I cultvated my sourdough starter....now what?

I have successfully cultivated my sourdough starter, it is very lively, smells good, and looks good...I know you can't see, but I'm patting myself on the back right now. My question is..now that I have it, how do I make bread from it. Do I just substitute the commercial yeast with my starter? And can I use just a rustic lean recipe?...flour, salt, starter and water? Maybe 65% hydration???

Congratulations on your starter! The simple answer (in order) would be possibly (with a fair amount of adaptation)...and yes! Apart from the excellent recipes on this site, please do check out some of the resources maintained by some of our resident sourdough experts. For example: http://www.sourdoughhome.com/recipes.html (Mike Avery's site) http://www.wildyeastblog.com (Susan 'Wild Yeast' site ) As for a basic sourdough, I'd recommend anything from a 15 to 30% (baker's percentage) starter component in the recipe. If that's more starter then you can spare, then you might want to consider an 'intermediate build'...this is just like using biga or poolish in a recipe - a preferment you can make the day before, using a small original amount of starter. After it has matured you typically use all of it in the final dough mix. 65% hydration sounds great for a basic white sourdough but maybe a little on the dry side if you're working with high gluten wholegrain flours. Have fun, and let us know how things go. Cheers FP

richawatt, why don't you try what I call Susan's Loaf because Susan of San Diego told me about it and it is the one I go back to time after time. Refresh your starter the night before and start the bread late morning or early afternoon. To 3/4c starter add 3/4c water and whisk together. Add 2 1/2c bread flour, 2 tspns oil and 1 1/4 tspns salt. mix well and let sit covered for 30 minutes. Stretch and fold 3-4 times at 30 minute intervals. Let double. Shape boule, place in well floured (I use rice flour) banneton and place in the refrigerator overnight. Let warm up for 2 hours, preheat the oven to 500* either with a stone or a heavy baking sheet. Gently turn the loaf onto parchment paper, slash and slide it onto the heated stone. Cover with a large stainless steel bowl rinsed in hot water and reduce the heat to 450*. Remove the bowl after 20 minutes, bake until brown (usually 15 minutes), give it another 5 minutes until dark brown and internal temp. is 205*. As so many of the more expert bakers on TFL say, make the same loaf over and over until you know how the dough should feel and then move on to other breads. Hope you will try this - it's a winner! A.

AnnieT, Thanks for the suggestion. I made it yesterday and it is the niceset looking loaf of sourdough I've made yet. It smells great, sweet when it came out of the oven and tangy now - we'll taste it later today.

I don't have a stainless bowl, so I used a Pyrex dish. The fun part is you can watch it rise through the glass. I've never used a cloche, this worked well, I like not trying to get steam.

Marni

Marni, I'm so glad you tried the loaf and had such success with it! I have made it so many times and still get a thrill when I remove the bowl and see the lovely loaf. There was a discussion recently about using a glass bowl - do be careful! I am so clumsy I would be sure to drop a glass one so I use a huge ss bowl. I also found an aluminum roaster at one of the thrift stores to use for batards but found that it is too long to fit on my stone - I should remember to take the measurements with me. Enjoy the loaf, A.

I'm much better at algebra than baking.

1.125 cups of water is 9 ounces. 2.875 cups of flour is maybe 11 1/2 to 12 1/4 ounces, maybe a good bit more if its really packed in. 9/12=75% hydration

I guess that's why people like to have recipes by weight instead of volume. I expect the original recipe's 2.5 cups of flour was more like 10-10 1/2 ounces instead of the nearly 13 ounces you have.

Hi Alex, that seems to be the recipe I use all the time to make Susan's Sourdough loaf. First off, are you using a firm starter? My starter is semi-liquid and I stir it down to be sure I'm not getting just bubbles. I'm afraid I don't do %s but the recipe as Susan gave it to me was 3/4c starter, 3/4c water, 2t oil, 2t kosher salt and 2 1/2c bread flour. If it seems a bit dry I add a little water but usually the dough is quite workable. For the lumpy dough, try wetting the counter and your hand and slap the dough down hard and turn it a few times, then let it rest. Or you can spread it out and do "frissage" to work out any lumps. Hope this helps, A.