All the sexy sourdoughs

Sourdough has become a small pandemic all on its own during this time of lockdown and quarantine. Recipes and ideas and posts about the perfect sourdough loaf is a daily occurrence on social media.

At De Windpomp we have till now not ventured into the world of sourdough but I have been personally experimenting at home and have had some amazing results that might just find their way to our restaurant tables once we open again.

There are so many videos and recipes online that talk about hydration percentages and crumb and crust and oven rise and that is not even the technical stuff about the yeast bacteria and lactic acid! And then they tell you it takes 24 to 48 hours from start to finish to bake your bread, not taking into account the 7 days to cultivate a starter. With all of this it might actually sound a little overwhelming to attempt your own sourdough bread, but let me assure you, the actual baking process is very simple and if you ask around you might be able to get a little starter off a friend or if you are close enough, just contact us and we can hook you up :)

This is my recipe for a great tasting, easy sourdough bread that, with a little planning, you can make fresh almost daily, or at least for a great weekend breakfast treat.

INGREDIENTS

450gr Bread Flour - White, Brown or Wholewheat

50gr Rye Flour (optional, if leaving out, adjust the other flour accordingly

300gr Water - room temperature and preferably filtered.

150gr Active Bubbly Starter

10gr Salt

When working with sourdough it is always better to weigh rather than measure out the ingredients. You can do it and there are recipes for that on the internet, but I always weigh and I have never had a bad bread.

In a big mixing bowl, weigh out your active starter and then add the water. Easiest way is to reset your scale to 0 everytime you add a new ingredient, that way you don't have to weigh everything seperately

Mix the starter and water a little to break up the starter.

Add your flour and salt and mix together by hand.

The dough will start to come together, but will still be very sticky and wet, that is fine.

Once all the flour is incorporated cover the bowl with a cloth and leave to rest for 15 to 30 minutes.

After this you will do your first stretch and fold - a technique that you will find many videos on if you are interested. Basically what you do is, take the dough on one side or even round the middel and pull it towards you. It will stretch to a point and then start to tear. Stop your stretching and then fold the dough back on itself. This first one will have one or two stretched and then it will lose elasticity. Form the dough into a ball while doing your stretch and fold and leave covered in a warm place.

This first mixing part will have to be done either late evening for an overnight rise or in the mornings with the idea that you bake the bread early evening or even the next morning. This is where your planning comes in. I prefer doing this in the evenings or late afternoon and then letting the bread rise on its own overnight.

If you are doing it during the day, and you have time and want to, you can do one of these stretch and folds every hour until you see the dough has about doubled in size.

It is not necessary, I have never done it, but rather added more rise time to my second proof and that works best for me. But feel free to experiment.

Once your bread has doubled in size (for me that is usually midmorning the next day now in the colder winter time) take out your dough and do a last stretch and fold. Fold the dough over like you would if making your own envelope.

Be careful not to knock out to much of the air in the dough.

Shape your dough and then it should be placed in a bannaton or bread basket.

I don't have one of those.

depending if I am making a round bread in my cast iron pot or a longer loaf in the clay dutch oven I place the bread in a floured cloth in round bowl or a loaf pan.

For the best results the second rise should be around 12 hours (either overnight or during the day for an evening bake.

You can however bake the bread after as little as 30 minutes.

Heat your oven to 230°C with the pot you will be cooking your bread in inside.

When the oven is ready, tip out the bread on a piece of baking paper. Score the bread (again a lot of videos and information on scoring on the internet)

Place the bread in the hot castiron pot and put the lid on. Bake for about 20 minutes covered and then another 15 to 20 minutes uncovered until nice and brown and the bread sounds hollow when tapped on the bottom.

Allow to cool on a rack before cutting.

You are supposed to wait until the bread is cool before cutting or you might find the texture a little doughy... I do have a friend that will eat half the bread piping hot from the oven :)

Butter and homemade Apricot Jam is the way to go with this one.