INGREDIENTS

INSTRUCTIONS

You will need a large bowl, and unglazed quarry tiles or a baking stone for
the next-to-bottom rack of your oven.  Place water in a large bread bowl,
add yeast, and stir. Add whole wheat flour and 1 cup white flour and stir
well, then stir 100 times in the same direction to develop the gluten (one
minute). Let this sponge stand for 1/2 hour to 3 hours, covered. Sprinkle
salt over the sponge, then add another cup flour and stir. Continue adding
flour and stirring until you can stir no longer. Turn dough out onto a
lightly floured surface and knead thoroughly, about ten minutes, until
dough is smooth and easy to handle. Clean out bowl, oil lightly, and return
dough to bowl. Cover with plastic wrap and let rise in a convenient place
for 2 to 3 hours. When the dough has more than doubled in volume, push down
gently and turn out onto a lightly floured surface. Divide the dough into
eight equal pieces and shape each into a flat oval shape, approximately 4
inches wide by 8 inches long. Leave these flat disks out on the work
surface and cover with plastic wrap to let rise for approximately 20
minutes. Place quarry tiles or large baking stone on a rack in the lower
third of your oven, leaving a 1 inch space between the tiles and the oven
wall to allow air to circulate. Preheat oven to 450'F.
Five minutes after the oven has preheated, begin shaping the first bread.
Place a small bowl full of cold water by the edge of your work surface.
Using your fingertips, first dip them in the water and then, beginning at
one end of the disk of dough, make tightly spaced indentations all over the
surface of the dough, so that it looks pitted, though not pierced through.
Now stretch the dough gently into a long oval strip by draping it over both
hands and pulling them apart gently. The dough should stretch and give, and
after several tries will extend to make a long oval about 12 inches long
with attractive stretch marks along it from the stretched indentations
(hence, the name "snowshoe bread").
Place the bread back on the work surface, sprinkle with a pinch (less than
1/8 teaspoon) of black onion seeds, then using both hands, place the bread
directly on heated quarry tiles or stone.  While the bread bakes, begin to
shape the next bread. Cooking time for each bread is approximately 4
minutes. You will soon develop a rhythm so that you can bake two breads
side by side across your oven, one going in when the other is half done.
When done, breads will have golden patches on top and a crusty browned
bottom surface. To keep breads warm and soft, wrap them in a cotton cloth
five minutes after they come out of the oven. Serve warm or at room
temperature.  Yield: 8 rippled flatbreads about 12 inches long and 3 to 5
inches wide, with both soft and crispy textures.
Recipe By     : BAKERS' DOZEN (ALFORD AND DUGUID) SHOW #1A26
Posted to EAT-L Digest  5 November 96
Date:    Wed, 6 Nov 1996 20:34:02 -0600
From:    Jackie Bordelon <jbord@PREMIER.NET>

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