Nearly everyone who has begun an adventure in making Sourdough Bread finds it addictive. Sourdough culture is a living thing that you carefully love to perfection. The connection between the sourdough starter and the cook comes into full light when you discover people name their starter mixes with clever, puny titles.
Basically, sourdough bread is leavened naturally vs. a chemical yeast, baking powder, or baking soda. You can make a sourdough starter from scratch in about a week’s time, but your first time out, you might want to opt for a commercial starter. In either case, once you learn how to feed the starter, you can use it nearly indefinitely.
In the refrigerator, a starter requires feeding every two weeks unless you bake regularly.
Once your starter becomes vibrant, you’ll be repeating a cycle of dumping, feeding, and waiting. Without discarding some of your starter, it will rapidly grow beyond your means of storing it. Once you see your starter doubling or tripling within 4-8 hours after a meal, it’s ready to use.
Basic Sourdough Bread
Ingredients
- 1 c active (fed sourdough starter)
- 1 1/2 c warm water (NOT hot)
- 5 c bread flour
- 2 ½ tsp salt
Instructions
- Mix together 3 cups of flour with the starter and water.
- Make sure everything is evenly blended
- Cover at room temperature for 4 hours
- Refrigerate overnight
- Add the remaining flour and salt.
- Knead to form a smooth dough
- Cover and leave in a warm space for 1 hour
- Stretch and fold each edge into the center, in quarters.
- Return to the bowl and cover again.
- Repeat this process 3 more times
- Divide the dough in half
- On a flour-dusted surface, pat each half, stretching the outside edges and folding them toward the center.
- Continue around the dough edges until they’re all in the center
- Turn the seam face down
- Cover and rest for 15 minutes
- Shape the bread into a circle (for a Dutch oven)
- Transfer the loaves to two separate parchment papers
- Leave them to rise for 4 hours
- Slash the dough, making an X
- Heat your Dutch oven while preheating - to 450F
- Remove from the oven
- Slide the parchment holding the one piece of dough into the Dutch oven
- Put the other in the refrigerator until you’re ready to cook it.
- Cover and cook for 30 minutes
- Uncover for 10-12 minutes
- Let cool before slicing.