Sunday, August 15, 2010

Bread of the Week 34: Basic Sourdough



This week I entered the realm of sourdough breads. Sourdough breads are different than most of the breads I've been making because they use wild yeast instead of commercial yeast. I collected some yeast using flour, pineapple juice, and water. I've been keeping it alive in my refrigerator by occasionally feeding it.

Well now, that is certainly a paragraph I never thought I would write. OK back to the bread.

I like sourdough bread. It has a bit of a kick to it, and it is nice and chewy. I like to use it for sandwiches, but if I ever get sick of it I think it would make great croutons.

I don't like how long it takes to make sourdough bread. Most of the breads I've been making up until now take about an hour and a half to two hours on the first day. Sourdough breads take four hours the first day. They take up to 10 hours the second day. It is making it hard to fill my weekend with social plans. Due to the crimp in my social life I've decided to do all of the sourdoughs over a two weekends. I'll still blog one bread at a time, which will allow me to actually leave town for the weekend without taking a vacation day to catch up on baking.

2 comments:

essjay said...

I'm glad the bread is tasty but man that is labor intensive!!

Anonymous said...

Sure, they take a while, but once you've made some really good sourdough bread, you'll be hooked. And it gets easier once you get used to it. You'll learn to make the bread work around your schedule and not the other way around. Retarding the dough in the fridge is also a great way to control the time to your liking.