Three Cheese and Roasted Tomato Tear & Share Bread

Being a sweet girl rather than savoury (in tastes if not in personality) - I am much more likely to reach for a slab of chocolate or cupcake rather than a piece of bread. I was going to add 'when I'm hungry' but who am I trying to kid?

Anyway, things change.

And this bread recipe definitely contributed to that.

Let me introduce to you... Three Cheese and Roasted Tomato Tear & Share Bread.

I'll pause a second while you digest the yumminess of that name.

And while you're waiting, I'll show you a picture of it to whet your appetite.

Ooooh.

Not only does this look good, it tastes rather fab, too. I've seen other tear and share bread recipes around the internet but putting your own little spin on something really makes it personal and makes it sure that it will be something you're sure to enjoy.

It was a good day for making bread yesterday. Although it was bitterly cold, the sun was shining in through the windows. Despite this, my old stone house didn't stand a chance of heating up so the heating was on full blast. So that's sunny and toasty conditions on the windowsill. Two very enthusiastic thumbs up.

So let's crack on with the show.

Three Cheese and Roasted Tomato Tear and Share Bread

What you need:

For the bread
8oz white bread flour
4oz plain flour
250ml (approx 8 1/2 fl oz) warm water
1/4 oz instant yeast
1 1/2 oz castor sugar
A generous pinch of salt (I used about 1/4 tsp)

For the filling
A good dash of herbs (either fresh or dried)
2 oz butter, melted
A decent handful of cheeses (I used edam and mature cheddar)
Some soft cheese (I used a garlic and herb variety)
3 tomatoes, roasted in the oven, skins removed and left to cool


Directions:

I'm not a baking puritan (except when it comes to using weights to measure out ingredients!) so I used my Kenwood to do all the hard graft. Feel free to do this by hand if you fancy - more power to you!

1. The first thing to do is roast your tomatoes. Pop them into the oven (at about 180 C) for approximately 20 minutes until the skin has puffed up. Take them out the oven and leave them to cool.

2. In your mixing bowl add the water, sugar and yeast. Using your 'K' beater (or general mixing paddle) gently add in the bread flour and mix on a slow speed. This is simply to stop your flour going everywhere except where you want it to be! This didn't work for me as my flour always has a mind of its own. I'm going to pretend it's all part of the experience!

3. Change onto your dough hook (which looks suspiciously like something Cpt. Hook donated) and add the plain flour until the dough forms. If you need to, add a little more water so that it comes together. Let the machine knead the dough for 10 minutes until it has come together nicely and isn't sticking to the sides of the bowl.

4. A little bit of kneading is required now but just a little. Pop the dough onto a floured surface and knead so that your ball of dough is lovely, smooth and round. Lightly oil a bowl (bigger than the size of your dough - it's going to get bigger!) and add your dough. Put cling film over the top of the bowl and leave it in a toasty place for a couple of hours until it's approximately doubled in size. It pains me to say that this break gives you an ideal chance to tidy up as you go along. Or, you could just watch Christmas movies like I did and leave the clearing up until much, much later!

 

5. Once it's puffed up (and your movie has finished) place the bread onto a floured unit and give it a pounding until it's a flat shape resembling a large rectangle approximately 1cm thick. I don't know why I don't have a picture of the bread once it's on the unit but here it is after rising!

6. Now it's time to melt your butter and grate your cheese. Drizzle the melted butter over the top of your dough rectangle. Generously sprinkle your grated cheese and herbs over the top so that it covers every piece of dough. Now put some blobs of soft cheese all over the dough so that it's evenly spaced but quite sparse.

 

7. Now get your tomatoes. They should easily be cool enough to handle and the skin should easily slip off. Pop a knife into each tomato and allow the majority of the juices to flow out. Chop (or just tear with your hands) so that the tomatoes are in bite sized chunks. Scatter these over the dough and cheese.

8. Find a standard bread tin for your loaf. Tip it onto its short side in preparation for receiving the dough. Check the size of your tin so that you can begin to cut your dough into the correct size pieces. You should be aiming for bits of dough that are roughly the size of the tin but this is a grabby time of bread - the more rustic it looks, the better!

9. Cut your dough into squares and pile them into your tin. Your filling will fall out - just pop it back in or sprinkle it over the top once you're done. All the dough should fit roughly into the tin.

10. More rising now - cling film your loaf tin again and put it back in its cosy home for about 40 minutes. More time for clearing up - sigh.

11. Pre-heat your oven to 180 C and bake your loaf for about 45 minutes until the top is golden brown. I used foil over the top of the loaf which ended up being a little bit of a mistake. It stuck to all the glorious, bubbling cheese! It did come off but perhaps I should have popped it in the oven naked!

12. It's ready! Unlike other breads, don't expect this one to sound hollow when you tap the bottom. I wouldn't recommend even looking at the bottom if you're used to making standard loaves - it looks a little soggy but I promise you, that's what it's supposed to look like!

13. Eat and be happy.

An interesting note about my experiment with this bread. Have you ever asked yourself - can I use yeast that's out of date? Well, based on this particular experience, I would say the answer is yes. My yeast was dated best before 6 months ago. I gave it a go, not really expecting anything to come of it, and it worked perfectly. Happy days.

This bread doesn't really need anything added to it to be enjoyed. Even the next day, cold, it tasted delicious and didn't need any additional flavours. I consider butter to be a flavour, by the way!

This is a really easy recipe so adapt it to make any tear and share bread that takes your fancy. How about chocolate and orange tear and share bread? Or apple and cinnamon? Cheese and bacon? Oh - bliss!