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Peanut Butter Jelly Bread

American food blogger Jerrelle Guy packs her food with family stories and big flavours. We have three recipes from her debut cookbook, Black Girl Baking

MAKES TWO 23CM LOAVES

“My ma would buy those alreadyswirled-together pinstripe jars of peanut butter and jelly (jam) and spread a good amount onto a couple of slabs of thick-sliced bread,” remembers Jerrelle. “For her, the ratio of peanut butter to jelly in the jar was perfect. For me, I never liked that much peanut butter. It left my mouth tacky and dry. I would scrape a small scoop from the jar onto the billowy-soft bread just to get a little taste, and then double the jelly, just enough to sweeten the bread, not caring that I was disrupting the jar’s equilibrium.”

295ml warm oat or nut milk 50g sugar 1 and a half tsp active dry yeast

360g bread flour, plus more for dusting

three-quarter tsp salt 36g peanut butter powder 6-8tbsp your favourite jam TO SERVE

Banana Honey l In a small bowl, combine the milk with 25g of the sugar, then sprinkle the yeast over the top and let it sit and bloom until a thick cap of froth is formed, five to 10 minutes.

l In a stand mixer with a dough hook attachment, combine the flour and salt. Add the remaining 25g sugar along with the bloomed yeast and peanut butter powder. Knead the mixture for three to four minutes, or until it turns into a springy dough. Place the dough in a clean oiled bowl, cover with plastic wrap and a damp cloth and place it in a warm dark place to double in size, about 60-90 minutes.

l Lightly flour a work surface and a rolling pin and have two 23 x 12.5cm oiled loaf pans lined with 10cm-wide strips of parchment long enough to stretch across the width and up the sides of the pan with a little hanging over.

l Unwrap the risen dough, punch it down in the centre to release the air and roll it out to roughly a 40.6 x 76cm rectangle. Spread the jam all over the surface, then roll the dough up tightly from the shorter end. Slice the log in half so you have roughly two 20cm-long rolls. Transfer them to the prepared loaf pans; if they’re longer, compress the rolls slightly, like accordions, or tuck the ends under to fit. Cover the bread again with plastic wrap and a warm damp dish towel and keep in a dark place to double in size, for another 60 to 90 minutes. The bread should peak out just slightly above the edges of the pan, or at least come up very close but not puff far over the edges.

l Preheat the oven to 180C/gas mark 4 and position an oven rack on the lower half of the oven. Bake the loaves for 50 to 60 minutes, or until you can hear a hollow knock when you tap on the bottom of the baked loaf with your knuckle. Transfer to a wire wrack to cool for at least 20 minutes. Slice and serve with sliced banana and honey, if you like.