Bread by My Starter

This post is all Mom, in honor of her recent birthday, we celebrate Andie Ellis. I like to think of her as my starter. She is the sourdough from which I’m torn. I’m just a bleb that bubbled off her blob. She is the master bread baker who has taught me everything I know. Now and forevermore the aroma of fresh baked bread summons her to mind and heart. May this also be true for you and someone you love. May you too be lovingly well fed and taught to do the same for others.

There is nothing so comforting as a warm slice of fresh bread with butter!  Once a month, in 2020, we hope to warm your kitchen with an unforgettable bread recipe. This month, drum roll please, BEER BREAD and Bake This Day’s Five Pillars of Bread Baking! During the year, we will refer to this vital list for bread success.

Five Bread Pillars to improve your baking

Pillar One; Never, ever, DEGASS, your dough.

Pillar Two; The higher the bread percentage of water the chewier the crust and less dense the crumb.

Pillar Three; Taste takes TIME.

Pillar Four; Crust requires steam.

Pillar Five; Tension pulls increase oven spring.

Microbrew Bread

200 g active sourdough starter

700 g room temperature microbrew, your choice

300 g stone -ground whole -wheat bread flour

700 g un-bleached bread flour

20 g kosher salt

Step one:  the autolyze

In a large ceramic bowl, mix your active starter and microbrew. Stir to dissolve and add the whole wheat and unbleached bread flours. Mix to a shaggy dough and let rest covered for 1-2 hours. This gives your starter yeasts a nice head start of fermenting without the fermentation slowing salt added. Think of your bread rise getting a 75 yard head start in the 100 yard bread dash!

Step two: the stretch and folds

Now, sprinkle with 20 grams of kosher salt and perform a stretch and fold every 30 minutes x 4. (Notice how your bread changes character!)

To stretch and fold picture your bread bowl as a clock face. Pick up the edge of the dough with wet hands, (not flour), at 12 o’clock and fold the dough softly over the center of the clock, without degassing or pushing down the dough). Turn your bowl and repeat this fold at 3, 6 and 9 o’clock on your dough.  Now recover and repeat this every 30 minutes X 4.  Stretch and fold is our method for retaining the byproduct of your starter’s fermentation, carbon dioxide.

A note on NOT degassing the dough

Why would we smash by kneading the hard work of a bunch of resilient lactobacillus and natural yeasts by pushing the air out of the dough?

Trust us, just stretch and fold. That’s right, no traditional bread kneading, at all. Your bread will slowly and surely become billowy and soft during this interesting process.

Step three: the final proofing

Carefully move your dough on to a flat counter- top, without flour, and divide for two loaves, by carefully sawing in two with a serrated knife. Shape into a round, dusting only the top with a bit of rice flour and place upside down in a towel lined proofing basket, dusted with rice flour.

Cover with plastic wrap and allow to proof. Indoors, this should take about 1-1.5 hours or you can let it have one hour on the counter and then go in the refrigerator or in the cool garage overnight for a cold rise.  

Note: a cold rise will produce a bread with enhanced sour flavors, a warm rise produces for yeasty, traditional bread flavors.

Step four-baking: Heat oven to 500 with rack in upper third position with your empty pan/s inside!

          Carefully move your final proof to a hot combo/pan or Dutch oven pan for the boule using the parchment slide. (See note below.) Slice the top, with a sharp knife or lame. Designs are fine, but a quick zig zag cut to ½ inch works perfectly well. Cover the hot pan and put in to bake.

          Once in the oven, immediately lower to 450 and bake for 30 minutes.  Then remove the lid and bake for 10-15 more minutes.  You might want to use your instant read thermometer at this point and watch for your desired temp of 198 -200 degrees. 

Cool on a rack and then wait 1.5 hours before cutting, that’s the really hard part of this recipe!

*To perform a parchment slide, remove plastic wrap and place a piece of parchment paper over your dough. Top this with a dinner plate and carefully turn the entire basket over on the plate. Viola’, your bread is now sitting on a parchment slide on a plate.  Pick up the plate and carefully slide the dough and the paper beneath it, into your hot pan, cover and bake.