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Oatmeal beer bread

This recipe makes two good-sized loaves. Baking it in an enameled cast-iron Dutch oven gives it a nice, crusty exterior and a soft, chewy interior. The steel-cut oats, along with the rolled oats, give the bread great texture, inside and out.

Two good-sized loaves
Two round oatmeal beer loaves coated with rolled oats cooling on a wire rack.

Gather these

Ingredients

  • 16 oz Porter, Stout, or Lager beer, room temperature (see note)
  • 2 tsp (1 packet) active dry yeast
  • 800–900 g bread flour, divided
  • 2 cups leftover steel-cut oats, room temperature (see note)
  • 1 Tbsp molasses
  • 2 tsp kosher salt
  • 4 oz rolled oats, divided (see note)
  • 1 egg, beaten with 1 Tbsp water

Let’s make it

Method

Sponge

  1. Combine beer, yeast, and 300 g of flour in a bowl. Stir to combine.
  2. Cover the bowl and set it aside for at least 2 hours, or up to overnight.

Bread

  1. In the bowl of a stand mixer, combine the sponge, prepared steel-cut oats, molasses, and 500 grams of flour.
  2. Mix on low with the dough hook until all ingredients are combined—this will take 2–3 minutes.
  3. Add additional flour if necessary until the dough begins to come together around the hook. The dough will be sticky. It is the right consistency when it pulls away from the sides of the bowl but still sticks to the bottom.
  4. Add the salt and half of the toasted rolled oats.
  5. Mix on medium-high speed for 7 minutes.
  6. Place the dough in an oiled bowl, cover it with a tea towel, and let it rise until doubled in volume, about an hour.
  7. Go get a cup of coffee.
  8. When the dough has doubled in volume, preheat the oven to 550°F. Let the oven heat during the second rise.
  9. Spray the inside of one or two Dutch ovens with cooking spray.
  10. Divide the dough into two pieces and turn them out onto a flour-coated surface.
  11. Give each piece a quick knead, then shape it into a smooth ball to form a loaf.
  12. Brush the top of each loaf with egg wash and coat it with the remaining rolled oats.
  13. Place a loaf, oat side up, in a Dutch oven. Cover it with a towel and let it rise for about an hour, or until doubled in size.
  14. Lower the oven temperature to 450°F and place the bread in the oven.
  15. Bake for about 40 minutes, until the internal temperature reaches 190°F.
  16. Remove the bread from the Dutch oven and cool it on a wire rack.

It’s a bit of a fussy recipe, but worth it.

Notes

Hoppy beers (like an IPA) can give the bread’s crust an incredibly bitter flavor. I find that beers with low to moderate IBU levels work best, with Porter being my favorite. The malty flavor plays well with the toasted oats, creating a well-rounded flavor in the final loaf.

I originally developed this recipe using leftover steel-cut oats (minus the sweet toppings). My favorite way to prepare oats is Alton Brown’s recipe. If you don’t have leftovers, consider cooking up some oats using beer instead of water for extra beer flavor. You’ll need about 2/3 cup of uncooked oats to make 2 cups of cooked oats.

For best flavor, toast your oats in a dry pan over medium heat, stirring often, until they begin to turn golden.

Equipment

  • Stand mixer — you could hand-knead this bread, but it is much easier to use a stand mixer. I love my Cuisinart mixer.
  • Enameled cast-iron Dutch oven (or two) — I find this bread gets the best crust when cooked in an uncovered 4–5 qt Dutch oven. Tall-sided earthenware also works really well. If you don’t have either, you can certainly prepare this bread in a traditional Pullman loaf pan or as freeform loaves cooked on a pizza stone.
  • If you only have one cast-iron Dutch oven, wrap one of the dough balls in plastic and stash it in the fridge while the first loaf rises and bakes. After the first loaf is baked, remove the remaining dough from the fridge, form a loaf, let it rise, then bake it.

Unbaked Oatmeal Beer Bread