Ingredients:
- 1/2 Cup of Bubbling Sourdough Starter (photo below)
- 1 and 1/2 Cup plus 1 Tablespoon of warm water
- 4 Cups and 2 Tablespoons of White Bread Flour (Whole Wheat Bread Flour, or a Mix, would also work)
- 2 teaspoons of standard table salt or fine sea salt
Instructions:
You should begin in the evening and bake the next afternoon.
1. Your sourdough starter should be active and bubbly. It should look like this:
If it doesn't, then wait and keep working on it.
2. Mix the 1/2 Cup of starter and 1 & 1/2 Cups + 1 Tablespoon of warm water together in a large bowl with a spatula. Wait 3-5 minutes.
3. Add the 4 Cups and 2 Tablespoons of bread flour and 2 teaspoons of salt. Mix to combine. Finish by hand to form a rough dough. Cover with a damp kitchen towel.
4. Next, you will do four sets of stretch and folds every 30 minutes. Use your hands and stretch from one edge by lifting the rough dough out of the bowl like you have a handle in your hands. Fold it all the way across the ball of rough dough and set it in the bowl. Turn 90 degrees and repeat. Continue this lift and pull process until you make it all the way around the dough. Then, flip the folded dough over, You might want a bread scraper to help. Wait 30 minutes and then do your second set, etc. Four sets, every 30 minutes.
5. First Rise: Set a damp kitchen towel over the bowl and let the dough rest for about 10 hours. I simply let it rest overnight. The dough should increase in volume somewhere between 50% and 100% (doubling) if you began with active starter. Don't worry if it expands but somewhat less than doubling. It is difficult to estimate how much the dough expanded.
6. Flour a surface. I used a floured plastic cutting mat to help avoid sticking. Do the stretch and fold, 90 degree rotate and set one time but do not flip the dough after making your way around the dough. Let the dough rest right in place for 30 minutes.
7. Shape the dough so it can fit in a loaf shaped banneton (check Amazon, just a fancy word for a wooden proofing basket used in breadmaking) or a standard loaf pan lined with a dry cotton kitchen towel. Flour the banneton or dry kitchen towel slightly. Place the dough into the banneton without flipping it over. Just lift it up and plop it in. Place the banneton in the refrigerator covered with a damp kitchen towel covering it.
8. Second rise: let the dough rest in the refrigerator for four hours (or up to about eight hours -- some recipes say longer).
9. Take the loaf out of the refrigerator. You can pull out a dutch oven here. I didn't have one. So I used a 9x4 silicone loaf pan with a non-stick one that could set on top and form a seal. Put the loaf pan you will be baking in, I used the silicone one, on top of the banneton. Then flip it over to drop the dough into the baking loaf pan. If necessary you can try to smooth the surface a bit with a bread scraper edge. You can also gently shake the loaf pan back and forth so the dough reaches the corners, or near the corners. I also used a bread scraper to tuck the sides down into the pan.
10. Preheat over to 450 F (or higher if your oven goes higher). When it reaches temperature, use a razer blade or very sharp thin knife blade to score the loaf from edge to edge down the center in each direction. The blade or knife should slice down by about 1/2" to 1".
11. Put the Dutch over or covering pan on top. Since I was using another pan, I used medium binder clips to help form a seal.
12. Place in over and bake at 450 F for 30 minutes.
13. After 30 minutes, carefully remove the cover or pan on top. Oven mitts!
14. Put it back in the oven but at 400 F this time. Bake it for about 15-20 minutes. You want the entire top to be a medium to dark brown. Don't worry if a peak develops (called the "ear") and toasts darker than the rest of the loaf. This is desirable, actually.
15. Take out loaf pan and set it on a wire rack for 10-15 minutes before taking the baked loaf from the pan and setting the loaf directly on the wire rack.
16. Enjoy the baked bread smell for an hour. A full hour. Then you can slice into it. Use a sharp bread serrated bread knife if you have one to "saw" through the top crust and work your way down the bread without mashing down the loaf.
17. You should have delicious sourdough bread to enjoy.
Credits: adapted from Alexandra Cooks Recipe.
and let rest for 30 minutes.
