How To Make Pistachio And Cranberries Sourdough – Vibrant And Flavorful Bread

Craving for something sweet but healthy still? This pistachio and cranberries loaf won’t fail you.

Recently I have been making sourdough bread with different dried fruit. I like the sweetness of the dried fruit and it always satisfies my sugar craving. One of the benefits of creating new flavor sourdough is I get to clear out leftover ingredients in my pantry. Most of my sourdough-creating moments happen when I look at my pantry and find many interesting possibilities.

For one, poppyseed is the most common and versatile ingredient for baking and I believe you have it in your pantry too. I have made different loaves of bread with poppyseed – white sourdough with poppyseed, seeded sourdough with poppyseed, sourdough bagel with poppyseed topping and more. Its presence alone makes everything seem more delicious.

A fun story behind the birth of this creation: I saw dried cranberries were on sale so I bought a package and I found some diced pistachio left at the back of the shelf at home. No harm in trying to pair these two ingredients and that came out a hit! This pistachio, cranberries and poppyseed sourdough not only offers great flavor and texture but delivers vibrant color to the bread. Just by looking at it, I want to have another bite.

New method of adding inclusions

I have encountered an issue lately when incorporating seeds/nuts/herbs and other add-ins into the dough evenly. There are different approaches regarding adding inclusions. The first method is gradually adding the ingredients to the dough while the dough is mixed in the machine. Another way is performing lamination (instructions in the Notes section).

I have found that adding inclusions in the dough while mixing in a stand mixer causes uneven distribution, because of the size of the stand mixer (or the large quantity of the dough) and the type of mixer itself (If using a spiral mixer, adding inclusions straight into the dough won’t be an issue). The inclusions often stay on one side of the dough and I have to rearrange them while doing folds afterward.

How I solved this problem was to mix the add-ins and dough in the container through numerous sets of folds during bulk ferment. After several folds, the add-ins are better distributed. The instructions and pictures are in the Notes section below.

Pistachio, cranberries and poppyseed sourdough recipe

weight	ingredients	baker’s percentage
450g	baker’s flour (12.5% protein)	90%
50g	wholemeal flour (12.1% protein)	10%
425g	water	85%
140g	starter	28%
10g	salt	2%
90g	pistachio	18%
100g	dried cranberries	20%
10g	poppyseed	2%
total 1270g

Workflow

Night before	Feed Starter (1:5:5)
Day 1
15:20	Fermentolyse* Using a paddle attachment, mix both flour, starter and 90% water in a mixing bowl until a dough is formed. Cover with a tea towel and leave it aside at room temp.
	Prepare inclusions* -pistachio: roughly chop -dried cranberries: soak in hot water for 10 minutes if needed
16:00	With a hook attachment, continue mixing the dough for 2-3 minutes to develop gluten. (windowpane test) Add salt and remaining water. Continue mixing until the dough doesn’t stick to the side of the mixing bowl. The dough should be smooth and shining.
	Add in inclusions.* Oil spray the container for the dough and sprinkle half inclusions inside. Move the dough into the same container and sprinkle the rest inclusions on the top. Perform one set of coil folds.
16:15	Bulk Ferment starts. Perform 3 sets of coil fold with 30-minute intervals.
21:30	Transfer the dough to the fridge.
Day 2
14:00	Take the dough out from the fridge (it has almost doubled the volume) and leave it at room temp for 30 minutes before dividing and shaping.
15:00	Divide and Pre-shape: 630g *2 Rest for 30 minutes
15:40	Final shape: batard (oval), into proofing baskets Rest for another 30 minutes
15:15	Stitch the dough. Coldproof in the fridge overnight.
Day 3
9:00	Preheat oven and baking steel to max temperature setting.
10:00	Prepare boiling water for steam. Score the bread and bake. 250 degrees, 20 minutes, with steam 230 degrees, 25 minutes, without steam.
	Cool down for at least 1 hour before cutting.

Notes

* Fermentolyse : fermentolyse is similar to autolyse. The only difference is whether the starter is included with the water and flour mixture and let it rest for at least 20 minutes. Check my other post what is Autolyse for more details. Depending on if my starter is at the peak, I choose one of these two techniques to start gluten development.

• if my starter is not at the peak yet: I’ll do autolyse first and wait for the starter to be ready
• if my starter is at/ after peak: I’ll do fermentolyse so the starter gets more food(flour) and gluten could start to develop at the same time

* Prepare inclusions:

• pistachio: roughly chop or use store-bought diced pistachio.

• dried cranberries: Depending on the dryness of the cranberries, I sometimes soak them in boiling water for 10 minutes and drain the water out before use.

* Add in inclusions:

As mentioned above, I don’t add inclusions while the dough is mixing in the machine nor do I apply lamination anymore. Instead, I sprinkle half inclusions in an oiled container, move the dough in, and sprinkle the rest of the add-ins. Perform a set of coil folds and voila, the inclusions are evenly distributed throughout the dough.

* The addition of sugar from dried fruit accelerates the fermentation process. If making sourdough with dried fruit for the first time, keep an eye on the volume increase so you don’t over-proof the dough. Control the quantity of sourdough starter also helps manage the fermentation.

At the end

It is always fun to create a new flavor of sourdough bread. What is your favorite combination? Leave a comment and I will give it a go too!