Basic Sourdough Recipe

Here is my basic sourdough recipe that I have been using. I started with the recipe found on the Sourdough Home web site and then tweaked it to my likes. I have this thing about round metric measurements. For example, a tablespoon of butter is 14 grams. I use 15 grams because 15 is a much nicer number and easier to divide or multiply if necessary. Likewise, I don't like a measurement of 180g of sourdough starter so I use 200g, a much nicer number. Odd I know. I assume it is the anal retentive engineer in me. That also means that my personal weight equivalents for flour do not match any standard published out there (one cup is often given as 4.5 ounces which is 127.6 grams. I'll use 125 instead, a much nicer number).

I opted not to post a recipe for the Basque Sourdough Bread that I made until I can have an opportunity to make it again "correctly" and successfully. I did however post a picture of it. This Basque recipe results in a lighter, softer loaf, both the bread itself and the crust. I attributed this to a combination of using shortening and baking enclosed in the Dutch oven.

Enjoy.

Salvage Operation

Sometimes you just know a recipe is wrong.

I was trying to make a Basque sourdough bread from my Wooden Spoon Bread Book. This is supposedly a bread that Basque sheepherders would make in a Dutch oven at the beginning of the day, bury the pot in the coals of the fire and have it ready to eat when they came home. The recipe described a stiff dough but what I ended up with was ridiculous. This dough was so crumbly, so dry, I couldn't even work it into a ball. So I threw it back into my stand mixer bowl and added another two tablespoons of shortening bringing the total to four tablespoons of shortening. This was a little better but still, I had to beat the dough into a ball shape. It was stiffer than Rose's Play-doh. And even though it was ball shaped, it was full of cracks and crevices. At no time would I describe my dough as "smooth and elastic."

Then it was supposed to rise in a Dutch oven, double in size in about two hours. I gave it overnight, maybe 18 hours. It got softer but never rose, never doubled.

Ok, this isn't me, no fault of mine. Even when I was making it I found it hard to believe that there was no call for any liquid. No water. No milk. No oil. Nothing but two tablespoons of shortening. I actually have two copies of this book, a first edition and a recent edition. I compared both books and both recipes are the same.

So I looked in my Basque cookbook. Yes, I have a Basque cookbook. No recipe for any bread though in that book.

So I turned to the Internet. There are a gazillion recipes for Basque Sheepherder's bread that are amazing similar, but not sourdough. Actually there is only one recipe that seems to have been copied gazillion times (one of my pet peeves with Internet recipes). So I did a search for Basque sourdough and two recipes popped up each calling for one cup of water.

Soooo, I like the word "so," so this morning I put the now slightly softer but unrisen ball of dough back into my stand mixer. I knew that if I tried baking it in the oven, I'd just end up with a round block of cracker. Figuring I had nothing to lose, I flipped the switch and the dough broke up very nicely in the mixer.

Now what I should have done was slowly pour water in with the mixer on and just add enough until I had a stiff dough that climbed the sides of the bowl. What I actually did was dump the cup of water into the bowl and mixed it into a paste. Damn.

I ended up adding an additional 2 1/3 cups of flour to get a soft but sticky dough. I kneaded it by hand until it felt good. It even passed a window pane test for me. I formed it into a smooth ball, popped it back into my Dutch oven and let it rest to double. It took longer than two hours but in eight hours I felt it had doubled sufficiently. I have found that every batch of sourdough I have made takes a very long time to double, often overnight, so I think that length of time was probably more correct than what the book called for. I would bet a yeast packet would have given me a dough that doubled in two hours.

I envision my little yeasties hung out in that dough ball all night and this morning were screaming, "feed me Seymour." That water and flour addition was the key.

Baked it covered in the Dutch oven for about 75 minutes and am quite happy with the results. I forgot to slash the top but that's a minor nit.

Sourdough Scones

I whipped some of these up today, at least that's what I am calling them. I was intrigued by a recipe in one of my favorite cook books, The Wooden Spoon Bread Book. I've had this cook book for ten, maybe fifteen years, great book. In the book it is called skillet bread and emulates a pioneer-era bread made in a cast iron skillet. To me it tasted like scones.

Maybe they tasted like scones because once again I screwed up and used baking powder instead of baking soda. Maybe, but I don't think so. The bread doesn't sit to double in size like a normal sourdough bread recipe which leads me to believe that the starter is added for flavor not for the yeast action.

Once again I used lard to make a bread recipe and I am beginning to lean away from using it. I can taste just a subtle hint of it in the bread and don't care for it. I think lard might be fine in stronger flavored foods or if you use jelly on your bread but I think bread is just too delicate. I'll have to try again but I think buttermilk might mask the flavor in biscuits. Frying in lard is another story. That usage I really like and have made excellent hash browns and potato pancakes.

Here is the recipe if you would like to try: Sourdough Scones.

Sourdough, Round II

Did you know there is an XM Radio station just for ABBA?


Yesterday I made a second attempt at sourdough. I've been just adding to my starter rather than just halving and replenishing and it was time to pare it down. I used a slightly different recipe and put the rest of my starter in a crock in the fridge to hibernate.

Again my plan was to do loaves rather than rounds (why is it that plural of loaf is loaves and elf becomes elves but leaf can be leaves or leafs?). I was amazed that one loaf doubled in about six hours but the other I had to let sit overnight, same dough, same quantity.

I baked the first loaf last night but in a dry oven with no steam "injection." As I noted before about maybe baking at too high of a temperature, this time I baked at a lower temperature. I did forget to slash the top. In my opinion this loaf came out much, much better than before. Not nearly as crunchy of a crust but still that fresh bread crispness. The second loaf I baked this morning. This loaf was a little lighter in texture, I think from sitting out longer it had more air in it. On this loaf I did do the steam "injection" and I'm not sure I can tell a difference. I think the second loaf was a little tarter, again I am guessing that's a result of rising longer.

I didn't get any oven spring, no significant rising in the oven. So while the texture of the bread was right, I kind of expected taller loafs. I did not oil the loaves as they rose. Every bread recipe I have seen calls for this except for every sourdough recipe I have read. I don't know why it would be different with sourdough. The oil is supposed to help prevent the surface of the dough from drying out, which mine did. Of course my expectation may just be off the mark. Need more practice.

I really, really have to work at baking. I can pull of even a complicated ethnic dish with little hitch but ask me to bake bread and it will be fortunate if the bread is edible. I've come to use my temperature probe as a crutch and this has drastically increased my success rate with bread. I'm not sure if my cooking instructor would approve but after 15 minutes in the oven, I rotate the loaf pan and insert my temperature probe setting the alarm for 200 degrees. I've had four perfectly done loaves now in a row. A first for me to have even one not doughy in the middle. Worth the small hole from the probe in my opinion.

Where the Wild Things Are

Wild yeast that is.

I've wanted to make sourdough bread for a long time. I love sourdough. The REAL thing that is. A lot of what you buy in the stores isn't really sourdough but more like sourdough flavored bread.

I found this web site and felt inspired. Especially since I have access to a lot of locally stone ground flour which seems to be the key ingredient for making your starter. I was thrilled when my starter took off in one day! I did run into a problem with it being very active but not doubling in volume. On a guess I added more flour without any water. That was the trick. Now it had enough body to double instead of being soupy. I emailed the web site author and he confirmed my tactic. He also told me a needed to switch over to regular flour now that it was a growing starter. When I have some money I'll be making a donation in thanks.

So today was bread day! Everything went very well except I had no idea how time intensive this was going to be. I'm disappointed I never got to the gym but I was able to get some cleaning in in between the four or five rises needed. All things considered, it came out well. It had a nice pleasant but light sour taste. Could be more sour for my tastes. The crust was way too dark and crunchy for me. My fault I'm pretty sure. As usual, I just can't follow directions verbatim. Maybe that has something to do with my "has issues with authority."* Instead of making two boules, French for rounds, I decided to make two loaves in loaf pans. My guess is that with the loaf pans I need to bake at a lower temperature. Oh well, I'll just take another week to grow some yeasties and try it again.

*From my management psych evaluation when I worked in SC.