Wednesday 2 July 2014

Home Made Sourdough Bread

I have my brother to thank for getting me into the sour dough craze.



When I last visited Brett he had made some delicious and light sour dough bread.
He offered me sourdough starter in a jar with instructions to feed it 
every second day with equal amounts of plain flour and bottled water.  
So I dutifully took it home, stored it in the refrigerator slightly ajar and attended to it 
every second day (almost). When there was enough product I asked Brett for his recipe.


Here is the dough ready to be baked at 180 celsius.
I know it's good for you, but I have only liked purchased sour dough loaves, when toasted ... until now.
This bread is light and delicious.

Brett's Sourdough Bread

2/3 cup sour dough starter culture
1 1/4 cup filtered water
1 dessertspoon natural sea salt
1 1/4 cups plain flour

In a large bowl place the sour dough starter culture with the water and salt.  Stir until mixed.
Add flour and mix together, using your hands to incorporate the flour.
Knead lightly just until all is combined.
Cover with glad wrap and let rise for at least 7 hours in a warm place.

Heat oven to 180 celsius.
Grease a loaf pan with butter.
Pour sour dough batter into pan.
Splash a little water on top and bake on lower shelf for 40 minutes turning once through cooking.

Bread is cooked when the mixture has left the sides of the pan and it sounds hollow when tapped on top.


Thanks Brett, for the sour dough starter and this great recipe.



Buon appetito, enjoy Merryn.

6 comments:

  1. I haven't done sourdough yet but I keep saying I'm going to. I swore it was going to be in 2013 but I'm halfway through 2014 and haven't started. You give me courage!

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  2. Do it Maureen, you will be so glad and the rewards speak for themselves :D

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  3. Sour dough is the one thing that kills me in the kitchen! I have tried and tried and tried and tried but I can not get it to be the way I want it. The starter seems perfect but the bread is always dense. It drives me crazy! Well done on getting a gorgeous loaf, I have bread envy :-)

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    1. Thanks Kyrstie. I did let the dough prove for about 8 hours and used 'homebrand' plain flour, so it wasn't any special technique. Just luck probably :D

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  4. I've had pretty bad luck with sourdough too. Yours looks gorgeous though, so maybe it's time to have another shot using your recipe. I think the key might be baking it in a loaf tin and keeping the oven temperature a bit lower. I was trying to get a wet-ish dough to rise in a super hot oven, and every time I just got a pudgy frizbee loaf that we could hardly bite into. Thanks for the inspiration.

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    Replies
    1. Thanks Sue, it must have been beginners luck. I will post the starter my brother gave me, I didn't know sourdough could be so temperamental 8)

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