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First sourdough baking - success!
First sourdough baking - success!
I hadn't made bread for a few years, but since I'd worked as a baker
for a while I figured it was
like riding a bicycle. However, I hadn't worked with sourdough before,
so after reading a bit here and
elsewhere and getting some good advice from a few of you (especially
Samartha, thank you) I jumped in.
I was thinking about ordering a starter but was impatient, so I made
one myself, here's what happened:
Sun. 12pm.
Mixed 1/4 cup Giusto's whole rye flour and 1/4 cup Giusto's whole wheat
(both with 0.1% malted barley added)
with 1/4 cup tap water* each in separate quart Mason jars; stirred and
put in homemade proof box:
a styro cooler with another quart jar full of water with a 50 watt
aquarium heater set to 80ºF sitting in it.
Fed every 12 hours with 1.5 Tbsp. of water plus 2 Tbsp. of rye or
all-purpose wheat flour,
respectively, stirring well.
Mon. am: fermentation evident
Tue. pm: both are sour and fragrant, the pH is between 3-4;
also taste tasting reveals they both have free sugars.
Wed. am: the rye sour has very strong yeast activity, clearly different
from the slower
Lactobacillus/Leuconostoc activity earlier, lots of gas and
yeasty/ethanol in the nose. Fed 1/4 cup flour plus 2
Tbsp. water and it doubled & collapsed twice in six hours. Decided to
go ahead and bake bread with it today.
The bread: my first try at an ersatz Hofpfister Öko-Schwabenlaib
http :// www .hofpfisterei.de/hpf sortiment natursauerteigbrote.php
First Try Rye recipe**
------------------------------------------------------
1) all the starter minus a tad for saving (about 1 cup of rye flour and
2/3 cup water total into the dough)
2) ~3 cups KA all-purpose, 2 cups first clear flour, 1 cup high-gluten,
1 cup rye;
3) 1-1/3 cups water, 1 Tbsp. each salt and ground caraway, 1 tsp. each
ground fennel and coriander.
Worked up about ten min in the KitchenAid, rested in the bowl at 65º
till double (~4 hr)
Knocked down and rolled up into a tight ball, rested on the stovetop
(~75º) for 1 hr.
Re-rolled into a ball and rested till doubled again (~2 hr)
Egg washed, poked holes instead of slashing, and baked on the stone at
425º for 30 min then at
350º for another 30 min.
Results: pretty darn good! My roommate from Munich said it was almost
as good as the real thing, 90% the same
;-) and anyway I was pretty happy that it came out at all. It was a tad
burnt on the bottom so I think I'll have
to move my stone up off the bottom of the oven and play with time and
temp. Nice and dense with a great crust.
The last rise was a little sluggish; I was following my normal method
for yeast bread, but on reflection I think
the reason to do that is because baker's yeast is SO active that you
need to wait until it's dying down to put
it in the oven or your bread will explode. For the SD next time I think
I'll bake it after the second rise.
The sour flavor and aroma were pretty mild, could use more. Next time
I'll also try the Detmold 3-step process
as described by Samartha, who's really made a serious study of it
http :// samartha,net /SD/procedures/DM3/index.html
Wed pm: The wheat starter is just beginning to show good yeast
activity; I fed it with 1/4 cup whole wheat flour
and will bake with it tomorrow (going to try to duplicate Acme Walnut
Levain ;-).
Thanks to everyone for sharing and happy baking - Dave
*I was slightly worried about that, but here in the SF Bay area we're
lucky to get pretty good water, it's all
snowmelt from the Sierras. They use ozone to disinfect, and do add
chloramine to the service lines - but I
checked with them and it's only 2-3 ppm. so I decided I didn't need
bottled water.
**A note to Samartha and others who have done a lot of work and
graciously shared their knowledge. Forgive me
the volume measurements people; as a former baker I know better, and I
do have a scale at home, but 1) I'm lazy,
2) I share recipes with less technically oriented friends so volume
works better, and 3) by now I know roughly
how various doughs should look and feel at different hydrations so I
can eyeball it pretty well. Depending on
how satisfied I am with the results, or how much I want to fine tune
it, I may go back to weighing everything. I
must concede it is better for consistency; crucial for a commercial
bakery, not as much for the home baker.
I hadn't made bread for a few years, but since I'd worked as a baker
for a while I figured it was
like riding a bicycle. However, I hadn't worked with sourdough before,
so after reading a bit here and
elsewhere and getting some good advice from a few of you (especially
Samartha, thank you) I jumped in.
I was thinking about ordering a starter but was impatient, so I made
one myself, here's what happened:
Sun. 12pm.
Mixed 1/4 cup Giusto's whole rye flour and 1/4 cup Giusto's whole wheat
(both with 0.1% malted barley added)
with 1/4 cup tap water* each in separate quart Mason jars; stirred and
put in homemade proof box:
a styro cooler with another quart jar full of water with a 50 watt
aquarium heater set to 80ºF sitting in it.
Fed every 12 hours with 1.5 Tbsp. of water plus 2 Tbsp. of rye or
all-purpose wheat flour,
respectively, stirring well.
Mon. am: fermentation evident
Tue. pm: both are sour and fragrant, the pH is between 3-4;
also taste tasting reveals they both have free sugars.
Wed. am: the rye sour has very strong yeast activity, clearly different
from the slower
Lactobacillus/Leuconostoc activity earlier, lots of gas and
yeasty/ethanol in the nose. Fed 1/4 cup flour plus 2
Tbsp. water and it doubled & collapsed twice in six hours. Decided to
go ahead and bake bread with it today.
The bread: my first try at an ersatz Hofpfister Öko-Schwabenlaib
http :// www .hofpfisterei.de/hpf sortiment natursauerteigbrote.php
First Try Rye recipe**
------------------------------------------------------
1) all the starter minus a tad for saving (about 1 cup of rye flour and
2/3 cup water total into the dough)
2) ~3 cups KA all-purpose, 2 cups first clear flour, 1 cup high-gluten,
1 cup rye;
3) 1-1/3 cups water, 1 Tbsp. each salt and ground caraway, 1 tsp. each
ground fennel and coriander.
Worked up about ten min in the KitchenAid, rested in the bowl at 65º
till double (~4 hr)
Knocked down and rolled up into a tight ball, rested on the stovetop
(~75º) for 1 hr.
Re-rolled into a ball and rested till doubled again (~2 hr)
Egg washed, poked holes instead of slashing, and baked on the stone at
425º for 30 min then at
350º for another 30 min.
Results: pretty darn good! My roommate from Munich said it was almost
as good as the real thing, 90% the same
;-) and anyway I was pretty happy that it came out at all. It was a tad
burnt on the bottom so I think I'll have
to move my stone up off the bottom of the oven and play with time and
temp. Nice and dense with a great crust.
The last rise was a little sluggish; I was following my normal method
for yeast bread, but on reflection I think
the reason to do that is because baker's yeast is SO active that you
need to wait until it's dying down to put
it in the oven or your bread will explode. For the SD next time I think
I'll bake it after the second rise.
The sour flavor and aroma were pretty mild, could use more. Next time
I'll also try the Detmold 3-step process
as described by Samartha, who's really made a serious study of it
http :// samartha,net /SD/procedures/DM3/index.html
Wed pm: The wheat starter is just beginning to show good yeast
activity; I fed it with 1/4 cup whole wheat flour
and will bake with it tomorrow (going to try to duplicate Acme Walnut
Levain ;-).
Thanks to everyone for sharing and happy baking - Dave
*I was slightly worried about that, but here in the SF Bay area we're
lucky to get pretty good water, it's all
snowmelt from the Sierras. They use ozone to disinfect, and do add
chloramine to the service lines - but I
checked with them and it's only 2-3 ppm. so I decided I didn't need
bottled water.
**A note to Samartha and others who have done a lot of work and
graciously shared their knowledge. Forgive me
the volume measurements people; as a former baker I know better, and I
do have a scale at home, but 1) I'm lazy,
2) I share recipes with less technically oriented friends so volume
works better, and 3) by now I know roughly
how various doughs should look and feel at different hydrations so I
can eyeball it pretty well. Depending on
how satisfied I am with the results, or how much I want to fine tune
it, I may go back to weighing everything. I
must concede it is better for consistency; crucial for a commercial
bakery, not as much for the home baker.
