These full-flavoured loaves have been very much a firm favourite in our house for many years and while it is great as a non-sourdough bread, the sourdough version is seriously terrific. Of all the flavoured breads I make, this is one I make more than any other.
The recipe guidelines for the non-sourdough version are below the main recipe.
Wish-list time:
Very high up in my list of ambitions in life is to have a bake of mine sold commercially; of all my bakes this is the one that would be top of my wishlist to go out there for folk to buy, ideally by an artisan bakery so that the flavours are just how it would taste if making it at home.
Well, it doesn’t harm to dream!!
About the recipe:
I adore the flavour combination of walnuts, pears and blue cheese, especially in a salad, so I developed this particular recipe to reflect these flavours.
The Gorgonzola comes through without dominating, but the tangy flavour of the sourdough and the sweetness of the pear shine. Combined with small bursts of walnuts, you get what I think is a stunning bread.
Slight variations:
Very few of my recipes are set in stone and I get much joy tweaking my bakes from time to time. For this bread I occasionally use different blue cheeses, reducing or increasing the amount depending on the strength of the cheese, but I would tend to err on the side of caution in terms of the cheese!
You can blitz the walnuts to a powder and incorporate them with the flour at the start, but this does tend to make the bread take on a purple tinge: I think it can look quite attractive but I know how divided opinion can be! So to avoid purplification, work in fairly finely chopped walnuts once the dough has been kneaded.
I sometimes make these without the walnuts – as in some of the pictures in this post – and it still tastes excellent.
From time to time I sprinkle grated cheese on top of the loaves just as they go into the oven: the crisp cheese layer you then get is wonderful!
Fuller details on sourdoughs, including making a starter, are in my sourdough post.
As the basis of a light lunch:
For a simple lunch or supper, try a toasted slice of this bread topped with a poached egg, served on a small bed of lightly dressed rocket and radicchio with a few crisp bacon lardons and some toasted walnuts: the oozing yolk as it drips over the toast and salad, with the saltiness of the bacon is wonderful.
Recipe: pear, walnut & Gorgonzola Sourdough (makes 2 loaves)
- 1 quantity of sourdough (recipe here : you can use all white flour or a mix of white, wholemeal, spelt etc…)
- 80g walnuts, finely chopped but not powdered
- about 150g Gorgonzola, crumbled
- 2 large pears, peeled, cored and roughly chopped
(1) Make up the dough as in the recipe link above for a standard sourdough, adding the walnuts in with the flour at the start. Go up to and including stage 5 ie) after the stretch and folds and an hour or so of the dough resting.
(2) Split the dough in two pieces and pat each into a rough and fairly large rectangle (about the length of a rolling pin – but this is really just an approximation!), with the shorter edge facing you.
(3) Crumble half of the Gorgonzola and half of the chopped pears over the surface, leaving a little border around the dough edge. Gently pat them into the dough so that they don’t go overwhere when you roll it up.
(4) Fold over the edges a little and roll up fairly tightly to form a long sausage-shaped dough. Turn the dough over and pinch along the seal down the length of the dough.
(5) Pat the top down with your hands or with a rolling pin to flatten it a little and bring the bottom half over the top, to give a fairly neat rectangle. Then roll this up from the bottom to give a loaf shape. Place in a well floured banneton. Repeat with the other piece of dough and the other half of the Gorgonzola and pear.
NB: alternatively, you could just knead the Gorgonzola and pear gently into each piece of dough, bringing the dough together to place straight into the bannetons. However, the dough can get very sticky and hard to handle this way.
(6) Cover with a damp cloth and leave at room temperature overnight, by which time the dough should be well risen.
(7) Pop the dough into the fridge for a couple of hours.
(8) Pre-heat the oven to its highest temperature and place thick baking trays or griddle pans on the shelves to heat up (the loaves will be turned out onto these). Place a solid roasting pan on the bottom of the oven (for creating steam).
(7) When you are ready to bake, remove the very hot baking trays from the oven and turn the dough out of the bannetons and straight onto these. Working fairly quickly, make slashes a little way into the dough with a sharp blade.
(8) Pour cold water or a couple of handfuls of ice into the roasting pan to create a lot of steam and then put the dough into the oven, fairly high up. Bake for about 10 minutes at this highest temperture. Turn the temperature down to 200°C (fan) and bake for a further 30-40 minutes. The loaves are ready if they sounds hollow when you knock the base of the loaves. Cool before cutting and eating.
For mini loaves:
Take one of the pieces of dough after the first rise and repeat as for the large loaves, until you form the sausage shape. Gently roll this dough further to make it longer and thinner before cutting into 12 portions and popping into mini loaf tins. Cover and leave until risen just to the tops of the tins before baking at 220C (fan) for 20-30 minutes.
Phil's Home Kitchen 
Love the fruit and cheese combination. Looks great and I’m sure the aroma while baking was amazing! 🙂
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Yes the aroma was wonderful: there is very little that is as intoxicating as the smell of freshly baked bread like this
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Oh, I wish I could smell it! Darn…it looks great. I’ve never thought to combine fruit and cheese, though it’s a natural combination. I bet the taste was fabulous!
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They did taste nice. Wonderfully savoury, but too easy to have another slice!
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Yum!!! I’ve made sourdough with apples but must definitely try this!!
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Yes do: the bread has such a deep flavour that is so hard to resist
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