We are really in the sticks of Sörmland here. I cannot even check into facebook. And there is no electricity in Valla Gård farm’s baking cottage. You can only imagine my panic. But I am keeping calm, and carrying on. Dan Brouwer of Järna Vedugns Bageri (Järna’s wood fired oven bakery) has come to show us how to bake Swedish knäckebröd, a traditional hard rye crispbread pronounced can-nacka-broohd.

Dan the happy baker man from Järna

We are in a traditional baking cottage. Low ceilings, no electricity, hot stones fired up in the oven. And an array of rolling pins on a wooden table. We get a lesson on sourdough starter fermentation from Dan the man, owner of and baker at nearby Järna Vedugns Bageri. On this topic, Jenny Jonevret from the CAS pipes up to tell us how trendy sourdough bread is right now in Stockholm, and that there are hordes of men taking to dough punching there. And Dan reminds us that sourdough is the traditional way of baking bread. Not just a Stockholm syndrome. Originally, bread was made in a big wooden bowl. It was never washed. So bacteria grew naturally, and sourdough bread just happened, so to speak. This gives you a wide spectrum of bacteria growing at different temperatures and giving different tastes.

Tools of the knäckebröd trade

We begin the dough-making process. Dan looks so happy. “This is the good thing about being a baker” he enthuses. “You get to be a child again. Play with the dough!”. The wood-heated stone oven is ablaze. We are using rye flour, which does not have much gluten. “Should we wash our hands fist?”Julia Klöpper of Living at Home from Germany asks. Dan resolutely says “NO” … “We need the bacteria. Washing hands takes away the flavour”. I like his attitude. Even more so when he takes command of the mixing bowl, firing in ingredients with unmeasured abandon. “Some bakers want exact recipes, but I go with my feeling for it”.  He adds “I used to be a chef before”. Now it all makes sense.

"Ha! Mine's bigger than yours" says Jessica Gunn of Waitrose Magazine, UK. Grace Fitzgerald of the CAS says nothing but considers using the rolling pin after the shot is taken.

We mix, punch, roll, and remove a disc from the centre of each thin piece of flat dough. This practise is traditional as the knäckebröd was hung on poles so that rats didn’t get to it first. Knäckebröd is designed for storing. It is dry, with a long shelf-, or in this case, pole- life. Swedes only baked a few times a year long ago as it took quite a lot of wood to heat the oven. Hard times, hard bread.

“So do people still eat knäckebröd here?” asks the curious London editor Jessica Gunn from Waitrose Magazine. “Oh yeah” says Dan. “Every lunch time you have a basket of knäckebröd and soft bread”. Jenny Jonevret pipes up  again; “and we eat it especially with sill”. We are now armed with what we think is the key knäckebröd information when Dan concludes with the final wonder of knäckebröd being that you can cook it just about anywhere, it seems; “You can do it anywhere. You can even do it out in the forest on a hot stone”. Now that’s what I call liberation.

Knäckebröd crisping up in Valla Gård's wood-fired oven

Dan’s personal life? He does not like to have a difference between his work life and his personal life. That said, he  is happy that he does not have a commercial bakery, which would require rising much before the crack of dawn. “I have a local bakery where I sell to the people nearby. So I bake in the morning and during the day”.  Dan explains he is a late starter and doesn’t get up until 4 a.m. What a sloth. So no midnight madness baking in Järna then. His customer experience aim? “Smell the bread, see the baker, see the work being done”. Oh, and I particularly liked this quote on his baking philosophy; “You can clean your hands afterwards. You just have to get used to being a little bit dirty”. It seems Dan has his priorities right.

Me with a large wooden paddle and master knäckebröd maker, Hélene Edling

My first knäckebröd is coming out of the wood fired oven. I am awfully excited. This means both my eyebrows are raised i.e. a moment of veritable joy and no evidence of botox. So obviously, the first thing I do is have a photo taken with my first knäckebröd, and Dan the baker. I slather butter on it, after first taking several moments to admire my craftswomanship. The butter melts. I tear off a corner. And eat. I can’t stop. I am typing with one hand. Such is the power a knäckebröd straight out of the oven has over me. Thank you Dan. You are quite the baking man.

www.jarnavedugnsbageri.se

And if you want book a baking session or buy sheepskins and handicrafts from Valla Gård (where the baking cottage is), check outwww.hantverksgruppensormland.se