Torr's Sourdough Journey and Explanation

Hello fellow SMUS Eats club members — and the world.

Who knew I’d be writing a food blog post during our February long weekend? It’s a pleasure and I’d like to take the opportunity to share my love for sourdough baking with you and simultaneously break down its deceptively simple 4-ingredient recipe.

Before we go on, I dare you, right now, to make a sourdough loaf once you finish this article. I really bet you won’t! $2. Comment below if you did. You will have earned my respect for life.

Because I am going to make a post on the SMUS Eats Blog, I think I will imitate every online recipe blog post ever and write way too much. Why just jump into a recipe when you can babble?

Also, as a side-note, keep on the lookout for a video where I show my home-setup for the easiest sourdough loaves possible, and share a more digestible explanation of this whole process. Sourdough bread is unfortunately something that does not fit very nicely into the standard online recipe card format, so bear with me as I explain. I have done a lot of research and experimentation to get my loaves just right, and chances are you will have to too. You will always have questions, and thankfully we have the internet. Use it. And be prepared to fail — just keep trying.

On the blog so far there have been some awesome recipes shared like Kate and Anna’s Waffles and Meheq’s Banana Date Oat Bars (shoutout to them for that!) and one thing to appreciate about their recipes is that they are ones you should be able to finish within one day. Sourdough baking, however, is just not quite that simple. The process for creating one loaf can take between 28 and 36 hours. If you want to challenge yourself or start a new hobby, sourdough bread baking is, in my opinion, your best route to ultimate satisfaction. I will try my best to cover the entire process in one post, but be warned that it is complex. I will end the post with some simplified notes and a daily routine that works for me, so that you can see that the whole process is really quite manageable.

Before you go further, remember to fret not! Instead, look at these photos for inspiration and then read on. If I can make these loaves, then so can you.

From here on out I will be succinct, I swear.

Sourdough Bread Recipe and Explanation

Step 1: Get a Starter

The Sourdough Starter is a mixture of flour, water, and natural yeast from the air. It is what makes your bread rise and what gives sourdough loaves their unique flavour. I will not write about how to make your own, because it is something I have not yet managed to do. 1 Instead, find someone you know with a sourdough starter (me or your local bakery, for example) and ask for a cup of it. Once you get your hands on some, read on...

Step 2: Keep the Starter

To keep your sourdough starter healthy and bubbly, feed it equal parts water and flour once a day and keep it in a warm place. I feed mine 20 g of flour and 20 g of water before I have breakfast every morning.

Step 3: Make a Levain

A levain is a mixture of equal parts flour, water and sourdough starter. Every morning after I have fed my sourdough starter, I pour 30 g of it into a jar with 30 g of water and 30 g of flour. 10 hours later, this mixture will have matured, doubled in size, and become ready for use in a dough!

Step 4: Use the Levain

The matured levain from the previous step can now be treated exactly like any normal yeast you buy in the store in a recipe, and I can give you a recipe card like you were probably hoping for.

Ingredients:

Part 1

464 g white all-purpose flour

90 g matured levain

318 g water 2

Part 2

9 g salt

25 g water

Instructions:

1. Combine the Part 1 ingredients in a bowl. Let sit for 20 mins.

2. Swirl salt and water together in a jar and add to the bowl.

3. Flatten the dough in your hands and hold it like it is a map. Fold the dough over itself 4 times: first from north to south, then east to west, south to north, and west to east. 3 Let sit covered for 30 mins.

4. Repeat folds and let sit for 30 mins.

5. Repeat folds and let sit for 2.5 hrs.

6. Put dough in fridge overnight (10-23 hours)

7. Bake according to Step 5 (read on)

Step 5: Baking the Loaf

Even just popping your bread in the oven is complicated in the sourdough process: you need a dutch oven. A dutch oven is just a large, heavy cooking pot with a heat-proof lid. Here is what you do:

1. Preheat dutch oven for 20 mins at 200°C (keep the lid half-off so hot air can enter the dutch oven)

2. Put some oil and your loaf into the dutch oven

3. Bake the dutch oven containing the bread at 200°C for 25 mins with the lid on

4. Remove lid and continue to bake for another 30 mins.

5. Remove the loaf from the dutch oven and let cool for 1-2 hours 4

Simplified Notes (save these on your phone)

Starter:

Feed 10 g flour, 10 g water once a day.

Levain:

30:30:30 g flour:water:starter. Let mature for 10 hrs.

The loaf:

464 g flour (pick any whole grain/white flour ratio)

318 g water (boiled and cooled; dechlorinated)

85 g mature levain

After 20 mins:

25 g water

9 g salt

The rise:

Let rise for 3.5 hrs. NESW folds at the 0, 30 and 60 min marks.

10-23 hours in the fridge.

The bake:

Preheat dutch oven for 20 mins to 200°C.

Bake with lid on for 25 mins, and lid off for 30.

My Timeline

7:30: feed sourdough starter and make levain before breakfast.

17:30: Combine Part 1 of the dough before I start my homework. Set a 20-min timer.

17:50: Combine Part 2 of the dough, NESW folds. Set a 30-min timer.

18:20: NESW folds. Set a 30-min timer.

18:50: NESW folds. Set 2.5-hr timer.

21:20: put dough in the fridge.

7:30: bake the loaf and repeat the process for the next day.

Notes:

1. If you really want to start your own from scratch, read this: https://www.theperfectloaf.com/7-easy-steps-making-incredible-sourdough-starter-scratch/Tthe Perfect Loaf is a wonderful website dedicated solely to the art of sourdough baking; worth a visit for anyone who hasn’t seen it.

2. I haven’t mentioned this yet for fear of overwhelming readers, but boil and cool water to remove chlorine from the water before using it in a sourdough recipe. Chlorine is bad for your natural yeast and can stunt the process. Alternatively, leaving water out in an open container for 24 hours will also dechlorinate it.

3. I call these NESW folds.

4. This is very, very important. If you cut your bread too soon after baking it will squidge and give you a sub-par, overly moist loaf.

Author: Torr Large