There have been a couple of articles in the media lately on the challenges and failures faced by home bakers making sourdough. One article in particular claimed that a home baker could never be really successful in making a loaf equal to one produced by a professional baker. They obviously haven't seen some of the bread made by subscribers to this website!
I have been inspired to address some of the challenges faced by the home sourdough bread baker by my cousin Kate in NZ who messaged she hadn't yet conquered sourdough baking but she was having another go. This is the first step in meeting the challenge; persistence.
In making sourdough we are trying to manipulate and control something wild and natural and made up of just three ingredients; flour, salt and water, given that our sourdough starter is just fermenting flour and water. Yet despite the simplicity of the ingredients and the process, last week I waded through reading a 65 page Masters thesis on the chemical actions and reactions which take place in the making of a loaf. My head is still spinning!
To gain control of these complexities we need to be persistent. My first attempt at making sourdough was a complete failure but I was determined to master it so persevered and am still doing that today. Every time I bake a loaf it is a new challenge to make it better than the last; for me the perfect loaf doesn't exist. Even when I am very happy with my loaf, I am never fully satisfied.
The second step which sits comfortably with persistence is patience. If the starter is not ready, don't use it. If the loaf is not soft and springs back when lightly poked, it is not ready to bake. The knowledge and understanding of what is happening in your baking process only comes from patiently observing and noting each step of that process to identify what is right and what is wrong.
Let's take a look at those stages of the process one by one. First your starter. The more frequently you feed your starter, the stronger it will be. However you don't want to make yourself a slave to your starter. I find one feed every three or four days is sufficient although when I have been away for a week or so and haven't fed the starter, I feed it every day for three or four days before using it to make bread. Don't forget to pour off the excess starter before each feed or, better still give some to a neighbour or a friend. Sometimes you might find a bit of brackish water on top of the starter; this is harmless, just pour it off before you feed the starter.
When feeding the starter to make bread use warm to hot water to raise the finished temperature of the starter from its fridge temperature to around 28C . The consistency of the starter at this stage needs to be that of thick pouring cream. If the consistency is too thin a layer of water will start to form because the starter has not received enough flour to feed on and become fully active. If this happens, just stir in more flour.. After 2.5 to 3 hours the starter should be slightly foamy with a head a bit like that of a good stout.
Now the water. Chlorine is a yeast and sourdough culture killer. If use are using tap water make sure you filter it or leave it to stand uncovered overnight to allow the chlorine to dissipate. Alternatively use bottled water. We have in-line filters at our house due to the poor quality of our tap water.
There is a whole separate article on flour quality variation in our blog, the link is here Ensure you use the best quality high protein baker's flour you can get your hands on. Some flour will take a higher hydration (water content) and the higher your hydration, the better your loaf will be. However, this needs to be balanced with the manageability of the loaf. The more experience you have with bread-making, the better you will be able to handle high hydration.
It is almost impossible to over-knead bread by hand and therefore it is often under-kneaded. You need to work the dough strongly and smoothly for a good 10 to 15 minutes, stretching the dough out in front of you with one hand then pulling it back and turning it to repeat again. Some bakers encourage using a turn and fold technique to replace the kneading action. I use both in combination. After a solid kneading I put the dough back in the mixing bowl, cover it with a damp cloth and let it ferment for one hour. I then lift the dough out onto a lightly floured bench, pat it out gently into a rectangle then gently pull on both ends to stretch the dough further then, fold one third of the length back over the next third, then the final third back over these two layers like folding a business letter. I then turn the dough 90 degrees and repeat this procedure. I replace the dough back in the bowl for one more hour then do the same again. At the end of the next hour the dough is ready to shape into a loaf for the final prove. At this stage some large bubbles in the dough should be very apparent .
After forming into a loaf it should take between 2.5 and three hours to be ready to bake. I let it prove for just two hours then retard the loaf in the refrigerator overnight. There are two benefits to doing this; one it seems to improve the texture of the final product and two it allows for the bread to be baked fresh around mid-morning and be delightfully fresh for lunch. You will need to take the loaf from the refrigerator around 2.5 to 3 hours before you want to bake it. If you want it out of the oven at 11.00am to serve with lunch at 12.30pm it needs to go in the oven about 10.20am. Therefore it needs to be out of the refrigerator by around 7.00am.
Like flour, not all ovens were created equal. Very rarely does the temperature gauge or the thermostat setting accurately reflect the actual temperature of the oven. The temperature in the outdoor gas oven I use fluctuates wildly over the 40 minutes of normal baking time and I have to keep a constant eye on it and adjust it accordingly. It is also much hotter at the rear than the front so I turn the bread a couple of times during the bake to ensure an even colour. Your oven will have its own peculiarities and you need to work around them. One important point in baking sourdough is that it likes a higher temperature than yeast bread. I bake mine at what my oven says is 240C and always get a rich golden crust which is just flirting with burning.
Finally, don't hesitate to send me photos of any bread you are having trouble with; I can often identify what the problem might be. Just make sure you send one of the loaf from side on and one of the inside front on. You can also send me photos of your successes because a good loaf is worth bragging about.
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