Greetings Everyone,
I am a 74-year-old man, and I recently began to experiment with sourdough starter. Actually, I never baked bread at all until last week: I baked some bread just to use up the free flour that I received from commodity (for the first time).
Quite a while back, I was seeking information how to get a chewier, more elastic crumb in my sourdough loaves.
I was advised regarding protein content of flour and going for a higher hydration, and I would like to say a big THANKS to the several bakers who advised higher hydration, because it really did the trick.
I learned to cook by going out to the garden and picking vegetables, and then going down to the hen house and seeing who had stopped laying, was ready to be dinner. That taught me an improvisational style of cooking - cooking as a form of jazz - the garden produces similar products over a period of weeks, and one cooks variations on a theme, because every day the basket from the garden varies, but there are themes that carry over from day to day and from week to week. That calls for improv bread. Certainly there is always pita, but . . . .
The inspiration for this bread is David Snyder’s Fig Walnut recipe. I followed it pretty closely but I subbed out dates instead of figs since I had some that needed to be used up. I also used a stand mixer rather than doing it by hand. And of course, I can’t forget the yogurt to tenderize the crust!
Recipe
Makes 3 loaves
Levain:
158 g strong bakers unbleached flour
40 g freshly milled Selkirk wheat flour (Selkirk wheat berries)
158 g filtered water
40 g sourdough starter
I made this sourdough yesterday and baked it this morning. I really feel like it’s the best whole grain I’ve made to date.
Loaf 4 - 250gwhite flour, 250g wholegrain wheat flour.
70% hydration
15% starter
2% salt
Made sponge overnight by mixing starter (straight from fridge) with 200g flour and 70% water.
The next morning, did 1 hour autolyse with remaining 300g flour and 70% water.
Used scoop & stretch method twice to combine, then roughly 4 hour bulk rise with 5 stretch and folds.
2 hour proof on baking paper in bowl, covered with plastic.
This experiment worked out very well. It's an everyday bread that I'll be using. It has no egg, only milk, and is suitably simple to use even if you're retired and aren't up for a kneading session. Most Celiac diagnoses happen after mid-life, so my series is meant to empower everyone to make their own bread, even if they're limited in mobility. My focus is on nutrition and simplicity. Please comment and tell me what you think. There is more detail in the article I'm linking to, but the recipe is reprinted here with a picture of the crumb.
With a rainy day off work, this past Tuesday I decided to make some sourdough bread. I fed my sourdough starter (composed of King Arthur bread flour) that afternoon, which left me until that evening to decide on what recipe I would follow.
Being a fan of Richard Bertinet, I eventually decided to use a version of his “White Sourdough” recipe from his book, “Crumb”. This is a great book for all things bread, by the way. I highly recommend it!
Changes compared to round 1
1. Accidentally made the hydration way too high.
2. Add-ins were ~29% total flour weight compared to ~38% last time. Didn’t soak the nuts and dates beforehand though, and forgot to toast the walnuts
3. Baked for much longer and at a lower temperature, seems like I could have still baked for even longer
4. Let the starter grow for 3 hours instead of 1.5 hours, rise of the dough was much better this time
Loaf 1 - 100% wholewheat, 450g
90% hydration
30% starter
2% salt
Long overnight autolyse in fridge.
Also proofed overnight in fridge and baked in the morning.
Baked at ~230c for 20 mins covered & 20 mins uncovered
This worked out well - a beautiful colour and tasted great. Alas, needed more time in the oven, and the crumb wasn't as open as I would have liked. Also, I used the wrong baking paper and it stuck to the bottom!
