Recipe Post: Sourdough Bread and Starter

I combined my cooking notes wrote up my recipe. Here it is! Enjoy!

The culture!

Sourdough Bread (and Starter)

Equipment needed for starter:

• 1 or 2 large bowls (two is better, because you need to move the starter to a clean bowl each day. Also, glass is better to prevent leaching of any lead or chemicals used in the makeup of the bowl.)

• A double layer of cheesecloth, big enough to stretch around the bowl

• A big rubber band, or several looped together, to fit around the mouth of the bowl and hold the cloth secure

• A wooden spoon

• A home grain mill.


(The fresh ground flour is optional, but once you grind your own flour, you’ll never be able to eat flour from a bag again. Flour actually “rots” quickly. I went my whole life not knowing this, and actually thought I’d never grind my own grain, but the taste is so much better and I feel so much better that now I don’t eat regular flour from a bag unless I have to!)

Day 1

Ingredients:

1. 2 cups rye flour (preferably fresh ground in a home grain mill, but you can use a good quality flour like Bob’s Red Mill)

2. Cold water (filtered is best—like that from a Brita)

Directions:

In a large bowl, combine flour and enough water to make a sort of flour soup. It won’t mix in evenly, just stir for a minute or two and break up some large clumps until you think you’ve had enough. Cover the bowl with cheesecloth (being careful not to get it in the mixture) and put a rubber band around it. Set the bowl in a warm (room temp is fine, just not too near the heat or air vent), dry place and leave it until tomorrow.

Days 2 through 7

Ingredients:

1. 1 cups rye flour (preferably fresh ground in a home grain mill, but you can use a good quality flour like Bob’s Red Mill)

2. Cold water (filtered is best—like that from a Brita)

Directions:

Pour yesterday’s flour soup (now your culture), into a clean bowl. Add one cup of rye flour and more water until it’s soupy again. Cover with the cheesecloth—it’s OK to use the same cloth all week, as long as it stays clean—and secure with a rubber band. Put the culture back in it’s happy, warm, dry spot. Leave it for another 24 hours.

Day 8

Reserve one quart of starter for use next time. You can keep it going on the counter, or store it in the fridge. (I store mine, because I find I only need to make bread every one and a half to two weeks.)

Yes,  I really do grind my flour into a candy dish--for the picture at least!

 Equipment needed to make bread:

• Oven

• Baking sheets, greased (I like real butter, lard, or palm oil)

• Bread pans (optional)

• Lint free cloth (for covering while rising)

• A spoon to stir, hands to knead (and/or a really powerful mixer like my Viking Pro.—dough this size can burn out a KitchenAid if you do it all at once, but I suppose you could do it in batches)

Ingredients:

• 2 quarts sourdough starter (or whatever you have left after removing one quart—because making starter isn’t an exact measure)

• 2 ½ tbsp celtic sea salt

• Lots of fresh ground whole wheat flour (about 15-20 cups, maybe more. It’s good to have a lot on hand)





Directions:
Place starter, a cup or so of the flour (exactness doesn’t matter), and salt in a clean bowl. Stir until salt dissolves. Continue adding flour to the mix one cup at a time and stir. At some point, especially if doing this by hand, it will be really obvious that it is time to stop stirring and start kneading. Keep adding flour you have a soft, stretchy, elastic dough. It should not be too sticky. If it is, add more flour. If it gets to stiff, you can add a small amount of filtered water at a time until it’s gets elastic. You will have a huge ball of dough. Divide it into four loaves and gently shape it either into long ovals for loaf pans, or rounds (when baking without loaf pans). (Make sure not to press down. Dough doesn’t have to fill out its container before rising. It will do that all on its own!) Put rounds greased baking sheets. Cover rising dough wet, lint free cloth. Allow to rise 4 to 12 hours (depending on weather and conditions in your house) until they have more than doubled in size. (You may need to rewet cloth if it dries, to prevent sticking to the dough. Got a stuck cloth? No problem, sprinkle it with water until it is wetted and it should pull off without sticking.) Bake at 350 degrees for about 45 minutes to an hour, until they start to brown slightly. (Hint: Bread starts to smell a little different when it is finished baking. Pay attention to that at around 40 to 45 minutes and over time you will have a good sense of that cue to take the bread out!) Allow bread to cool out of the pan (to keep it from sweating). I like to freeze 3 loaves for use later and keep only one loaf out at a time.

Dough is rising. Don't look now, but those might be cinnamon rolls in sourdough clothing!

Making bread the next time: Place your reserved starter in a bowl, add one cup of flour and enough water to make flour soup. Cover as above. Let it sit for a day. Follow the same proceedure as before, but for only 2 more days. Bubbling should calm down and you'll have enough starter on day 4 to make bread. Monitoring the culture takes some practice, and you might not be sure your starter has finished bubbling enough by day 4, but it's OK. Use your best judgmen and go for it! The uncertainty makes it exciting and by day 4, you should be OK to make bread, even if you aren't sure! (At least, that's how it works for me!) If you are still hesitant, wait another day. You'll need more flour, but you'll get more bread, and who complains about that?

Saving the culture! (And Mia sorting grain!)

Alternate ideas: You can make hamburger bun size rolls out of the dough. These work great for sandwiches, and are fantastic as bases for mini-sourdough pizzas.

Cook’s note: Did you know sourdough breads can be lower in gluten? This is because the culture breaks down the grain. It also makes it easier to digest so you absorb more nutrients. I’m not sure if my recipe actually is sufficient to reduce gluten to safe levels; however, you can Google sourdough starters and gluten free sourdough to find more information and recipes!

Credit where credit is due: My original instructions on sourdough came from the book Nourishing Traditions by Sally Fallon, NewTrends Publishing, Inc, (2001). This is an excellent cookbook and has some wonderful reading in addition to a fabulous collection of old-time recipes. I can't reccommend it enough.

Helpful items I can personally reccomend!