Anyone baking bannock?

[iveofione]

I am always looking for ways to make a bread or biscuits in my truck but it ain't easy. I have tried a number of ingenious schemes all of which seemed to burn the bread on the bottom and leave the top un-browned. Biscuits just aren't right when you have to flip them over halfway and usually turn out more like hockey pucks. I have bought a few things that promised success but the only success was to thin my wallet.

Now I am trying bannock and it looks like it might be an easy solution that I have overlooked before. The secret seems to be to cook it at a low enough temperature that it won't burn but hot enough to bake through. I am cooking it on an induction plate in my truck in a carbon steel pan. It is quite good and there must be 100 different iterations of the recipe.

I am new at this and my recipe is dead simple until I achieve some consistency. I am using a cup of flour, a tsp of baking powder, 1/4 tsp salt, some oil-soon to be replaced by ghee-and a scant 1/2 cup of water. I'll tweak it until I get it right then go from there. If you have a favorite recipe or technique I would like to hear about it. I'm thinking that sausage gravy over a crumbled buttermilk bannock might make a damned fine camping breakfast.

 

[krusty]

There's nothing better than a pemmican or vegemite bannock sammich.....and if the bannock doesn't work out it makes a fine biodegradable campground Frisbee.

 

[O' Clarkii Stomias]

Cast iron is your friend when cooking a bannock. I prefer fry bread, but you probably wouldn't wanna fry in the back of your truck.

 

[Pescaphile]

I used to make Irish soda farls from hard red winter wheat that I'd grind myself. . It was wonderful with butter (lots) and marmalade or jam accompanied by a strong cup of coffee. I haven't made it for several years but your post is inspiration to make some more. It was dirt simple to make and very dark and hearty. It might be a good candidate for you to try camping.

O' CS is dead on in the value of cast iron for making pan bread, the heavier the better.

 

[MELinOre]

soon to be replaced by ghee

Wasn't that the ski instructor on an episode or two of Fraiser?

 

[krusty]

"Irish soda farls". A poor selection of product name by the marketing folks?

 

[iveofione]

Update: I'm getting good at this! Using the above recipe I used 1/2 TBLS of melted butter in the mixture along with 2 tsp of raw sugar. I fried it in the carbon steel pan that I camp with in the Casa and cooked on a Nuwave Pic Flex induction cooktop. The Nuwave is a step forward in induction cooking as it has 3 wattage settings-600, 900 and 1300 and also has 6 heat settings in each range so control is much easier than with my old Duxtop. It was easy to cook without burning and watching the wattage on a Kill A Watt meter it never got above 764 watts in the 900 degree range. Much of the time after it came to heat it would show only 4.2 watts, just enough for the LED's and fan. All this means that I can make bannock inside the Casa with little heat buildup and no flame while being well within the parameters of the Jackery 1000. I have moved from 100 watts of solar on the truck to 240 watts and discovered a way to charge the Jackery from the truck at 2x it's previous charging rate. So power is no longer an issue as my modest needs are being met by the old Jackery.

But the best news is that the bannock is damned good! Fried in ghee with a little sugar added to the dough. it takes on a slightly sweet and nutty flavor. It was crisp on the outside but well done and fluffy in the center, I cooked it as a single large round. The new induction cook top allowed me to find the sweet spot where it didn't burn on the bottom but cooked all the way through. All of my expectations of baking this stuff have been exceeded and I am really looking forward to baking it in camp and sharing with my buddies.

As a side note I will mention that I have been using the organic white unbleached flour from Costco with a protein content of 11.5 %. This has proven to be a superb product, equivalent to King Arthur for my purposes and cheaper. And it comes in a 2 pack of 10 pounds each which I really appreciate. I go through the 5# bags so quick that it seems like I am always out of flour. Buying flour locally isn't an option, I was in the local store last week and saw a 5# bag of flour for $11.79! I might expect that if I was shopping near the Arctic Circle but in northern Washington? C'mon, man!