I don't know if I've written about our sourdough yet. We make a lot of bread, in general, and like a year ago (more? I have no idea), Ari gave us some sourdough starter. This is a robust starter, that has lived up in the AMC huts, and made a whole lot of bread in its day. Robust is key, because sometimes, we don't make bread for a couple weeks, and just sort of forget about it, and it hasn't died yet. Theoretically, this is more alive than my house plants, but it seems to be surviving a little better.Anyway, here's a long overdue blog post about bread, and sourdough in particular. Some people get crazy into the details - those are people who are aiming for a consistent product. That's awesome, and good for them, but I like my method, which feels easier and more flexible, and I don't have a kitchen scale anyway. So, the easy thing is to do a no-knead situation, a la NYT no-knead bread recipe.
Feed me
Start with feeding the starter. It's alive, after all. I dump the contents of my starter jar into a big bowl, and mix with 2C warm water and 2C all-purpose King Arthur flour. I've always liked King Arthur Flour, and recently I heard from one of my health-nut friends that the gluten intolerance that lot of people are experiencing is not actually the gluten, but rather the utter shit that passes for flour in some brands. So hey, another excuse to stick with a flour and a company that I know and respect.
So then I re-fill my start jar with stuff from the bowl. Theoretically, leave that out of the fridge to let it feed, but sometimes it only gets 10min outside before I have to leave or whatever and put it back in the fridge. I leave the jar semi-screwed.
What's left in the bowl is the starting point for the bread.
Mix stuff in
No-knead
The quick version is to add another 2C of flour, any sort, and two ish tsp of salt. I tend to do two two-finger scoops of kosher salt from the salt jar. I think that's a little more than a teaspoon each time. Stir this into a shaggy mess, and then leave it alone, covered with plastic (I stick the whole bowl into a big plastic bag), for 8-24 hours. The length of rise can basically replace kneading in terms of gluten development.
Kneaded version
The no-knead is easy peasy. But I'm coming around to preferring the kneaded bread. Takes a smidgeon more time, obviously. First, do everything you did in the no-knead step. Then, walk away for 10-30 minutes, and give the flour a chance to hydrate. The autolyse step, is what this is called. It'll be a lot easier to knead after doing that. Also, if you're making a whole wheat loaf, this step is kind of crucial to avoid kneading in too much flour and making the loaf denser than a brick.
After the autolyse, flour your work surface and knead until it feels right. Add as much flour as you need to. I think 2-5 minutes is what feels right, but I'm also lazy.
Put the dough back in its bowl, cover, and let it rise about 2 hours. This part is flexible, anywhere from 1-4 hours is probably fine.
Shape the bread
Dump it out, and watch this video to shape some little balls for the second rise. The two-cup version of my bread gets me two baguettes. Let the little balls rise another hour, and then form baguettes.
Preheat the oven to 450F, with a pan of water on the bottom rack. That'll make the steam that you need to develop the delicious, trademark, french baguette crust. We recently acquired a baguette pan, which, besides having adorable little hole patterns in the bottom, allows the steam through the bottom of the pan to make the whole thing delicious and crusty. Without the baguette pan, you have to cook a little longer and turn down the heat and remove the steam when you're halfway through.
Cook me
The baguettes don't have to rise a super long time. Maybe 30 minutes? Once you're ready to cook, slash the tops and pop them into the oven. I tend to do about 25 minutes at 450, and then remove the pan of water (carefully!!), and turn down the oven to 350-400 to finish cooking the innards.
Let the loaves cool at least 5 minutes before cutting them open. Same as meat, you gotta let it rest.
Also delicious: rosemary focaccia. Possibly giving you a recipe for that soon, but the gist is to just add a ton of fresh rosemary, chopped, when you mix in the flour. Then the second rise just dump it out on a heavily-oiled sheet pan and smoosh it to the sides. Makes things crispy and delicious and golden.
