Batch size: 2 loaves

Required ingredients:

  • Flour, 840g + extra for shaping / baking
  • Salt, 18.3g
  • Brown sugar, 81g
  • Cinnamon (ground), 20g
  • Ginger (ground), 1.7g
  • Cherries (fresh, whole), 475ml / 2 cups
  • Active Dry Yeast, 3.6g
  • Water, up to 710g @ 43 C / 110 F

Special Equipment: Enameled cast iron dutch oven (4-6qt)

Time management:
Prepping ingredients and making dough takes ~1 hr (much of it spent prepping cherries)

Concerns:
Moisture content is difficult to manage with a combination of moistrue from the fresh cherries, and ambient humidity. Be careful and gradually add the 10% water reserve as necessary. You may add flour to compensate.

Preparation:

  1. Slice cherries into pea-size and smaller chunks, discarding stems and pits.

  2. Combine and hand stir the following dry ingredients in a bowl:

    • Flour, 840g + extra for shaping / baking
    • Salt, 18.3g
    • Brown sugar, 81g
    • Cinnamon (ground), 20g
    • Ginger (ground), 1.7g

  3. Heat water to 43 C / 110 F. Do not exceed this temperature because slightly higher temperatures will kill yeast.

  4. Add 640g of water to a bowl.

  5. Add 3.6g of Active Dry Yeast to the bowl of water and stir until it is reasonably dissolved.

  6. Set aside a reserve of 70g of water in a cup.

  7. Gradually add the water + yeast combination to the dry ingredients and stir them. Gradually add the cherry chunks. If there is (likely) some dry flour remaining, gradually add water from the reserve cup, stir, and repeat until all dry ingredients are combined.

  8. Divide dough in half and form each half into a ball.

  9. Store both dough balls in two separate bowls or other suitable containers (they must have room for 2-3x volume growth) where they can prove and expand over the next 12-16 hrs. Cover / place dough balls in oven or some other place.

  10. After dough proves (it should increase in volume by 2-3x), re-form a ball on a large sheet of parchment paper (dusted with flour) with floured hands. Cover dough with a kitchen towel and let it rise for 25 minutes. Begin preheating oven (next step) while waiting for dough to rise.

  11. Preheat oven and Dutch oven, with lid to 450 F (232 C).

  12. “Remove the Dutch oven and lift the dough ball, using the parchment paper, into the bottom of the pot. Keep the parchment paper under the dough. This will allow you to lift the bread out easily when baked. Using a sharp knife, gently score the dough with an X shape."1 Trim any significant excess parchment paper.

  13. Put the lid on the Dutch oven and bake for 30 minutes.

  14. Remove lid from Dutch oven and bake for an additional 10 minutes.

  15. Carefully remove the loaf, using the parchment paper beneath it, and let it cool on a wire rack or similar.

references: [1] https://www.lordbyronskitchen.com/dutch-oven-cinnamon-raisin-bread/