Ingredients
Equipment
Method
- Toast the pistachios in a dry skillet until fragrant, then cool and roughly chop.
- Dissolve the starter into the lukewarm water until no lumps remain.
- Mix in half the flour with the cardamom, add the salt, then mix in the rest of the flour into a shaggy dough.
- Cover and rest 30 to 40 minutes.
- Stretch and fold, folding in the toasted pistachios as you go. Rest 30 minutes.
- Repeat three more times, for a total of 4 rounds, resting 30 minutes between rounds.
- Bulk ferment until risen about 50% (2 to 3 hours in a warm kitchen).
- Turn out, pre-shape, then shape into a tight boule.
- Transfer to the floured banneton, seam side up, and cover.
- Refrigerate overnight.
- Preheat the oven with the Dutch oven inside to 475°F for at least 30 minutes.
- Score and bake covered 30 minutes, then uncovered 10 minutes.
- Finish on a baking sheet, open, about 5 minutes.
- Cool completely, at least 1 hour, before slicing.
Notes
This recipe is Research-backed. It follows the same dough and timing as the plain loaf, with ground cardamom mixed into the flour and toasted pistachios folded in during the stretch and folds. It has not been through a Bake-Keeper kitchen test yet.
Cardamom and pistachio show up together across a lot of baking traditions, and I wanted a loaf that let both of them actually taste like something instead of getting buried under sugar. There is no added sweetener here at all, this is a savory-leaning loaf that works as well next to a bowl of soup as it does with butter and honey.
If you only have ground cardamom that has been sitting in the pantry a while, taste a pinch before you commit. Stale cardamom smells more like dust than citrus and pine, and no amount of pistachio will make up for it.