The following recipe is the product of a few years of "research" in my kitchen. This recipe continues to evolve basically each time I bake, tweaking quantities, durations and techniques as experience and knowledge are gained. I put it here in digital form for all to enjoy.
Bread is such a fascinating subject (yeah I'm geeking out here) and is so rewarding to make - and eat. Bread is at once earthly and heavenly. Once you start "feeling" the dough, once you realize the dough is a living, breathing thing, once you understand how to control its elasticity and its rising, you'll be able to harness your creativity in order to realise endless variations of bread.
Making sourdough bread is a long process, composed of many steps. It is certainly more involved and time-consuming than making bread using instant yeast. But your effort will be greatly rewarded with bread that is much more aromatic and flavorful, while being also easier to digest. Sourdough bread is regarded as a possible solution for people with gluten-intolerance.
You may want to think ahead of time of all the tools, utensils and supplies you'll need. You may also want to prepare a large enough working area as manipulating a mass of 1.6kg on a small kitchen counter might prove problematic. Some aspects of the dough preparation and the baking process might need to be adjusted according to the way your kitchen is arranged. Accuracy and discipline are of the utmost importance if you wish to achieve good results. Using an accurate enough kitchen scale is imperative.
I strongly recommend reading this recipe in its entirety before actually trying it for the first time. You may want to reread it a couple of times more while first preparing your sourdough culture.
I do not in any way presume to be an expert in the subject of baking bread. I'm but a simple amateur. I may be totally wrong on the internet, so if you have any ideas or corrections please leave a comment below. This recipe is published to the public domain under a "do what you want" license. You may want to fork this gist so you can tweak it to your liking.
Makes two to four loaves of bread:
Note: Quantities in this recipe are indicated in grams. This makes it easier to calculate them if you wish to make more or less dough.
- 800g wheat flour T65 BIO (For those living in Burgundy, France, I currently use a local wheat flour from Minoterie Carnat)
- 460g lukewarm water
- 11g salt
- 320g sourdough culture 50/50
You may wish to add some "bells and whistles" to your dough once you've gained enough experiene, e.g.:
- grains and seeds: wheat, oat, rye, linen seed, sunflower seed, squash seed, sesame seed...
- nuts: walnut, hazelnut, pistaccio, pecan
- berries
- fresh armatics: basil, oregano, parsley, sage, rosemary and thyme...
- spices: cumin seeds, turmeric seeds, coriander seeds (whole or ground) etc
The quantity of salt may be adjusted according to taste but may also depend on factors such as the salinity of the flour or even the water.
The quantity of water may need to be adjusted according the behavior of the wheat flour, which depends on many factors, among which the grain's humidity levels when ground, storage humidty levels, protein and lipid levels etc. The bread's desired moistness may also depend on taste and aesthetics. This recipe has a nominal hydration level of about 65% (the ratio of total water to total flour.)
If the dough feels too dry or unresponsive while kneading, you may want to elevate the hydration rate by one or two percentage points by incorporating 10-20g of water into the dough, all the while kneading.
If on the other hand it feels too sticky or gooey, you may want to reduce the hydration level a bit by incorportaing a small quantity of flour into the dough.
Tip: Do not panick if the dough feels sticky at first. This is normal! As you work the dough, it will start to stick less.
The best of course is to have the right ratio right from the start, but this will take numerous trials. In any case, any adjustment to quantities must be noted as precisely as possible, so you can track how the dough's behavior changes with each adjustment. You better refrain from changing more than one detail at a time. Remember, this is a long process. It's best to find good quality wheatflour and stick with it, since changing the wheatflour will probably necessitate changing the hydration level.
Read all about sourdough here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sourdough
Before making your first loaf of bread you'll first need to prepare your sourdough culture, which is a culture of naturally occuring lactobacilli and yeast. The lactobacilli convert sugars to lactic acid and thus give the bread its sour taste. The yeast aso feeds on sugars and produces CO2 as a byproduct.
It is important to understand that the sourdough culture - as well as the dough itself - is a living thing, a mass of organisms. As long as you feed it, you may keep it indefinitely, even for decades. You may also share your culture with friends and family.
Preparing sourdough culture from scratch will usually take about a week. Each time you use it, you'll need to feed it by adding flour and water. Storing it at a temperature of 3-4ºC will enable you to keep usage and maintenance to a minimum. If using it daily, you may find it better to just keep it in a dark and dry place.
The sourdough is made of equal parts wheatflour and water, making it easy to reason about the hydration level of your dough.
You'll find that with time the sourdough culture takes on a more pronounced smell and taste. This process will be hastened by using your culture often.
Demo on youtube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2FVfJTGpXnU
- Put 50g of wheatflour and 50g of water in a big enough container (say a 1l jar)
- Stir to a rough mixture
- Leave covered with cloth on kitchen counter
- Add 50g of wheatflour and 50g of water into the mixture and stir
- Leave covered with cloth on kitchen counter
- Repeat the following day
At this stage the mixture should be already bubbly and viscuous and smell sweet and sour. Don't worry if there's liquid on the top, just stir it back in with a spoon
- Remove and discard 150g of the mixture
- Add 100g of wheatflour and 100g of water to the mixture
- Leave covered with cloth on kitchen counter
- Remove and discard 200g of the mixture
- Add 150g of wheatflour and 150g of water and stir
- Leave covered with cloth on kitchen counter
- Remove and discard 250g of the mixture
- Add 200g of wheatflour and 200g of water and stir
- Leave covered with cloth on kitchen counter
You'll now have 600g of sourdough culture. If your kitchen is warm enough, your sourdough culture might be ready for use. If it's still not active enough, just repeat the steps:
- Remove and discard 400g of mixture
- Add 200g wheatflour and 200g water and stir
- Leave covered on kitchen counter
Once your sourdough culture is ready it you'll need to close its container with a cover or lid. When not in use, store your sourdough culture in the fridge at 3-4ºC. Storing the culture in the fridge will put in a state of suspended animation. I've been making bread on and off for years now, and I've had no problem leaving my sourdough culture in the fridge for weeks at a time with no maintenance.
If you don't use your sourdough culture for an extended period of time, you can maintain it by repeating the step from day 7:
- Remove and discard 400g of mixture
- Add 200g wheatflour and 200g water and stir
- Leave with covered with lid on kitchen counter for one night
- Put back in fridge the following day
As a rule of thumb, everytime you feed the culture, you'll want to first discard more than half of it. This ensures a healthy, robust development.
If used everyday or every other day, the culture can be stored outside the fridge in a dark and dry place.
If at any moment you start seeing mold on your culture, you'll need to start over.
If your sourdough culture is stored in the fridge you'll first need to warm it up to room temperature in order to bring it back to life. Therefore make sure to take your culture out of storage in advance. If after having warmed up the culture seems deflated and lifeless, just add equal measures of wheatflour and water, and wait a couple of hours for it to become active again.
After using your sourdough culture for making the dough, you'll need to replenish it with equal measures of wheatflour and water. For a used quantity of 320g, you'll need to put back in 160g of wheatflour and 160g of water.
The process of making sourdough bread is made of a few discrete steps, which will be discussed in separate sections. For the sake of practicality, we'll assume that the dough is prepared and undergoes a first rising the night before baking it. The dough is then put in the fridge in order to put it into a state of suspended animation (in similar fashion to the sourdough culture), and then taken out the following day to do the second rising and then the actual baking.
You might need to adjust the schedule according to your needs, but keep in mind that the whole process from raw ingredients to final product will take at the least 7-8 hours.
Duration: 10-15 minutes
The mixing stage introduces the ingredients to one another, letting the flour absorb humidty and for the mixture to homogenise.
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Verify that your sourdough culture is at room temperature and active. If there's liquid on top of the culture, just stir it back in.
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Put the ingredients into a bowl in the following order: wheat flour, water, salt, sourdough culture. You might like to get yourslef a rectangular plastic container of appropriate proportions with a lid. This is very handy especially if you want to make larger batches of dough.
Tip: before putting in each ingredient, reset your kitchen scale to zero. That way you'll avoid making unnecessary calculations.
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Mix the ingredients into a rough, sticky, non-uniform aggregate
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Cover the dough and leave on the kitchen counter for 10 minutes
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During that time you can replenish the sourdough culture with the quantity removed, half wheatflour, half water. Stir, cover and leave on the kitchen counter.
Duration: 20-25 minutes
The kneading stage will form the gluten web and will also homogenise and oxygenate the dough, giving it elasticity and texture. It is important to keep kneading until the dough is elastic enough that it won't tear when stretched to a thin, transparent film. This is called the window pane test.
A well kneaded dough will be puffy and smooth. A good telltale sign of the dough being ready is that it starts to make farting sounds when kneaded. The act of kneading can be physically demanding, especially if you're new to it, but I cannot stress this enough: dough that has not been well kneaded will not rise properly and will lead to bread that is flat and dense.
The repeated gesture of stretching, twisting and folding creates a web of gluten strands (you can actually see the gluten web if you take a piece of dough and stretch it under running water). As the dough is being kneaded it will slowly transform from a sticky, chunky blob into a puffy, smooth ball. With time, you'll start to get a feel for it.
There are many techniques for kneading. Choose whichever one works for you. I use the technique discussed here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FkvjdqkZWqg. This specific technique requires relatively little physical effort, you just need to develop some stamina. I suggest watching the whole thing to get a sense of the gestures involved.
- Prepare a large enough work area free of obstacles and lightly flour it
- With the help of a scraper remove the rough dough from its container onto the work area.
- Fold the dough onto itself along two axes.
- At this stage the dough will be probably stick to the counter. This is totally OK, don't panic! Don't add flour! Just use your scraper to scrape any pieces that stick to the surface and incorporate them back into the dough.
- With your the tips of your fingers on both hands, pick up the right-most extremity of the dough in the air, then twist it downwards onto the counter, stretching the extremity towards you, and then fold it onto itself away from you while releasing it from your fingers. This gesture takes some time to get right. Just remember that the goal is to stretch the dough but not tear it, so you'll need to find the right balance of springiness and gentleness in your movements. Remember, this is a mass of living organisms, be nice to them!
- At first, the dough will tear a lot, but after a few minutes it will start taking shape, and will become more firm and smooth.
- Repeat the kneading gesture for at least 20 minutes. Don't look for shortcuts.
- At a certain point your dough will develop a smooth surface, and you'll notice that it tears less. At a certain point it also start making farting sounds. Just continue the kneading, don't stop!
- Once the gluten web feels fully developed, stop kneading and do the windowpane test: with the help of a scraper, cut a small piece of dough and stretch it between the fingers of both hands. A properly developed dough will stretch to a transparent film without tearing. If the dough still tears, go back to kneading.
- Upon a successful windowpane test you can stop. The whole process should take about 20 minutes, but the actual duration will vary with the speed and efficiency of your kneading. When it comes to kneading, the only way to develop your skills is to do it over and over again.
- Form the dough into a ball, put it back in its container and cover.
Tip: If preparing a larger quantity of dough (say 5 or more kilos) you might want to split your dough into 2 or more batches, each kneaded separately. If prearing a smaller quantity (say less than 1kg of dough), you might need to employ another technique more suited to smaller chunks of dough.
Duration: about 3 hours (of waiting)
After the kneading is done, we let the dough rise. This is the beginning of the fermentation process. Put the dough container some place safe, and wait. The actual duration might vary according to the room temperature. Lower temperatures mean a longer rising duration.
Duration: 5-15 minutes
Now that the dough has finished its first rising, you'll need to divide it into separate pieces that will be shaped into individual loaves of bread. You may also choose to fashion one giant loaf of bread if you so wish.
- Lightly flour your work area.
- With the help of a scraper remove the dough from its container onto the work area. You'll find that the dough has lost its firmness and can't hold its shape. This is completely normal. It means that the dough has fermented and that some of the gluten was digested.
- To give the dough back its elasticity, fold it onto itself along the two axes. Some people fold the dough once or twice during the first rising in order for it to retain its elasticity while fermenting.
- Split the dough into as many parts as you wish. Some people use a kitchen scale to measure equal parts of the dough. I just divide it by eye into 2 or 4 more or less equal parts.
- Shape each part into a ball.
Now that you have separate balls of dough, you can choose whether you want to let them rise in a