HOW TO BAKE A LOAF OF SOURDOUGH BREAD
"Lets face it, this is baking, not microbiology, rocket science, or voodoo!
We all do it because it's fun and challenging. No one who owns a computer
is baking their own bread because they have to." Buddy
This is a short, simple "how to" for sourdough newbies. The FAQs are
terrific and full of information (over 50 pages, in fact). This can be
overwhelming to those who have barely baked a loaf of yeast bread. I hate
to see people get discouraged and give up on sourdough and hope this will
prevent that.
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INDEX
GLOSSARY
GET A STARTER
STARTER RECIPE
BAKE BREAD
KNEADING, RIING, EXPANDING AND DOUBLING
QUARRY TILE BREAD RECIPE (makes 1 loaf)
4-H CHAMPION SOURDOUGH BREAD RECIPE (makes 4 loaves)
YEAST IN THE BREAD RECIPE?
EXPAND SOURDOUGH BY FEEDING SOURDOUGH STARTER
BAKE BREAD
SUGAR?
HOW LONG CAN YOU FORGET STARTER IN THE REFRIGERATOR
DRYING STARTER
RESTORING DRIED STARTER
ADDING STUFF TO BREAD
BAKING STONES
OTHER INTERNET SOURCES OF INFORMATION
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GLOSSARY
To give you a hand with terms in the long FAQs, here are various
meanings and definitions which a couple people were considerate enough to
send to me. Thanks to Jeff Renner and Bob Batts.
>From "Breads From The La Brea Bakery" by Nancy Silverton:
FERMENTING: before dough is shaped
PROOFING: after dough is shaped
RETARDED: dough placed in refrigerator or cold environment to slow proofing
>From "Alaska Magazine's Cabin Cookbook":
STARTER: "what's in the refrigerator"
SPONGE: starter mixed with flour and water
>From "Sourdough Jack's Cookery":
'BATTER,' 'STARTER,' AND 'SPONGE': the stage "before ingredients other than
flour and water are added." The three terms are used interchangeably.
SPONGE: "a thicker dough in preparation for making bread"
BATTER: dough in preparation for making pancakes (thinner than "sponge")
Bob Batts sent this helpful paragraph: "I think that on this group
(rec.food.sourdough) ..., we most often called what we keep from batch to
batch the starter or culture, the next stage the sponge. We have often used
the terms building or doubling rather than expanding, although you can
certainly triple or quadruple an active sponge."
I use the following terms:
SOURDOUGH STARTER: the flour and water mixture I keep in the refrigerator
EXPANDED SOURDOUGH: The night before I bake bread, I take the starter out
of the refrigerator and add flour and water to it. It sits overnight and
expands. In the morning, it's bubbly and lively-looking. It does look like
a sponge, but that's something you clean the bathtub with! Anyway, part of
this goes into your bread dough and some ALWAYS goes back into the refrigerator.
DOUGH: Expanded sourdough plus other recipe ingredients such as sugar,
butter, oat bran, the roaches that fell into the expanding sourdough the
night before, etc.
BREAD: baked dough
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GET A STARTER
A starter can be started from scratch, received wet or dry from a
friend, or purchased.
If you can't get one from someone and don't want to buy one, a
simple recipe follows. Yes, it has yeast and sugar . . . that's ok.
If you want to stay "pure," someone who I asked to critique this
document suggested reading Nancy Silverton's "The La Brea Bakery." He said,
"She has a very involved recipe for making a starter and is death on any
type of commercial yeast in a starter (she uses grapes in her starter for
natural fermentation)."
I'm trying to keep this simple and I'd suggest the newbie get a few
loaves under their belt the easy way first.
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STARTER
6 c. flour
1 T. sugar
1 pkg. yeast (1 T.)
1/4 c. warm water
water
Dissolve yeast in warm water. Stir into flour, sugar and enough
water to make a thick batter (the consistency of muffin batter). Cover, let
stand at least 2 days. Do not chill yet. It should be bubbly and foamy,
like the head on beer, except thicker and opaque. It should smell good ...
yeasty, beer-like, bready.
You now have a starter and can bake bread immediately. You can
also put it in the refrigerator, take it out another evening to expand it,
and bake bread the next day. I'll assume now that you want to bake immediately.
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BAKE BREAD
Once your starter is established, the basic steps are:
1. remove starter from refrigerator and feed it flour and water
2. let starter sit overnight and expand
3. remove the amount of starter needed for the bread recipe (NEVER
all of it)
4. return what remains (and some always must) of the expanded
starter to refrigerator
5. mix a bread recipe
6. bake bread
7. eat bread
8. return to step 1 when bread is gone : )
Try a one-loaf recipe first. If it doesn't rise, add yeast. But
if the starter is bubbling, it should rise.
Find any sourdough recipe and use the required amount of expanded
starter. Don't use all the starter! Be sure you keep some of it to expand
the next time you want to bake.
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KNEADING, RISING, EXPANDING AND DOUBLING
Knead your dough until it feels like a baby's bottom. If you don't
know what that feels like, I'm so sorry. (This would be a freshly bathed,
dry baby.)
Doubling refers to the increase in volume of the bread recipe
(dough). Completely mix the recipe. Let it double in size, then shape it
into loaves. Let the loaves double in size before you bake them.
NOTE WELL: Sourdough bread dough will not rise as quickly as yeast
bread doughs. Give it as much as four hours. Rising time will vary
depending on the weather, humidity, how often you bake, the temperature of
your house, etc.
On a cold day, or if your house is cool, speed the rising process
for both starter and dough by letting it rise in the oven. Turn the oven to
200 degrees for 2 minutes; turn it off; check the temperature and make sure
it's not higher than 100 degrees; put the starter or dough in the oven (in a
bowl that won't burn, covered with aluminum foil, in case someone comes
along and turns the oven on without looking in the oven). Turning on the
oven light can also warm the oven enough to get the stuff rising well. Use
a huge bowl if you try this with your expanding starter. You don't want a
mess in your oven from overflow!
Postings to this newsgroup have stated that a long rise will
increase the sour taste of your bread.
Cover dough rising on the counter with a dish towel to prevent the
crust from drying out.
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QUARRY TILE BREAD -- 1 loaf
Bake on unglazed tile or a pizza stone on the bottom rack of oven
to make it nice and crusty. Or bake it in a greased bread pan.
2 cups expanded sourdough
1 1/3 c. flour
1 t. salt
1 t. sugar
1/5 c. water (eyeball it =85 this is a weird measurement because I
converted this recipe to sourdough from a yeast bread recipe)
1 T. olive oil
additional flour
Mix all ingredients and knead, adding flour until dough is no
longer sticky. Let rise until doubled in volume. Punch out bubbles and
form loaf, let rise until doubled in volume. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
Bake 30-40 minutes or however long it takes to brown nicely all over.
I lined a small Corning dish with a dish towel and let the bread
rise in it. I took it out by lifting it out by the towel edges, transferred
it to one hand and quickly put it on the stone right side up.
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Here's another good recipe, but it does make four loaves:
4-H CHAMPION BREAD - SOURDOUGH VERSION
(I and my sister won lotsa ribbons with the non-sourdough version of this
recipe)
four loaves
3 cups expanded sourdough
3 1/3 cups lukewarm water (or beer or buttermilk, at room temp)
3/4 cup dry milk (optional)
1/4 cup + 2 tablespoons sugar
2 tablespoons salt
4 1/2 tablespoons margarine, melted
9-10 cups flour
Mix expanded sourdough, water, dry milk, sugar, salt, and
margarine. Add 5 cups flour and beat until smooth. Let stand 15 minutes.
Add flour to make a soft dough. Knead, adding flour, until dough is no
longer sticky.
Place dough in large bowl. Cover with a dish towel. Let rise
until double in volume. This could take 3 or 4 hours. Knead down and
divide into fourths. Let stand 15-30 minutes.
Shape into 4 loaves and place into greased and floured one-pound
loaf pans. Let rise until 3/4 inch over top of pan. This will probably not
take as long as the unshaped rising did. Bake at 350=B0 for 40 minutes.
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YEAST IN THE BREAD RECIPE?
I've been asked "If I just 'cheat' and use commercial yeast in my
recipe, will my bread taste ok?" Yes, it will.
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EXPAND SOURDOUGH by FEEDING THE STARTER
The night before you want to bake:
To all the starter which is in the jar in the refrigerator, add 3
parts flour and 2 parts water ... e.g. 3 c. flour and 2 c. water. It should
be the consistency of muffin batter. Use a big bowl. When feeding/expanding
the starter, it sometimes triples and quadruples in size. Cover the bowl
with a dish towel (unless you're putting it in the oven, as noted in
"RISING" above . . . then use aluminum foil).
If my starter is threatening to overflow the capacity of the jar
because I've expanded it far beyond the requirements of my recipes, I feed
it less, e.g., 1 c. flour and 2/3 c. water.
If I'm going to bake a lot, I add more (e.g. 4 c. flour and 2 2/3
c. water). (YES! Math teachers are vindicated . . . you will use algebra
in your actual life! The equation is X cups of flour are to 3 as Y cups of
water are to 2.)
If it's convenient (you DON'T need to get out of bed at 3 a.m. to
do this), occasionally fan the expanding starter with the towel and stir it
vigorously to mix in airborne yeasts and whatever.
The next morning, it is expanded and you can make the recipe.
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BAKE BREAD
From the expanded starter, remove the amount called for in the
bread recipe and mix up your bread. HEED WELL: Always keep some of the
expanded sourdough and put it back in the refrigerator. You have to have
something to "feed" the next time you want to bake. I like to have at least
1/2 cup; one tablespoon is probably the minimum. This is the only sourdough
thing about which I am compulsive. Once you've got a good starter going, it
only gets better.
My starter often continues to expand in a two-quart jar in the
refrigerator. Use a big jar until you know what yours will do.
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SUGAR?
I added sugar to expand my starter for 24 years before I read the
FAQs and learned I didn't need it. It never hurt it.
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HOW LONG CAN YOU FORGET THE STARTER IN THE REFRIGERATOR?
That depends.
I got my starter in Cheyenne, Wyoming, and supposedly it was 100
years old then. If true, it's now 125 years old! This may be why I can
leave it alone for 2 months and it will revive. I've dried it (I learned
that from the FAQs last fall). So far, that's revived too.
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DRYING STARTER
Lay a strip of wax paper on the counter where you can leave it all
night or for a few days (not a good idea if you live in the South or any
other roach territory). Spread expanded sourdough as thinly as you can over
the wax paper. It doesn't take much more than a few tablespoons. Let it sit
until it dries completely. Remove from wax paper, crumble (or reduce to a
powder in food processor) and store in tightly covered jar. I live in a dry
climate and keep it in the cabinet. Others advise freezing it. Mine's been
in the cabinet only since September 1996, so I'll keep you posted on its
viability over time.
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RESTORING DRIED SOURDOUGH STARTER
In a glass bowl, mix 1 cup warm water (check on your wrist like you
do for a baby bottle) and 1 or 2 tablespoons dried culture. Let soak 30
minutes. Add 1 1/2 cups flour. Mix well. Let sit 12 to 18 hours. It is
ready when it is "lively," i.e. frothy and bubbly.
You may have to feed this (by adding more flour and water in
proportions of 2:3) more than once to make it lively. Repeat the steps above.
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ADDING STUFF TO BREAD
To adapt a plain recipe (bagels, for example), you don't have to
measure things like raisins, shredded cheese, dried apricots, garlic or
chocolate chips. Just throw them in. Start with 1/4 to 1/2 cup (perhaps
not that much of the garlic : ) and see how it looks.
The only thing I've had trouble with were blueberries. I used
frozen whole ones which made the dough slimy. I added more flour and they
were ok.
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BAKING STONES:
I went to the local flooring store, bought 6 smooth quarry tiles
(red "flower pot" material) for about $6. Having several is nice because
they can be rearranged to fit different loaf and oven sizes. Most direction
I received on them said to dust them with corn meal to facilitate removing
the bread. I've found it removes just as well without the corn meal.
Two of them broke after a few months . . . perhaps because I washed
them before they totally cooled? The tile man told me they're fired at 1200
degrees and shouldn't break due to oven heat. Most likely, it's a handling
problem. The breaks were clean, and I still use them =96 fitting the pieces
together like a jigsaw puzzle.
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OTHER INTERNET SOURCES OF INFORMATION
I haven't looked at all of these . . . just collected them.
baking supplies: yeast, various types of flour, etc.:
http://www.register.com/bluemoon/ Bread baking supplies are in the "Rainbow
Natural Foods" heading in the Blue Moon Shopping Mall. Once you are in the
Rainbow Natural Foods, there is a heading called "Bread Baking Supplies."
bread recipe archive: http://haven.ios.com/~wordup/bread.html
bread recipe archive: http://www.upword.com
bread: Fleischmann's Yeast World Wide Web site. Recipes and helpful
baking tips: http://www.breadworld.com
bread: ftp://ftp.forsci.ualberta.ca/pub/barb/sourdough/
bread: http//mindlink.net/darrell_greenwood/
bread: http://www.countrylife.net/bread/
bread: ftp://ftp.neosoft.com/pub/rec.food.recipes/breads-yeast/
bread-bakers-digest recipe archives: each digest is archived; there's also
a separate archive of just the recipes in MasterCook format (both text and
MC cookbook formats). Updated each quarter. From: Reggie & Jeff Dwork
(reggie@jeff-and-reggie.com): http://www.jeff-and-reggie.com/ftp/archives/bread and
http://www.jeff-and-reggie.com/ftp/archives/bread/recipe
newsgroup: rec.food.sourdough
sourdough FAQ: http://mindlink.net/darrell_greenwood/sourdoughfaqs.html
sourdough FAQs:
http://www.reference.com/
and search for BREAD+BREADS+SOURDOUGH
sourdough recipes both for bread machines and by hand and a bunch of recipes
for starter: http://soar.berkeley.edu/recipes/baked-goods/breads/sourdough/
sourdough starter recipe: http://hubcap.clemson.edu/~bmedder/: report is
that the starter recipe at this site is fantastic. I don't which one that
refers to=85there are many.
sourdough starter recipe: ftp://ftp.forsci.ualberta.ca/pub/barb/sourdough/
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REMEMBER! Have fun! It's just flour and water!