Slathered in butter, a slice of this figgy bread roll is better than good. If you like fig rolls, you’ll love this bread. It’s a heady mixture of figs, almonds, honey and spices all rolled up in a cinnamon scented wholemeal spelt bread dough.
Random Bread Recipes
Dom has tasked us with randomly picking a bread recipe for this month’s Random Recipes. Since I’ve started baking the odd yeasty loaf or two as an aside to my regular rye sourdough, I was quite excited by this challenge.
The recent success I had with bagels spurred me on so that as soon as I found out what the challenge was, I started randomising immediately. Then dashed off to the bakers to buy some yeast with a big smile on my face. I’ve started using fresh yeast again recently because I’m wary of the “improvers” listed in the ingredients of dried yeast.
As most of my cookbooks have a bread recipe or two in them, I decided to use Eat Your Books again to select my recipe from. Once I’d got my random number I simply counted down the list until I hit number 69 (of 88) and just hoped it wouldn’t be one of my books with no bread recipes to be found. It wasn’t.
I picked Gaia’s Kitchen by Julia Ponsonby, one of my favourite vegetarian cookbooks. Despite the favour I have shown it over the years, evinced by its rather tatty appearance, I’d never made one of her bread recipes. I counted them out and she had six. Another random number gave me Figgy Bread Roll, which amazingly gave me the very recipe I’d been eyeing up AND there was absolutely no cheating involved.
Figgy Bread Roll
Although Dom asked us to stick to the recipe religiously, I couldn’t do it. I had to get chocolate in after all. I did make the bread dough more or less as written, although I used wholemeal spelt flour rather than wholewheat.
As for the filling, I changed that significantly. I had a Spanish fig and almond round that had somehow got pushed to the back of a cupboard a rather long time ago and was definitely in need of using. So I forwent the use of the other dried fruits and nuts in the recipe and used the whole round instead. I was also keen to take this opportunity to use the dandelion honey I made recently.
The scent of sweet cinnamon wafting through the house as this loaf baked was indescribably good. The bread slathered with butter was better than good. It stayed sweetly and spicily scented for the several days it took to eat it. It was rather a large loaf.
If you think a figgy bread roll is all well and good, but really you just want good old-fashioned fig rolls, then head over to my recipe for the most scrummilicious fig rolls made with wholemeal spelt.
Other Sweet Bread Recipes You Might Like
Keep in Touch
Thanks for visiting Tin and Thyme. If you make this figgy bread loaf, I’d love to hear about it in the comments below. And do please rate the recipe. Have you any top tips? Please share photos on social media too and use the hashtag #tinandthyme, so I can spot them.
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If you’d like more fig recipes, follow the link and you’ll find I have quite a lot of them. All delicious, of course.
Choclette x
Figgy Bread Roll. PIN IT.
Figgy Bread Roll
Ingredients
Bread
- 450 g wholemeal spelt flour
- ½ tsp sea or rock salt (I used Himalayan pink salt)
- 1 tsp ground cinnamon
- 1 tbsp golden caster sugar (I used cardamom sugar)
- ½ oz fresh yeast
Fig Filling
- 400 g dried figs chopped
- 100 g almonds chopped
- 1 tbsp cocoa powder
- ½ tsp ground cinnamon
- 6 tbsp dandelion honey or regular honey if you're not wanting a vegan loaf
- 1 tbsp sesame seeds
Instructions
Bread
- Place the flour, salt, ground cinnamon and sugar in a large bowl. Give it a good stir and make a well in the centre.450 g wholemeal spelt flour, ½ tsp sea or rock salt, 1 tsp ground cinnamon, 1 tbsp golden caster sugar
- Dissolve the yeast in 300 ml warm water and pour into the flour well. Stir together from the inside out until everything is well mixed. Cover the bowl with a plastic bag and leave in a warm place to rise for ½ an hour.½ oz fresh yeast
- Knead for a few minutes, then roll out on a floured surface into a rectangle about 25 x 15 cm and about 1 cm thick.
Fig Filling
- Meanwhile chop the figs and almonds into small pieces and put into a bowl. Add the cocoa, ground cinnamon and honey, then stir to combine.400 g dried figs, 100 g almonds, 1 tbsp cocoa powder, ½ tsp ground cinnamon, 6 tbsp dandelion honey
- Spread this over the rectangle leaving a good cm clear all around. Roll up the dough lengthways and seal the sides with your fingers.
- Place on a lined baking tray seem side down and then cover with a plastic bag. Leave to rise in a warm room for a further 30 minutes or until doubled in size.
- Brush with milk then sprinkle the sesame seeds over the top. Bake in the centre of a preheated oven at 180℃ (350℉, Gas 4) for 30 minutes or until the loaf is golden and sounds hollow when tapped on its bottom. Place on a wire rack to cool.1 tbsp sesame seeds
Notes
Nutrition Estimate
Sharing
Thanks to Dom of Belleau Kitchen for this wonderful figgy bread roll. It was simple to make as it required virtually no kneading and was not only light in texture, but delicious too. Hooray for Random Recipes.
This loaf entailed using up a very old fig almond round given as a present. It also included homemade dandelion honey rather than real honey and malt extract. So I’m submitting it to Credit Crunch Munch which is being guest hosted by Janice of Farmersgirl Kitchen.
Magnolia Verandah says
How great does this look! What a great innovation using fig. Looks lovely.
Caroline says
That looks lovely – it’s been so long since I had a fig roll and a combination of figs and chocolate in bread sounds heavenly!
Angie Schneider says
This looks so GREAT! Spelt is my favourite grain and nutty fig filling…heavenly!
Charlotte Charlotte'sKitchenDiary says
This sounds so good Choclette. I am loving sweet yeast breads at the moment, although probably a bit too much for my waistline. It’s good to hear that this one keeps, too.
laura@howtocookgoodfood says
Like Dom, I adore fig rolls, takes me back to the 70s! Your loaf has all the goodies i would enjoy and I must see this recipe for dandelion honey. What a good idea. I need to put some of mine to good use!
belleau kitchen says
How utterly incredible is this beautiful loaf. I do love a figgy roll. Haven’t had one for years! Such an amazing entry for random recipes and well worth the long twitter tease over the past few days! Thanks for entering
The KitchenMaid says
Oooh! I have all these ingredients! And no bread for breakfast… I wonder if I can make it before bed?