This was a mother and son challenge! My mother started making sourdough a few years back and she will admit to it being a bumpy start… There was a lot of dough thrown away, my father broke his tooth on it and they often joked about the cost of a loaf of bread being £15… I thought I could do better, but exactly the same thing happened, I broke my son’s braces and had flour and water (glue) in every corner of the kitchen. After several failed attempts I retired from making sourdough, thinking it was only possible to make if you had some sort of special powers!
My mother continued to battle on and found a new technique through Elaine at https://foodbodsourdough.com/ that made this nightmare dough start to behave. It also brought the cost of a loaf down to something like £0.60p and doesn’t break anything in your mouth! The lift and fold technique described keeps the dough in the same bowl for the most part of the process. No kneading involved and no glue being left in every corner of the kitchen! Bingo… Here is my mother’s attempt including hot cross buns! My attempt is below in the process.
Stage 0
Grab your best sourdough starter from the fridge (don’t have one? see here from FoodBod Sourdough) and let it come up to temperature. Feed it with 30g of strong white flour and 30g of water, stir it well, and just let it do its thing and become active and bubbly, this may take up to 2-3 hours or longer!
Stage 1 (Starter)
Mix 60g of your bubbling starter with 315g of water, ideally at room temperature. Weigh out 500g of strong white bread flour and add 5g of salt (that’s my preference!)… Add the water to the dough and give a stir with a spoon/knife/fork/chopstick/whatever… Mix together until it forms a shaggy dough, no kneading required. Cover and let rest for 1 hour.
Stage 2 (Autolyse)
Cover your creation with a plastic bag or cling film and leave it for an hour or so somewhere out of the way and at room temperature.
Stage 3 (Lift and Fold)
After an hour, use the lift and fold technique, grabbing some dough and bring it into the centre. Keep turning lifting and folding as you go around the bowl to bring into a smooth ball of dough (20 ish times). Repeat this every hour or so 3 or 4 times. There is no set pattern required, just do when you get time!
Stage 4 (Bulk Fermentation)
Cover the bowl again with some cling film or bag and leave somewhere room temperature for 8 – 10 hours (that’s my approach and it is a bit trial and error based on temp). Note, the optimum temperature would be between 18C – 20C for 8-10 hours or 24 hours in the fridge.
Stage 5 (Banneton)
Use a banneton or bowl that allows the flour to stick to the sides. Dust (a good amount) with flour. Don’t be shy with the flour as it will stick! Carefully perform another round of lift and fold bringing the dough to the centre and place into the dish or banneton. Move this to the fridge to help firm up and rest for no less than 6 hours.
Stage 7 (Cook)
Tip the dough onto greaseproof paper using a plate or something similar to help flip upside down and release from the banneton. Score with a sharp knife or blade! This is important… Place into a pot ideally with a lid on and get into a preheated oven at 230C for 1 hour and 15 minutes.
Stage 8 (Eat)
Enjoy!
Loved this story very funny in parts. Good overall description of the pitfalls that comes when just starting out to try and make sourdough bread. But also showing the good points when the obstacles have been eliminated And showing that successful results can be achieved. Well written.