Pain d'Epi/French Wheat Stalk Bread with Caramelized Onions

Pain d'épi is known as the wheat stalk bread which calls for an impressive twist on the classic French baguette. We get these Pain d'épi very much easily in every bakeries here, obviously i never had a chance to bake these wheat stalk shaped bread at home. But finally it happened, and i baked Pain d'épi at home.Epi de Blé is the name given to the bread which looks like wheat stalk or the ears of wheat. This bread is often baked during special holidays and celebrations, this bread calls for an easy preparation and sounds almost like French baguette. Apart from cutting the dough to resemble as much as like wheat stalk, this bread calls for easy ingredients.

This bread is best to eaten fresh, the day its made. If you want to enjoy this bread later, wrap them well in paper until it is used. If the bread starts to go stale, revive it by sprinkling with water and briefly reheat in oven. Or else you can grill them in griller and enjoy with cheese or butter. This bread makes excellent croutons or bread crumbs. However my today's Pain d'épi calls for caramilzed onions to add some flavor. If you want to make authentic pain d'épi, just omit the onions. This Pain d'épi was challenged by Aparna for this month's We knead to Bake, a baking event by Aparna of My Diverse Kitchen. Am posting this bread for this week's blogging marathon as am running with an interesting theme, Pick an appliance and make 3 is the theme for this week,i couldnt resist to pick my humble 'OVEN' for this theme, hence this bread for today's theme.

2+1/2cups All purpose flour
1tsp Salt
1+1/2tsp Instant yeast
1tbsp Oil
1cup Warm water
1 Large onion (finely chopped)
1tsp Oil

Take the flour, salt, instant yeast, oil, water in a large bowl. Meanwhile, heat a teaspoon of oil and saute the chopped onions until they turns golden brown, keep aside and let them cool.

Once cool, add the caramelized onions to the flour mixture and knead everything as a smooth,soft dough.

Shape as a ball and place in a greased bowl, cover it loosely and let it sit in a warm place for an hour.

Dust your working surface lightly with flour. Divide the dough as two (as my baking tray was small i divided the dough into two),then press out the dough into a rough rectangle.

Fold the long edge away from you towards the center. Fold the long edge near you towards the centre. Now fold over in half, like a letter fold and pinch the seam together neatly and tightly.

Else check my baguette link to know how to shape this bread.

Now sprinkle the flour generously over the baguette, hold the scissor parallel to the bread then cut the dough about three inches apart, tilt them so that they are at 45 degree angle.

Make the cuts in the dough and take the piece and move it to the left, keep doing this until you reach the end of the bread. Check this link to understand the cutting process (Youtube Link).

Arrange the pain d'épi in a baking tray and let it rise again for 15minutes.

Preheat the oven to 420F,  with a baking tray upside down on the rack and an empty pan at the bottom of the oven.

Place the epi in the oven, pour a cup of water to the pan . Bake it about 15to 20 minutes till the crust turns golden brown.

Let it cool completely before cutting the bread.

Check out the Blogging Marathon page for the other Blogging Marathoners doing this BM#67