When people use the words “Russian” and “Bread” in the same sentence, the chances are that the word “Rye” appears between them. And the most famous of Russian rye breads is Borodinsky Bread (in Russian: бородинский хлеб): a dark, dense, coriander-spiced sourdough.

Soviet Russia being what it was, there were officially sanctioned recipes. Therefore, if you’re on a quest for officially authentic Borodinsky Bread (and a Russian speaker) look no further than GOST 5309-50. There’s an even older source, which predates the GOST standards board, for “Borodinsky Supreme” (the 100% rye version; the “standard” has 15% wheat flour). It’s reprinted in a 1940 recipe book and lovingly recreated in this Youtube video. The origin of the name, by the way, is by no means as precise, with various stories to pick from. Choose your favourite: mine involves the wife of a general using coriander from her garden to make flavour the bread she was making to fortify the troops at the battle of Borodino (but don’t spend too much time considering the plausibility of a general’s wife feeding an entire Napoleonic army).

For an amateur baker in the West today, there are two problems with going for absolute authenticity. The first is that the process is seriously lengthy, with multiple stages of pre-ferment, “scald” and different rises and washes. The second is that you may struggle to get hold of one of the key ingredients: red rye malt (in Russian: solod (солод). If you’re desperate for the authentic, look out for stockists of home brewery supplies like this one.

While I may get round to trying for absolute authenticity one of these days, for regular use, I’m doing a cut down version based on the one in my usual bible, Andrew Whitley’s Bread Matters. I’ve approximately doubled the quantities for my large loaf tin and done a bit of flavour adjustment for my own taste: in particular, I’ve reduced the molasses, which I do find tend to take over the flavour to the exclusion of everything else, at the expense of the result not being quite as dark.

The first ingredient, as in any sourdough, is the starter: mine has been going for six months now. I bake a loaf more or less weekly, and refresh it with two parts water to one part dark rye.

Ingredients

• 80g dark rye sourdough starter
• 580g dark rye flour
• 100g light rye flour
• 10g salt
• 10g ground coriander
• 5g coriander seeds
• 30g molasses
• 30g barley malt extract

Method

1. The night before you will be baking, make your “production sourdough”: mix your starter with 80g of dark rye flour and 100ml of water. Leave at room temperature overnight: in the morning, it should be bubbly and nicely fermented.
2. Crush the coriander seeds in a pestle and mortar. Brush the sides of your loaf tin with oil, and line the sides with half of them.
3. Make your dry mixture of the rest of the flours, the salt and the ground coriander. Make your wet mixture from the production starter, 400ml of lukewarm water (mine was at 43℃), the molasses and the barley malt extract.
4. Mix the two together thoroughly till everything is smoothly combined into a wet, sticky dough. Pour the dough into your bread tin, shaping it to be somewhat domed at the top. Don’t bother trying to press the dough into the corners of the tin. (In case you’re wondering, by the way, I haven’t forgotten all about the kneading stage: it’s just that dark rye won’t form gluten properly so there’s no point in bothering).
5. Sprinkle the remaining coriander seeds over the top of the loaf and press them in slightly.
6. Leave the dough to rise in a warm place: my own technique is to heat an over to 50℃, put the bread tin in together with a mug of water, and switch the oven off. It’s hard to know how long the rise time is likely to be: mine took about 6 hours.
7. Preheat your oven to 250℃. Bake for 15 minutes, turn the heat down to 200℃ and bake for another 30-45 minutes. I tend to take mine out after 40 when it’s still just a fraction damp, because I don’t like risking overbaked, dried out dense rye; you may be braver.

Like any dark rye, this won’t rise massively. But the combination of rye, sourdough ferment and coriander makes Borodinsky the most intensely flavoured bread I know and my favourite accompaniment to lunchtime soups and salads.

As usual, a few in-process shots: