Polar breads are a nice alternative bread for making a sandwich. They are essentially quite flat breads with an open texture inside and a real nice bounce! A nice addition to your repertoire and a bread that comes straight from my new “Eat Well” course.
Yoghurt is something I always put into a pita bread for a real tasty twang, and it suits these polar breads really well too. Honey brings the tiniest touch of sweetness, but really it’s there to help the breads take on a golden colour as they “bake”, and contribute a little chewiness too.
Just like an English Muffin these are baked in a dry frying pan. Four minutes each side, on a heat probably lower than you think, should bake them through to the middle without taking on too much colour.
Polar Breads
This recipe makes six polar breads.
Difficulty
Easy
2.5 to 3 hours
Ingredients
330g Strong White Bread Flour
45g Wholemeal Rye Flour
6g Salt
40g Plain Yoghurt
10g Honey
230g Room Temperature Water
10g Fresh Yeast or 1 x 7g sachet of dry easy bake yeast
Method
Weigh both of your flours and salt into a large mixing bowl. Add the yoghurt and honey.
Weigh your water out into a jug, and if your yeast is the fresh kind, dissolve it in the water. If your yeast is dry, pop it into the bowl with the flour.
Pour the yeasty water into the bowl and mix everything together using a dough scraper. As it comes together into a rugged dough, turn it out onto the table.
Knead the dough well. It’ll take about 8 minutes and it might be a little sticky at first thanks to the rye and honey. Resist the urge to dust with flour and it’ll become silky and smooth.
Place the dough back into the bowl, dust the surface, and cover with a clean cloth. Rest your dough in a draft free place, at room temperature, for 60 minutes.
When your dough has rested it will have puffed up nicely. Turn it out of the bowl and divide into six pieces, then roll them up into six balls.
Rest up your dough balls again for 30 minutes.
One by one, take a dough ball and dust it well. Then with a rolling pin, roll them out into discs around half a centimetre thick. Dust them as you go if they start getting sticky.
Prick them well with a fork, on both sides.
Heat a large frying pan on a low to medium heat and starting with the first one you rolled out begin to cook your polar breads. You’ll need to do them one by one and they will take 4 minutes either side. Your first one is your tester. Make sure the heat is steady and place your first polar bread in the pan. Set a timer for four minutes. If it is colouring too fast by three or even two minutes you know you’ll need to turn down the heat for the next one. Flip it and cook it the same on the other side.
Repeat the process to bake all your polar breads.
Cool on a wire rack.
