Sourdough Bread
So here’s my recipe for sourdough. I’m passionate about sourdough and have been reading about it, researching it and cooking the bread for the last few years.
But you know anything about sourdough, you will know that it is very much trial and error, and practice, practice, practice! I have incorporated lots of skills from my sourdough heroes, and I hope the following recipe will help you to make a good loaf of bread.
450g strong flour
150g sourdough starter
325g tepid water
10g salt
Mixing the dough
Measure the flour into a large bowl. Add the sourdough starter and the water. Don’t add the salt just yet. Mix very roughly just enough to incorporate the ingredients.
Autolyse
Cover and leave for 30 minutes so the mixture can autolyse. I use a clear plastic shower cap as a cover, as it fits nicely over most sized bowls. A tea towel is fine too.
Kneading
Add the salt to the mixture. Now you can choose to knead the mixture using a dough hook in an electric stand mixer or knead by hand. If you want to knead by hand, that’s fine, but I don’t, so I won’t describe here. There is plenty of information out there about ways of hand kneading!
If using a mixer, mix the dough for 6 minutes on the lowest speed, then 4 minutes on the next speed up. The dough should be lovely and stretchy and pass the windowpane test if you pull and stretch a small section – it should be translucent.
Bulk prove (first prove)
Cover the bowl again and leave the dough in a warm place to prove for about 4 hours.
Stretching and folding
The stretch and fold step is highly recommended, almost essential, if you want to ensure strength in your dough.
Remove the cover from the dough. You need to wet your fingers for this method, to stop your fingers sticking to the dough. Gently take one of the edges of the dough and stretch it, then fold over to the other side of the bowl. Repeat, turning the bowl around so you have lifted up all of the dough and stretched and folded it to the other side of the bowl. The dough should start to feel stretchy.
Do this stretching and folding of the dough once every hour, for the 4 hours, covering the bowl again after each stretch and fold.
After the first prove of 4 hours the dough should have increased in size by about 50%.
Pre-shape
Now comes the interesting part of the process for getting the dough into a shape that can then be shaped for baking. I was very nervous of pre-shaping initially, now it’s my favourite part of bread making.
Carefully remove the dough from the bowl with help of a dough scraper onto an unfloured work surface. Definitely no flour needed! I use an oversized wooden board, but a bench top will work too. The dough will be stretchy, and quite delicate, so no rough treatment. Slide the scraper underneath the dough, lifting it from underneath. You will feel the scraper catch the dough as it lifts it up. I try not to remove the scraper, just move it round all of the dough in a circle. Sometimes the scraper sticks, and you need to pull it out, remove the sticky dough, and then go under again, but the more you move around the dough, the tighter the dough becomes and the less likely to stick. Do this circular movement with the scraper a few times until the dough forms a round, wobbly ball that roughly holds its shape. Leave for 20-30 minutes to let the gluten relax.
Shape
I shape my sourdough loaves to fit the 2 cast iron pots I bake in. One is round, perfect for a boule shape. The other is oval, which is fine for a batard shape.
It’s important that you are super careful with the shaping. The dough is delicate, and you don’t want to damage the dough you have worked so hard to develop.
For a round boule:
Put the pre-shaped dough onto the work surface, lightly floured. Imagine the round of dough is a clock face. Take one edge of the dough at 12 o’clock and gently pull towards you, and fold into the centre of the dough. Move the dough around to 3 o’clock and pull and fold again. Move to 6 o’clock, then 9 o’clock, pulling and folding. Do this process a few times until the dough feels tight and a little bouncy. Turn the dough over. Put the dough into cupped hands and move the dough backwards and forwards, until the dough feels tight and smooth.
For a batard:
Put the pre-shaped dough onto the work surface, lightly floured. Imagine the dough is sort of square shape. Take the two sides of the square shape that are opposite each other and gently stretch away from each other. Fold these stretched bits over each other in the centre of the dough. Turn the dough round 90 degrees and do the same with the other two sides of the square. Now that you have folded the 4 sides of the square, fold 2 of the opposing corners in the same way, and then fold the other opposing corners. Take the top of the dough and roll up, towards you. Press the seam to seal.
For either shape, carefully move the dough into a proving basket, round or batard shaped, with the smooth side of the dough on the bottom and the seam side on top.
Second Prove
While you can prove your dough for 2-3 hours at room temperature, I advocate the retarded or fridge prove, and this method serves me well. Leave the dough at room temperature for 1 hour then place in the fridge for at least 8 hours, or up to 16. Doing this at night works well as it allows you to bake your bread first thing the next morning.
Score and Bake
For the pot method, pre-heat your oven to really hot – 250 degrees C fan. Put the pot in when you begin to pre-heat, and leave for 20-30 minutes. The pot will certainly be really hot after 20 minutes - and perhaps this is a waste of energy – but I sometimes want to be completely sure the pot is hot, so I go the extra 10 minutes.
Turn your dough out of the proving basket onto a piece of baking paper. The pretty side of the dough is now on top. Open the oven and carefully take the lid of the pre-heated pot off. Lift the baking paper and shaped loaf carefully into the hot pot.
At this point you can score the dough using a lame or razor blade or sharp knife. Sprinkle a small amount of flour (a couple of teaspoons) over the loaf. This helps to accentuate the scoring.
For a boule, I score with 2 slashes to form a cross. For a batard, score with 1 or 2 long cuts down the length of the dough.
Put the lid back on the pot and close the oven door. Turn the oven down to 220 degrees C fan. Bake for 25 minutes, then remove the lid and bake for a further 25-30 minutes with the lid off, until the bread is a deep burnished brown. Remove the bread to a wire rack and leave to cool for an hour before cutting.
TIPS AND TRICKS
*If at first you don’t succeed, try try again!”That about sums up the sourdough process. You’re not going to make the perfect loaf the first time. But with care and attention and practice and above all the time it takes to make a number of loaves, you can succeed.
*The proving times are approximate. You sometimes need a little more than the recipe suggests. This is because proving is temperature dependent, and if the weather is colder it may take more time, or if you are proving in a cooler area. Conversely, if it’s a particularly warm day, or your indoor temperature is warm, proving can taste less time. I have a constant battle with temperature cooking in Sydney in summer, where it’s always warm!
*The oven temperatures are reasonably accurate, I have researched these over several years of baking sourdough. However I am conscious that not all ovens are the same so there may need to be some variation in temperature settings. You know your own oven, if you feel you need to make a slight variation in temperature.