Delicious Sourdough Part Two: The Bread

We have our bug. Now we make bread!

Our general aim in this process is to stimulate the gluten fibres in a floury dough, so that when our little yeastie friends eat their way through the substrate the gases they excrete are trapped inside, causing the bread to rise. During baking, the fibrous, air-filled structure is solidified and the yeastie friends are killed.

Before you begin, make sure that your bug is smelling and looking active. Feed it up at least eight hours prior, and if the weather is cold leave it in the hot water cupboard to get going.

Mixing:
- Tip most, but not all, of your bug in to a large bowl (a Mason Cash ceramic bowl is an expensive but worthy investment).
Keep the remaining bug and feed it up for your next batch - if you're careful you can keep the same bug for years.
- Mix in oil, salt, and a sweetener, which can be brown sugar, honey, molasses, or treacle. Quantities? To be honest, I never measure. For my 2-3 loaves, I'd say roughly 1/4 cup oil, 2 tablespoons sugar and 3 teaspoons salt. Bread is not precise.
- Mix in some high grade white flour until a thick paste is made and give a good vigorous beating for a few minutes - this will encourage the gluten to develop and save time in kneading later on.
- Add any seeds or grains you like (I am fond of pumpkin, sunflower and sesame seeds, soaked quinoa, and caraway seeds for flavour), and mix in more flour (I use about half and half high grade white and wholemeal) until the dough is too stiff to mix. Then....

Kneading:
- Turn the whole lot out on to a floured bench, making sure to scrape the bowl out well. Flour up your hands, roll up your sleeves and put on an apron - this will get messy.
- The basic kneading action is punch, fold, press, turn, repeat. Supporting the dough from the lower side with one hand, punch it out in the centre with your fist or the heel of your hand. The supporting hand folds the dough over in half. Press the dough down, then turn it 90 degrees and start the process over again.


(Thanks to Helen for the pictures!)

- Knead the dough heaps. Knead until you think it must have been kneaded enough by now, surely, and then knead some more. Knead until thy arms wither. Keep adding more flour to the bench and your hands, and keep folding in the scrappy bits that fall around the outside. The dough is well kneaded when it is stretchy and is not sticking to the bench.

Rising:
- Form the dough in to a ball, cover with flour, put in the bowl and cover it with a sheet of baking paper and a damp teatowel.
- Leave it in a warm place, e.g. a hot water cupboard, overnight or for at least 8 hours. Sourdough takes much longer to rise than commercially yeasted bread. For this reason I tend to make my dough the night before a day when I don't have work.
- When it's ready, grease a couple of loaf tins in preparation. Punch the dough down and shape in to loaves.
- Leave them rising in the tins for a further 2 - 4 hours (too long and they will collapse). I do this with the oven on very low heat - be warned that temperatures of above 60 degrees will kill the yeast.


Baking:
- Turn the oven up to 180 degrees.
- If you like, slash the tops of the loaves to let out steam while baking and make pretty patterns. You can also glaze the tops by beating a whole egg and brushing it on top.
- Bake for about an hour. Test to see if a loaf is done by tipping it out of its tin and tapping the bottom. If it makes a hollow sound, it is done. The loaves should also be a gorgeous golden brown.
- Leave the loaves to cool on a rack after tipping out. Then eat them. Eat them all up.
Notes:
You can use just about any grain including millet, oats, buckwheat, etc. I would recommend soaking things like barley and quinoa before adding them.
All white flour will make a fluffier loaf and a stretchier dough, but with less nutrition. All wholemeal loaves tend to be very crumbly and also hard to knead. Many bakers get around this by using a small amount of gluten flour.
Keep your senses switched on. How does the bug, loaf or dough look, smell, feel and sound?
Every batch of bread is different and there is no such thing as a precise recipe, so experiment and customise according to your tastes.