An Instruction Guide on Sourdough and Breadmaking I Made for my Roommate

Note: If all of this is too much, here's a much more chill peasant bread recipe that produces a similar product with just yeast, I also have no notes on this recipe. It’s great the way it is.

Sourdough, however, everyone does it a little differently.

Step 0: Gather the basics

Before starting, a digital scale, clean straight-sided vessel, and sourdough starter is needed.

Time to pick your recipe. I used this recipe as reference, but my experience is also in the instructions below

Step 1: Feeding the starter

The goal: sourdough starter is a living culture of healthy yeasts used for thousands of years to make bread. Feeding the yeasts helps them ferment and proof your dough into soft bread.

Take 80 g (approx) of starter. Mix 40 g of water to 40 g of all purpose flour or whole wheat flour, and mix this fresh 50 g mix to the starter.

Put the starter in the fridge for long term storage, or leave it in a room temp spot if breadmaking is the plan. Make sure the container is large and the lid is loose, as the starter will expand.

Good practice is to mark on the container where the starter height is before it grows to see when the dough has expanded

Step 2: Wait at least 6 hours

The goal: Give time for the yeasts to “wake up” in the starter.

About 8 hours (sometimes less or more, can be a 6-12 hour range) later, the starter will have doubled or more. At the starters “height” (the most it will expand), thats when it’s time to mix with ingredients for bread. The yeasts are excited and ready to work with.

You will have leftover sourdough starter later, that is necessary. The extra can be fed later for more bread making.

Step 3: Assemble Ingredients and tools

Need: A clean surface, clean towels, large clean bowls, digital scale

Useful:

Stand mixer.
Large cutting board for a surface
Bench scraper
Razor blade
Parchment paper

Ingredients:

Bread flour (optional, but really nice for gluten development and a good crust)

Side note - Wheat flour can also be cut in for an artisanal dough, do this when you feel confident and fancy.

All purpose flour (required unless you’re crazy and use all bread flour)
Salt
Water
Butter (only needed if not using parchment paper)

Note: This is why people go crazy for sourdough. There are three ingredients and two of them are salt and water.

Step 4: Mix

The goal: To introduce the yeasts to your dough and fully hydrate the newly added flour.

Mix 375 grams of lukewarm water to a bowl. Add 75-125 g of starter to the water, (less is good in warm months, more in colder months. More starter may add more sour flavor). Add a pinch of salt (11 g), and mix starter into the water. Add 500 g of bread flour (or all purpose), and mix.

There’s also a bunch of background stuff about the water to flour ratio. Here's a super in depth explanation of that if you're interested, but it may be good to actually just BAKE for a while before going into that. Bread can be very forgiving as long as the yeast is treated well. This is a pretty wet 75% hydrated dough, if that matters. Great for beginners and experts.

I recommend using a spatula or danish whisk to mix, the goal is not to knead but to let the yeast mix into the dough.

Optional: Use extra starter (up to 300 g total) or add some regular dry yeast in to speed up fermentation.

Note: When you feel more comfortable with working with a dough, it’s ok to add more flour or water if things seem too wet or dry. After a while, the goal is not to follow a hard scientific recipe, but to trust your instincts.

Step 5: Wait 15-30 minutes

The goal: Let the flour soak up all that water.

Let the dough hydrate completely in a large bowl, larger than you think, it’s gonna grow later.

Step 6: Stretch and fold

The goal: Work with the dough so that it becomes more taut, because it’s going to be at least a little sticky and shaggy after the first mix.

The lazy method is to use the stand mixer on a slow setting, but I prefer to do the traditional method and use the stand mixer later.

Here's an example which can be done in the bowl.

Optional: Do this 3-4 times with 15-30 minute rests, this builds texture in the final product but totally can be skipped. I find that it’s only useful to keep doing it when the dough is super sticky.

Step 7: Wait again

The goal: This is the "fermentation stage” where the yeasts start to do their work and eat on the dough to create yummy yummy bread something something bread science.

Cover the dough with a clean cloth and wait. There’s no standard time to wait. Just “wait until the dough doubles in size.” Probably at least 4 hours. The warmer space and the more yeast for fermentation, the better.

Some people pre heat their over for like 30 seconds to create that warm enviornment, which I only recommend if you have a thermometer and can tell it’s not hot enough to murder your yeast before they get a chance to do their job.

You’ll murder the yeast later when they have finished

This can also be done in the fridge for 24 hours instead. Some bakers swear by it.

Step 8: KNEAD

The goal: Build the full texture of the dough. Kneading forms gluten, which has a distinct texture and you’ll get to know what it feels like the more dough you work with. This also creates surface tension on the dough’s surface when done right, which creates and "artisanal feel” to the final product.

Preheat the oven to 450 F. Prepare the vessel the bread is going to be baked in. Either grease with butter or use parchment paper.

All that growth that just happened, yeah, it’s time to punch it down. This can be done with forks, Like this or Like this, which explains why we do it this way

Either use a stand mixer for 15-25 minutes (or until dough is tight) or knead on a clean flat surface using a bench scraper. Extra flour on the board helps with stickiness. An example of kneading on a board

I recommend learning to knead before relying on the stand mixer because it helps your brain learn how to read dough. When it’s too sticky and needs more flour, which you can only learn if you knead it and it sticks to everything or if it never takes shape. When it’s too dry and breaks apart and there’s not enough water. When the gluten is stretched out and about to break and needs to chill, which you’ll see when physical strands appear in the dough and start to break as you knead. All that you gotta learn with your hands. Here's a really in depth explanation by bread nerds.

Then you can be lazy and watch the process in the mixer.

Step 9: Let that thing chill

The goal: After a good knead, set the dough aside for like 10 minutes to an hour so that the structures you form inside “rest.”

The kneading and chilling step can be repeated as much as needed to form the dough into a glutenous beauty. There is also such a thing as over kneading when the gluten starts to become broken. The rest step is especially important for that.

Step 10: PREPARE FOR BAKING

The goal: Set up the dough so that it takes one more mini-rise while baking to become the perfect texture for the final product.

Scrape the dough into the vessel of choice after it’s covered with parchment or greased. This is the final chance to make sure the dough is shaped well.

Use a sharp knife or razor blade to cut a one inch deep slit across the dough. This can be anywhere and in any pattern, but it’s designed to help the dough rise in the oven.

Note: Some recipes will talk about using a dutch oven and preheating that. It's a cast iron trick I can teach, but I find it’s better to just use high quality bread flour than anything.

Step 11: BAKE

The goal: not just to fully cook the dough into bread, but this is the crust formation step. The goal is to create a humid environment while baking, which helps form that crust into the beautiful texture we love.

Cover dough, set in a 450 f degree oven for 30 minutes.

Optional: Instead of covering/uncovering the dough, you can set a pan full of ice in the oven to create the steam needed to create a great crust.

Lower the oven temp after 30 minutes to 400. Bake for 20 more minutes.

Remove from oven carefully, it’s hot.

Step 12: Enjoy Bread

After it comes out the oven. WAIT for the bread to cool for an hour before cutting.

Then cut open an eat.

Enjoy bread.

You did it!

Search This Blog

I End Up Cooking In The Kitchen A Lot