Sourdough
- For the starter
- •Up to 1kg strong bread flour – including at least 50% wholegrain flour
-
- For the sponge
- •About 100ml active starter
- •250g strong bread flour (white, wholemeal or a mixture)
- •300ml warm water
-
- For each loaf
- •250g strong bread flour (white, wholemeal or a mixture)
- •1 tbsp olive or rapeseed oil (optional)
- •10g salt
-
Begin with the starter. In a large bowl, mix 100g strong bread
flour with enough warm water to make a batter, roughly the consistency
of thick paint. Beat it well to incorporate some air, then cover with a
lid or clingfilm and leave somewhere fairly warm and draught-free. Check
it every few hours until you can see that fermentation has begun –
signalled by the appearance of bubbles on the surface. The time it takes
for your starter to begin fermenting can vary hugely – it could be a
few hours or a few days.
Your starter now needs regular feeding. Begin by whisking in another
100g or so of fresh flour and enough water to retain that thick batter
consistency. You can now switch to using cool water, and to keeping the
starter at normal room temperature – though nowhere too cold or
draughty. Leave it again, then, 24 hours or so later, scoop out and
discard half of the starter and stir in another fresh 100g flour and
some more water. Repeat this discard-and-feed routine every day,
maintaining the sloppy consistency and keeping your starter at room
temperature, and after 7-10 days you should have something that smells
good – sweet, fruity, yeasty, rather than harsh or acrid. It’s now ready
to bake with.
The night before you want to bake your loaf, create the sponge: take
about 100ml of your active starter, and combine it with 250g fresh flour
and 300ml warm water in a large bowl. Mix well with your hands, or very
thoroughly with the handle of a wooden spoon, then cover with clingfilm
and leave overnight. In the morning, it should be clearly fermenting –
thick, sticky and bubbly.
Now make your loaf: add a fresh 300g flour to the sponge, along with 1
tbsp oil, if you like (it will make the bread a touch softer and more
silky, but is not essential), and 10g salt (which is essential). Squidge
it all together with your hands. You should have a fairly sticky dough.
If it seems tight and firm, add a dash more warm water. If it’s
unmanageably loose, add more flour (but do leave it as wet as you dare –
you’ll get better bread that way).
Turn out the dough on to a lightly floured surface and knead until
smooth and silky. This takes in the region of 10 minutes, but it can
vary depending on your own style and level of confidence.
Put the dough in a lightly oiled bowl and turn it so it gets a light
coating of oil. Cover with lightly oiled clingfilm, or put the bowl
inside a plastic bag, and leave to rise. Don’t expect it to whoosh up to
twice its original size in an hour, as a conventional loaf does.
Sourdough rises slowly and sedately. The best thing is to knead it in
the morning then simply leave it all day (or knead in the evening and
leave overnight) in a fairly cool, but draught-free, place, until it is
more or less doubled in size and feels springy when you push your finger
gently into it. Knock it back (deflate it) on a lightly floured
surface.
You now need to prove the dough (i.e. give it a second rising). You are
also going to be forming it into the shape it will be for baking. If you
have a proper baker’s proving basket, use this, first dusting it
generously with flour. Alternatively, rig up your own proving basket by
lining a medium-sized, fairly shallow-sided bowl with a clean tea towel,
then dusting it with flour. Place your round of dough inside, cover
again with oiled clingfilm or a clean plastic bag and leave to rise, in a
warm place this time, until roughly doubled in size. This might be only
an hour or it could be three or four. Then the dough is ready to bake.
Preheat the oven to 250˚C/Gas Mark 9 (or at least 220C/gas 7, if that’s
your top limit). Have ready, if possible, a clean gardener’s spray
bottle full of water – you’ll be using this to create a steamy
atmosphere in the oven, which helps the bread to rise and develop a good
crust. (You can achieve the same effect with a roasting tin of boiling
water placed on the bottom of the oven just before you put the loaf in –
but the spray bottle is easier.)
About five minutes before you want to put the loaf in the oven, put a
baking tray in the oven to heat up. Take the hot baking sheet from the
oven, dust it with flour, and carefully transfer the risen dough to it
by tipping it out of the proving basket/bowl, upside down, on to the
sheet. Slash the top of the loaf a few times with a very sharp, serrated
knife (or even a razor blade).
Put the loaf into the hot oven and give a few squirts from the spray
bottle over and around it. After 15 minutes, reduce the heat to 200C/gas
6, give the oven another spray, and bake for a further 25-30 minutes,
or until the well-browned loaf vibrates and sounds hollow when you tap
its base. Leave to cool completely, on a rack, before you plunge in with
the bread knife…
