sheet. Push the cloth gently against their exposed edges, then space the remaining three pieces of dough in the same manner, again pushing the cloth against their edges.
7. Cover the rolls with lightly greased plastic wrap or a free-standing cover, and allow them to rise for 60 to 90 minutes until they’re very puffy. Towards the end of the rising time, preheat the oven to 425°F.
8. Very gently lift the rolls off the cloth, and place them, floured side up, on a parchment-lined or lightly greased baking sheet. Bake them for 20 to 25 minutes, until they’re golden brown. Remove them from the oven, and cool.