Sprouted 3 Seed Sourdough

The name isn’t really all it is cracked up to be.  Yes, it has 3 toasted seeds folded into the mix – squash, sunflower and flax.  But is also has 8 different sprouted seeds and at least 2 unsprouted seeds that were ground into flour.  So, this could be called a 13, some sprouted, seed sourdough too.

No matter what it is called. Sprouted seeded sourdough is one of our favorite breads.  We have so many favorite breads it is hard to rank them but this would be in the top 10 or 20 for sure:-)  Our favorites seem to change based on what we are baking this week.

It has been a big bread week.  Yesterday was national bagel and lox day and it was also national pizza day – three of our favorite foods.  We went to Pizzeria Bianco in Saturday, the Best pizza place in the USA for a decade, the Bagel Man yesterday and we also made pizza last night.  Today was all seeded sourdough.

My daughter said the pizza at Biaco’s was the best she had ever had because his crust is the thinnest, the mushrooms were smoked and the sausage fantastic.  That lasted best tag for Bianco’s lasted less than week- until last night.  She now says my pizza is better than Chris Bianco’s.

Don’t you wish you had such a smart offspring who is always right about everything?   She says my crust is just as thin and crisp but has garlic, rosemary and sundried tomato in it so it tastes better.  I smoked the Italian sausage, onions and mushrooms this time and my tomato sauce is a day long, complex affair instead of plain crushed fresh tomatoes.

My take is that Chris’s WFO gives him a slight edge but my pizzas only cost $3 and his are a $17 minimum-  plus my house wine is better and cheaper too J   I have to admit that I try to make my pizzas using Chris’s as inspiration and guide and have spent 10 years trying to get somewhere close to his level with a 550 F oven at home.  With a WFO and 900 F, I could almost be there!

The Bagel Man is a Valley of the Sun transplant from NYC where he spent 30 years learning to make bagels.  He makes the best bagels in the Phoenix area by far and his lox is as good as you can find.  4 take out bagels, with enough cream cheese and lox to put on them will set you back $25 but they are worth it, just like Chis Bianco’s pizzas.  Needless to say, we have been living well of late!  Now if todays bread was half as good…..

The 8 sprouted grains for the bread were: red and white wheat, rye, spelt, buckwheat oat, barley and Kamut.  The100% hydration levain was a 16% pre-fermented flour, 3 stage bran one where the first stage was the bran from the 8 sprouted grains and the next two was high extraction 8 sprouted grain flour.

The whole sprouted grains were 40% of the flour and the overall hydration was 85% soit was a bit wetter than usual.  We autolyzed the dough flour and water for 1 hour with the 2% PH sea salt sprinkled on top.  Once the levain hit the mix, we did 50 slap and folds and then 2 sets of 6 slap and folds followed by 3 sets of 4 stretch and folds all on 30 minute intervals.

The 8% each of the 3 seeds were toasted and folded in during the first set of stretch and folds.  After shaping we dropped the dough into a tall basket, rice floured basket that we don’t use very often, placed it in a trash can liner and into the fridge for a 20 hour retard.  Once it came out f the cold we let it warm up for 2 hours on the counter.

After unmolding and slashing in a triangle we dropped it into a 550 F preheated combo cooker for 5 minutes of steam at 500 F and 13 minutes more steam at 450 F.  We then took the lid off and continued baking at 425 F convection for 56 minutes before removing the bread from the bottom of the combo cooker and allowed it to finish baking on the bottom stone for another 6 minutes.

The bread was 207 F on the inside when we set it out to cool.  We were kind if worried when we unmolded the dough and slashed it.  It was a bit over proofed and collapsed in the middle when slashed.  But it did recover to spring and bloom in the CI cooker.  It browned to that mahogany color we love so much and the smell of the bread when it came out of the oven was outstanding.

Hopefully the crumb will be nice too!  The crumb came out soft, moist and fairly open for a bread like this one.  The best part is that it is seriously tasty.  My future SIL said 'This is really good!' and I have to agree.  This combination of seeds is just delicious in a SD bread.  Yummy indeed!

Pizza

50% each Lafama AP and Smart and Final High Gluten

70% water

2% salt

10% pre-fermented polish with a pinch of IDY fermented for 3 hours.

1T each of fresh chopped rosemary, sun dried tomato and garlic for half the dough

Slap and folds and stretch and folds over 2 hours and then 24 retard in the fridge.  Each pizza was 253 g of dough.  (2) 13.5” Pizzas were baked at 550 F for 8 minutes.  One was a Margarita Pizza with smoked onions and ricotta added.  The other was the same with additional smoked sausage, smoked mushroom  and very thin pepperoni.

Seed Sourdough

16% pre-fermented 100% hydration bran and HE 8 sprouted grain levain - retarded 12 hours after 3rd stage doubling.

Dough

24% High extraction 8 sprouted grains

30% Lafama AP

30% Smart and Final high gluten

85% water overall

2% PHSS

8% each toasted; squash, sunflower and flax seeds.

Lucy says to have a great salad with that pizza and sunset