Bean bread

I have told you before about my large supply of ready-cooked kidney beans. Well, it hasn´t diminished very much, sadly, and since our freezer is quite small I have been constantly thinking about ways to use them, between campaigning of course. One evening last week I remeberd reading somewhere that you can put cooked beans in bread. But where did I read it? After a little thinking and searching I found it in the lovely book Brödglädje which means The joy of bread, published by the Swedish church. It is filled with lovely recipes and stories and nice pictures, oooh I like it so much.
Anyway. There was a story about three women studying to be domestic science teachers. They had an assignment to find a way for students to learn to eat pulses and came up with the idea to put it in bread. And it worked very well, too! They had also done some research and found out that the protein you get by eating a slice of this bread roughly replaces the protein you should get from putting a slice of ham for example on a slice of "ordinary" bread. And no, the bread doesn´t taste beans at all!

The recipe in the book called for lentils, soy beans or chick peas but I replaced with kidney beans and it was fine. I also used fresh yeast because that is what I usually have on hand. I also used the flour I had at home which was wholemeal wheat. I was amazed by the dough, it was so easy to work with! And the taste is great. I will definitely make this again! And the picture? Well, I didn´t have the camera handy baking these so this is a nice spot to eat sandwiches - a nature park in Nôva, western Estonia.

Bean bread
12 bread rolls or 2 loaves

250 grams red or brown lentils, chick peas, soy beans or indeed kidney beans - cooked from scratch or can
450 ml water
50 grams dry or fresh yeast
2 teaspoons salt
50 ml neutral oil, like canola
1 tablespoon golden syrup (I guess honey is a fine replacement)
500 ml rågsikt, which is a Swedish mix of 40% fine rye and 60% wheat (you can use something else too)
700-800 ml wheat flour

Mix the rinsed pulses with 200 ml water and mix in a blender until smooth. Add the rest of the water, in total you should be left with 700 ml bean/water mix. Pour in a skillet and heat it to 37C using fresh yeast and about 42 using dry yeast.
Pour the yeast in a large bowl and add the warm mix, stir until dissolved and continue with salt, syrup, oil and the rye flour. Add about 400 ml wheat flour and work it in. Add more flour until the dough let go of the bowl. Cover with a towel and let it rise for 30 minutes.
Work the dough again on a floured surface and shape it to bread rolls or loaves. Put on baking sheets and let them rise for 30 minutes.
Bake in 225C for about 15 minutes for bread rolls (in the middle of the oven) or 175C for about 25 minutes for loaves (in the bottom of the oven)