Damper -- Bread Making at it's Easiest

Damper is a thick, dense bread made without yeast. It often sustained the early colonial settlers who explored Australia's remote and harsh landscape for months at a time.

The basic ingredients are flour, salt, sugar, water and a little baking soda to help it rise. These ingredients kept well and were easily transportable, making damper an important food source for long journeys.

The hard-shelled bread was slowly baked in the hot ashes of a fire, or cooked in a Dutch oven. The dough was sometimes wrapped around sticks and held over an open fire.

It would be eaten with whatever condiments were handy at the time such as slices of meat or golden syrup and a mug of hot, sweet black tea, known as “Billy tea.”

In this particular recipe, I've given damper a bit of a face-lift by adding a few more ingredients such as parmesan cheese, sliced black olives and butter. While these are just small additions, they make a huge difference in the overall taste and texture of the bread. I've used self-raising cake & pastry flour for this recipe which can sometimes be hard to find in North America. The About.com Guide to Southern Food has a good recipe for making your own self-raising flour.

A few days after I made the damper, I decided to toast it -- a good move. The parmesan cheese had had time to impart its flavor to the bread making it all the more tasty.

Other additions to damper could include nuts, dried fruit or herbs and spices. I'm going prepare a few more damper recipes in the coming months including one for an apple and cinnamon damper and a whole wheat, honey nut damper. The options are endless and the great thing is, it's such a simple way to make bread.

Photo: © S. Wongkaew (2008) licensed to About.com, Inc