Sourdough Focaccia with Garlic and Onions

 

Today, I bring you Sourdough Focaccia! Have you ever tried to made focaccia? My only other attempt was a long while ago and it wasn't great.  I'm sure it was baker's error.  I've been seeing some very tempting sourdough focaccia photos on Instagram lately, and since I still have a lively sourdough starter from the start of the pandemic, I decided to give focaccia another try. Oh my, this was delicious!  Even my husband commented on how good it tasted. 

I served the focaccia as an accompaniment to soup that night but it would be a delicious accompaniment to any pasta dish or hearty salad.  You can also slice it in half horizontally and use it to make sandwiches.   

The recipe I used for this focaccia is adapted from @Breadtopia on Instagram and you can find the recipe on the Breadtopia blog. Included on their website is a yeast version if you don't have a sourdough starter. 

In ancient Rome, panis focacius was a flatbread baked in the ashes of the hearth.  The Latin word for hearth was 'focus' = 'focaccia'.  Focaccia spread across many countries....focaccia in Italian cuisine, hogaza in Spain, pogácsa in Hungary, and fougasse in Provence, among others.  

If you have an active starter, you will be as impressed as I was with the formation of bubbles in this recipe.  Sourdough baking can be a long process, as there is no yeast involved, but with this recipe, I had the focaccia in the oven within six hours after mixing the dough in the morning. 

It helped to use my oven as a proofing box, preheated only with the oven light turned on.  My oven light warms the oven to about 80-85 degrees Fahrenheit. If you have an oven thermometer, you can test how warm your oven gets with just the light on.  You don't want it to get warmer than 95F or you could kill the starter or yeast, if using.  If the oven light method doesn't work I've also read about using a pan of warm water on the bottom oven shelf. Or, you may want to try the 'overnight' version included in the recipe.  

I wanted to make a simple but flavorful topping for my first attempt at sourdough focaccia so I sprinkled freshly chopped green onions and chopped fresh garlic over the top before baking.  There are many other ways to top focaccia with some of the most popular choices being rosemary, olives, basil, sage, tomatoes and cheese.  

There is quite a bit of olive oil used in making and baking focaccia so you'll want to use a good tasting extra virgin olive oil. Olive oil is also used to coat the bottom of the baking pan which gives the bottom a nicely browned crust as well.  

Sourdough Focaccia

Adapted from Breadtopia

Note: A digital kitchen scale comes in very handy.  I use mine all the time for baking to get more precise measurements.    

400 grams bread flour (about 3-1/2 cups)
75 grams whole wheat flour (slightly more than 1/2 cup)
345 grams water (1-1/2 cups)
143 grams sourdough starter (1/2 cup)
15 grams honey (2 tsp)
13 grams olive oil (1 Tbsp)
11 grams salt (2 tsp)

Additional coarse salt for sprinkling on top before baking,
Toppings of your choice (I used 4 chopped green onions and 2 large cloves of chopped garlic)

Make the Dough and First Proof:

Add all of the ingredients in the bowl of a stand mixer and mix on low speed for about 2 minutes with the paddle attachment, and medium speed for another 8 minutes with the dough hook, scraping down the sides of the bowl with a spatula a few times. If necessary, you may mix by hand the same for the same amount of time. 

Move the dough to a lightly oiled bowl and cover. Note the time as the beginning of the first rise. (bulk fermentation). This is when I first put my dough into the oven with only the oven light turned on. 

After the dough has rested for 30 minute rest, either stretch and fold, or coil fold the dough four times (every 20-40 minutes) over the next 2-3 hours. Wet your hands before handling the dough, and cover the dough afterward. Here is a YouTube video showing both folding methods.  I put the dough back in the oven after every fold, which lasted 2 hours. 

Next, allow the the covered dough to continue rise undisturbed (using oven light warmth, if possible) for 2 more hours until it has almost doubled and is bubbly. 

Final Proof:

I used a non-stick 9 x 13 inch baking pan but you can also use a 13 x 18 inch pan which will yield a thinner focaccia.  If your pan is not non-stick, line it with parchment paper  Pour about 2 tablespoons of olive oil into the bottom of the pan and cover the entire bottom and sides of the pan, or parchment, with the oil.   

Scrape the dough gently into the pan. With oiled fingers, push and press the dough out to the edges of the pan.  Dimple it with oily fingertips.

Cover the pan with plastic wrap or put it inside a large, plastic grocery bag, trying not to let the plastic touch the dough.  

Let rest 1-2 hours at room temperature (or overnight in the refrigerator, plus another 2-4 hours to warm up in the morning). The dough should look thicker and have some bubbles when the final proof is over.

Topping and Baking 

Place a flat baking sheet or pizza stone one rack up from the lowest oven rack. Preheat the oven to 450F for 20 minutes with a baking sheet and 30 minutes with a pizza stone.  

Drizzle 1-2 tablespoons of olive oil on the top of the dough and dimple it again. Add toppings and finally sprinkle it with coarse salt.

Place the focaccia pan in the oven on top of the hot baking sheet or pizza stone. Bake for 15 minutes, rotate the pan and bake an additional 10-15 minutes. The internal temperature of the focaccia should be at least 200F. 

Remove the focaccia from the pan and parchment, and let cool on a rack for about 20 minutes before serving. Leftovers can be wrapped in parchment. 

Sourdough Banana Bread and Country Rustic Sourdough Sandwich Bread

I can't believe it's the end of October and I'm still on the sourdough bandwagon! Even if many have grown tired of the sourdough trend, I'm having a great time with several special sourdough recipes and I've been baking a lot of bread lately! I gave a loaf to my daughter recently, and our oldest grandson loved it so I hope to keep them supplied with bread for as long as they continue to enjoy it.  

You may be wondering what I've been doing with my time for the past 3 months!  Other than baking and gardening, social distancing but still spending some time with our small family, we've had a few large renovation projects that have taken much of my time.  We bought a small home as an investment and I'm the one who picks out the paint, carpet, cabinets, countertops, etc.   It's been mostly a fun project! 

Back to the sourdough baking, I know I'm speaking to a small audience so I thought I'd share two recipes at once.  :)

The sourdough starter that I received from Kitty early last spring is still going strong and I enjoy tending to it. It's nice having little hobbies when our social lives have been so disrupted. 

I bake these banana bread loaves in my 4-cavity Wilton mini loaf pan so that I can freeze them individually for freshness.  I tried putting a streusel topping on one of the loaves of bread but frankly, I enjoy it better without the topping.  

You can see the slight open-hole texture of this banana bread due to the sourdough starter.  It's so moist and delicious and not at all 'sour'! 

This is the sourdough loaf I've been making almost every week since I first discovered this recipe.  I was looking for a sandwich loaf that rivaled the Country French artisan loaf from a local bakery that I used to buy for $4.99.  It's so good with a high dome, crispy crust and moist interior.  This recipe rivals that loaf!  

Based on King Arthur's Rustic Sourdough bread, it took several attempts to get the high dome I wanted by playing with the amount of dough I used. My high-domed loaf is baked in an oven-safe glass loaf dish that measures 9 x 5.  

I also learned that I can use my bread machine for the mixing and kneading and it makes making this bread so easy! Since it uses a very small amount of regular yeast it rises much more quickly than more traditional sourdough loaves which also shortens the process.  

Using about 2/3rds of the dough to get the high dome, I have enough left over to make a small baguette which is the perfect size for the two of us. I forgot to slash this one! 

It also makes the most amazing French toast, grilled cheese sandwiches and BLTs! 

I still have some of Kitty's dried starter if anyone is interested in rehydrating it and trying sourdough baking!  

The new Blogger platform is giving me some grief and I'm having some issues with editing as you may be able to tell with the different sized fonts in this post :( And now I can't figure out how to post a recipe on the new Google sites where I merged all my recipes when I was advised the Classic sites wouldn't be available much longer. That's another reason I haven't posted for a while.  I hope things get easier, as I continue to figure it out. 

Please copy and paste from this post if you want to save either recipe. I hope I've reached at least a few sourdough bakers out there :)  Happy baking!

Sourdough Banana Bread Recipe

Servings: Makes 4 mini loaves or 2 8x4 loaves

1/3 cup butter, room temperature
1 cup granulated sugar
1 large egg, slightly beaten
1 1/2 cups (3 to 4) very ripe bananas, mashed (preferably overripe)
1 cup Sourdough Starter (227 grams)
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 teaspoon grated orange zest (either fresh or dried orange zest I buy from my local spice store)
2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon ground ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon salt
3/4 cup pecans or your favorite nuts, coarsely chopped

Spray loaf pan(s) with nonstick baking spray
Preheat oven to 350 degrees F with oven rack in the center position.

Cream together the butter and sugar until light and fluffy with a mixer. Add egg and mix until blended. Stir in the mashed bananas and the sourdough starter. Stir in the vanilla extract and orange zest and set aside.

In another bowl, combine the flour, baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon, and salt. Add the flour mixture and the chopped nuts to the prepared sourdough mixture, stirring just until blended.

Pour batter into prepared loaf pans and allow to rest for just 15 to 20 minutes.

Bake approximately 30 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. Start checking at 25 minutes.

Remove from oven and cool on a wire rack 10 minutes; remove from pan. Cool completely before slicing.

I like to wrap the individual loaves in plastic wrap and freeze so we can enjoy a fresh loaf any time. They also make great gifts!

Adapted from: https://whatscookingamerica.net/Bread/SourdoughBananaBread.htm


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Rustic Sourdough Sandwich Bread

Makes 1 - 9 x 5 loaf (1 lb 12, ounces of dough, weighed with digital scale)
plus 1 small baguette or several French style rolls using the remainder of the dough.

Note:  Original recipe was intended for 2 smaller free-form loaves.

1 cup (227g) ripe (fed) sourdough starter
1 1/2 cups (340g) lukewarm water
1 to 2 teaspoons instant yeast*
2 1/2 teaspoons salt
5 cups (602g) Unbleached All-Purpose Flour (I used King Arthur)

(Please visit the King Arthur site at the end of the recipe if you want to manual knead the bread.)
Combine all of the ingredients in your bread machine adding them in the order suggested by your machine. Set machine to the 'Dough' cycle which takes about 90 minutes. After the first few minutes, check to see if you need to add another teaspoon or so of water if the weather is dry. Your machine should not work too hard to mix the dough.

After the dough cycle is completed turn the dough out onto a lightly floured countertop. Deflate the dough and cut the dough into 2 pieces, approximately 2/3rd and 1/3rd. Weight the larger portion on your digital scale. It should weigh 1 pound 12 ounces or slightly more. Add more dough to the scale from the other piece, if needed.

Shape the larger piece into a loaf. Here is a very good tutorial on how to form a sandwich loaf with bread dough: https://www.kingarthurbaking.com/videos/baking-skills/how-to-shape-a-sandwich-loaf.
Spray a 9 x 5 inch glass loaf pan with cooking spray and place the shaped loaf into the pan. Using a large, somewhat clear grocery bag, cover the loaf loosely and allow to rise for about 1 hour or so, until the dome has risen above the pan by about 1 inch.

With the smaller portion of dough, but using the same shaping technique make a long thinner loaf for a baguette, or shape the remainder into rolls. I place the baguette dough on a piece of parchment which I fold several times lengthwise to form a baguette sized form to hold the dough and place the parchment on top of a flat baking sheet. Envision two lengthwise triangles with a center narrow cavity of about 3 inches. Place a long length of plastic wrap over but not touching the dough (two glasses place on either side keep the parchment in place and keeps the dough from spreading).

At the end of the hour, start preheating the oven to 425 F degrees. Allow the oven to preheat for at least 15 minutes.

I like to bake the baguette first as the rising time is quicker. Slide the parchment holding the baguette right onto the center oven rack. Lightly spray the sides of the oven with water and bake for about 15 minutes. Turn the baguette over and bake for another 5 minutes or until golden brown. Remove and place on a cooling rack.

Right after removing the loaf, place the loaf pan with the larger loaf into the oven. Again spray the sides of the oven with water and bake the loaf for about 25 minutes or until nicely brown on the top. Carefully remove the glass loaf from the oven and tip out the loaf. Place the loaf back into the oven, directly on the rack and bake for another 5 minutes until the bottom and sides are golden. Remove from the oven and place on a cooling rack.

https://www.kingarthurbaking.com/recipes/rustic-sourdough-bread-recipe

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A Sourdough Story Of Sweet Friendship During Covid

I'm back!  Sorry for my prolonged absence but I've been suffering from lack of motivation lately.  Is anyone else having the same problem?  I'm also trying to spend as much time outdoors as I can as it  keeps me from thinking about the problems facing us now.  My priorities are being with our small, immediate family, working in my garden, golfing with my husband and baking when it's raining.

Speaking of baking, I wanted to tell you about a wonderful and very kind baking story that happening during the time we were in lock-down this past spring.  I've met so many wonderful bloggers over the years and one of them is Kitty from Kitty's Kozy Kitchen. We share a loving of baking and being with our grandchildren. Kitty loves tea cups and having tea parties with her granddaughters! About 20 years ago, Kitty was given a live sourdough starter from someone she knew who had brought it back from Arkansas in a cooler.  It was called a Civil War Starter. Kitty has kept it alive all these years and continues to use it to this day. 

At some point, Kitty mentioned her starter in one of her blog posts.  I asked her if she would consider sharing her starter with me.  She said she would be happy to share it but she didn't think a live starter would survive being sent from Texas to Wisconsin. I remembered reading about a way to save sourdough starters for future use by drying it out and found a great tutorial on how to do it at King Arthur Baking Company's website.  I asked Kitty if she would be interested in trying it.  Of course, she did and, within a very short time, I received Kitty's dried starter!  When I opened the zipper bag of dried starter, it smelled so fresh and good!

The same King Arthur tutorial on how to dry the starter also gave instructions on how to revive the dried starter and soon I was on my way into the world of COVID sourdough bread baking (along with countless other bakers in the world who weren't able to find dried yeast on the grocery shelves for so long).

Kitty's starter and recipe from Arkansas were different from the usual starters you might find online in that none of the starter is ever discarded.  After feeding, it is divided in half.  One half to use for baking bread and the other half returns to the refrigerator for next time.  It's also different in that sugar is added to maintain the starter and in the bread recipe.

Here is Kitty's sourdough starter after a feeding.  As you can see, it makes a lot of starter! At it's peak, it contains five to six full cups of starter. I have to tell that you Kitty was so patient with me because I had so many questions about the starter and recipe. ♥  She is such a kind person!

These were the first loaves I made with Kitty's starter!  The starter makes three full-size loaves of bread. If you look closely, you can see that I added walnuts and cranberries to the loaf in the center.  All were delicious and smelled and tasted wonderful!

I was able to bake 2 or 3 times more times with this beautiful starter and, then, I decided to try to decrease the amount of starter.  I started by trying to decrease the recipe by one-third. I didn't want to make so many loaves at one time as it's just my husband and I at home and I was going through a lot of flour.

That was when things started to go wrong.  The starter seemed okay at first.  The first rise would be fine but after the loaves were formed they did not rise very well.  I tried twice to revive the starter but it still didn't do well and I had two baking failures.  When I performed the starter 'float' test, it wasn't floating.  Perhaps this starter likes it better in the south :)

Back to square one!  I did have more of Kitty's dried starter so I started over from scratch.  This time, I decided feed the starter in the conventional way and in the proportions of the King Arthur starter instructions.  I decided to keep some with a much smaller amount of added sugar, and created another starter without any sugar at all as an experiment.

The first bread I made with my newly revived starter from Kitty was this whole wheat loaf from, who else, King Arthur.  I had asked a friend's daughter who bakes a lot of sourdough bread for her family what recipe she was using and she pointed me to this one. It is delicious too! And now, my new "Kitty" starter makes one loaf, which is perfect for us.  

"Kitty" on the left has no sugar.  "Kitty" on the right has just 1 tablespoon of added sugar when it's fed. The one with the sugar in it seems to perform slightly better than the one without the sugar.  Perhaps that's because it was used to having sugar in it for 20 years!

Now that I have a more conventional starter made from Kitty's original starter,  I now also have the flexibility to use the discard when I feed it.  There are some great recipes that use discarded sourdough starter!

The first thing I tried were popovers.  Oh my, these are so good!  A little butter and preserves on a Sunday morning make having discard so appreciated. I've made Sourdough Parmesan Popovers...

 and plain Sourdough Popovers. 

The plain popovers are so delicious with a little butter and preserves and make a special weekend breakfast treat. 

The other recipe I've made with the discard is this Sourdough Coffee Cake. Both my husband and I loved it!

Rather than bake it in a square pan as the recipe indicates, I decided to make 4 mini loaves so that I keep one out and put the rest in the freezer.  The crumble topping is delicious.  The coffee cake would be wonderful with homemade blueberry sauce.  Another great weekend treat!  There are many more sourdough discard recipes that I look forward to trying.  

So, my adventure in sourdough baking continues, thanks, in whole, to the kindness of Kitty going out of her way to dry her starter and send it to me.  My starters are doing very well in their new format and I feel confident I can keep Kitty's Civil War Starter alive and well for a very long time to come!  

The timing with the Pandemic stay-at-home order could not have been better as we couldn't see our family and friends and, even now, we are still are not able to resume our former social activities.  It really does help the mind and soul to be able to have fun in the kitchen creating with Kitty's sourdough starter.   

The recipe for the Whole Wheat Bread and links to the sourdough discard popovers and coffee cake below.  

If you have any questions, or would enjoy receiving a packet of Kitty's starter, please let me know, as I still have 5 vacuum-sealed packets to share.  I prefer to ship within the United States due to shipping costs.  I would also be happy to try drying some of my current starter for anyone who would like to try sourdough baking.  Happy Baking!

Click on links to find recipes for Sourdough Popovers and  Sourdough Coffee Cake 

Honey Whole Wheat Sourdough Bread

Printable Recipe with my Tips and Edits

Makes 1 loaf

1 cup (227g) fed and risen sourdough starter

1 cup + 2 tablespoons (255g) lukewarm water

2 cups (226g) Whole Wheat Flour

1 cup (113g) AP Flour

2 tablespoons (14g) honey

1-1/2 teaspoons salt

1 teaspoon instant yeast

2 tablespoons (25g) neutral vegetable oil (I like using Avocado oil)

In a large bowl, combine all of the ingredients, and mix until a loose dough forms.

Cover the dough and let it rest for 30 minutes. Turn out of a lightly floured surface and knead until fairly smooth.  It should be slightly sticky. Depending on how wet your starter is, or the humidity in your kitchen, you may need to add 1/3-1/2 cup more flour.  Only add enough flour to be able to form a cohesive, somewhat sticky ball of dough.   

Place the dough in a lightly greased bowl, cover it with a tea towel, and let it rise until almost doubled, about 60 minutes or so. I like to turn my oven on to preheat for one minute, and then turn the oven off. This will make a warm but not too hot environment perfect for the dough to rise. Place the bowl inside the oven. It usually only takes 60 minutes for my dough to double in size with this method.

Turn dough out onto a lightly floured surface and fold the dough onto itself pulling from the outside and folding toward the center.  Do this several times. Turn it over and shape it into an 8" log, and place it in a lightly greased 9" x 5" loaf pan.  I use an oven safe glass loaf pan. 

Cover the loaf with a tea towel and let it rise until it has risen about 1" over the rim of the pan, (using the 1 minute preheated oven tip above, for about 60 minutes). Towards the end of the rising time, carefully take the loaf out of the oven without jarring it,  and preheat the oven to 350°F

Bake the bread for 40 to 45 minutes, or until the loaf is golden brown and a digital thermometer inserted into the center registers 205°F to 210°F.

Remove the bread from the oven.  Let it rest in the for about 5 minutes, then turn it out onto a rack to cool. I have taken the bread out of the baking pan and placed it back in the oven for about 5 minutes to get more browning on the sides and bottom. 

Adapted from King Arthur Baking Company

Pasta à la Monique and Sourdough Bread!

Even though the first week or so of spring has been challenging weather-wise, I have had a delicious, savory time in the kitchen!

Recently, Monique at La Table de Nana, shared this delightful pasta dish with rapini, bacon and pine nuts that included dry sherry.  I had just used sherry in a stir fry recipe not that long ago, and when she mentioned using sherry in her pasta dish I knew it would taste terrific.  And it did :)

I didn't have any penne pasta which Monique uses, but the campanelle pasta that I did have in the pantry worked fine and I love the spirally trumpet shape.

My pea shoots are still going strong so decided to add some as a garnish. It would be nice to stir them into the dish right at the end so they wilt slightly too. Such a good dish!  My husband loved it too.

I added a little more sherry and pasta water to make it even more saucy and tossed in lots of grated parmesan, as Monique suggests.  You can see Monique's instructions here.  I served it with some freshly made sourdough bread.

See that rabbit shape on the far right? That's the shape I was happy to finally create  :)

I've been keeping my sourdough starter alive for over a year but I've never been able to achieve the type of bread I'd been longing for until after I ordered a couple of books to read.  The bread above was made with Ken Forkish's levain ingredients and ratios from his book Flour Water Salt Yeast.  The whole wheat flour added to my starter feeding really made a difference.

Sort of fitting for Easter, don't you think?  My rabbit even has eyes and what looks like a hind leg :)

I used the techniques I found in Emilie Raffa's book Artisan Sourdough Made Simple.   She really does simplify the long process.  So far, I've tried two of her recipes and both worked very well with the greatest success coming from the 'high hydration' recipe.  It was so good I couldn't stop eating it myself :) The crust was amazing. Still not as 'holey' as some breads I see on Instagram but I'm happy with my first new results so far and I'll keep working on it!  I know a lot of people aren't into nurturing sourdough starters, and making bread, but if you are, just send me a private email and I can tell you what I did.

The past couple of weeks we've celebrated two birthdays in our family (including yours truly) and have two more coming up in the next two weeks with my husband's birthday falling on Easter Sunday this year.  Fun times ♥ 

Wishing you and your family a safe and joyous Easter or Passover weekend!

Monique's pasta would make a delicious side dish for your holiday menu :)

Pasta à la Monique for Two - 

1 diced shallot
3 or 4 cloves of minced garlic
1 small bunch of rapini, cleaned and cut into 1-2" pieces, discarding the tough ends
Toasted pine nuts
Cooked bacon, as much as you like - perhaps 2-3 pieces per person, diced
Cooked pasta, perhaps 1/2 pound of dry pasta - save a half cup of pasta cooking water before draining
1/8 cup dry sherry...or more :)
Lots of grated Parmesan - perhaps 4 oz or to your liking
Red Pepper Flakes, a pinch
Salt and Pepper to taste
Fresh basil, parsley or pea shoots for garnish :)

Heat a tablespoon or two of olive oil in a large saute pan over medium to medium high heat. Saute the shallot and garlic about a 30 seconds or so being careful not to burn.  Add rapini and cover pan to let it steam-cook for about 3 minutes until just barely tender.  Remove cover and toss in the rest of the pasta, pine nuts and bacon. Add the sherry and a splash of pasta cooking water and toss.  Add the parmesan and seasonings and toss.  Add more sherry or cooking water if you like.  Pass the Parmesan and red pepper flakes at the table.  Simple and tasty!!

Savoring Time in the Kitchen is a member of the Amazon Affiliate Program. If you purchase a product by following a link that we provide, the price you pay as a consumer does not change, but if you do make a purchase through one of these links, we earn a very small commission for providing that link.  Thank you for your support of Savoring Time in the Kitchen!

Fig, Walnut and Crystallized Ginger Sourdough Bread

I love fall and all of the beautiful changes that it brings...golden and red leaves, the smell of the leaves drying on the ground, watching the squirrels hiding nuts for winter, and the cooler days perfect for a long walk or working in yard.  I love the changes that fall brings in the kitchen too, warm soups, stews and chili, slowly braised meats, harvest vegetables, and....baking!  

I understand that I may be speaking to a very small minority who have sourdough starters or who may be interesting in starting one.  It was always something I had wanted to try and it has been very rewarding for me.  Don't think you must use a sourdough starter to make a dried fruit and nut bread either.  You could make this bread with any of the 'No Knead' bread recipes out there, such as Jim Lahey's, or use a Cheater's Sourdough recipe that uses Greek Yogurt instead of sourdough.  You can do a web search and find lots of ideas using the key words "No Knead Bread" or "Cheaters Sourdough". 

I am happy to report that the sourdough starter that I began last year (I shared my first sourdough loaf, on the blog here), is still alive and well in my refrigerator.  Sometimes I neglect to 'feed' it for almost two weeks and it always bubbles back to life without a problem.  

I had dried figs, walnuts and some crystallized ginger on hand and thought the three would make a delicious, fall combination for bread.  And, it was!

The thing to remember about baking bread with a sourdough starter is that you need to start the process the day before you want to bake the bread - that's the hardest part.  But the taste is unbeatable and the satisfaction of pulling a beautiful loaf of bread out of the oven is very satisfying.

The dough is allowed to rise overnight in the refrigerator in a container about the size you would like for your loaf or loaves, lined with a well-floured tea towel.  I used two rectangular loaf pans. This recipe made two, nice-sized loaves. Don't worry if they don't look too puffy after you take them out of the refrigerator, they rise beautifully in the oven.

After the loaves have had their overnight rise, I like to place them on the back side of a cookie sheet on top of a large piece of parchment paper.  This way,  I can slide the loaves, parchment and all, onto my baking stone.  No worries if you don't have a baking stone, you can always use the preheated dutch oven method used in many other recipes, such as this one.

Slathered in good, fresh butter or jam, or toasted the next day it's delicious!

Walnut, Fig and Crystallized Ginger Sourdough Bread

Printable Recipe

Supplies you will need:

You need to have an active sourdough starter. If you look on Etsy there are lots of sellers - I used World Sourdough. Amazon sells one by Breadtopia that is live and not dried here. King Arthur also sells an already "active" sourdough starter here.

A bread stone for your oven is also preferred but you can also use a cast iron Dutch oven with lid.

Spray bottle filled with water

Ingredients:

1-1/4 cups recently fed and active sourdough starter

1 cup water

3 cups all-purpose flour

1-1/2 teaspoons salt

1/4 teaspoon instant yeast (not necessary but helps obtain a good rise)

3/4 cup diced dried figs, dried cherries or cranberries

1 cup walnuts, roughly chopped

1/4 cup crystallized ginger, chopped into small pieces.

Directions:

In the bowl of a mixer with dough hook, combine the starter, water, and flour. Stir together until smooth. Cover the bowl and let the mixture sit for 1 hour. Then, mix in the salt and yeast and knead the dough with your mixer's dough hook on medium speed for about 6 minutes. Just before the kneading is done, mix in the dried fruit. If you don't have a dough hook you can knead by hand on a lightly floured surface. Add the walnuts and fold them gently into the dough. Cover the bowl and allow the dough rise at room temperature for 40 to 60 minutes.

Turn the dough out onto a lightly greased surface. If you wish to make two smaller loaves instead of one large one, divide the dough in half. With a scraper, scoop up one side of the dough bring it into the center, pressing down. Turn the dough a quarter turn, and repeat four more times. Repeat with other loaf, if necessary.

Flour a tea towel or banetton (a bread proofing basket). If using a tea towel, place it inside of a bowl or pan with a shape you find pleasing, bottom side up. Cover with plastic wrap, and refrigerate overnight.

The next morning, preheat the oven to 450°F for 30 minutes with a baking stone placed in the lower third of the oven (or a Dutch oven with Lid). When the oven is preheated, put 1" of water into a small skillet that can go into the oven and bring it to a simmer. Take your breads out of the refrigerator. Don't worry if they have not risen a lot, it's okay.

Place the simmering water skillet into the bottom of the oven. Place a piece of parchment on a baker's peel or the back (flat) side of a baking sheet. Turn the refrigerated loaves out onto the parchment. Slash the top of the loaves, and slide the bread, paper and all, onto the stone in the oven. Spray the inside of the oven generously with water from a spray bottle. In 5 minutes, spray once more and bake for another 35 minutes, or until the center of the loaf reads 200°F with a digital thermometer.

Remove from the oven and cool on a rack.

Note: If using a cast iron Dutch oven, when the oven has preheated for 30 minutes, remove the lid. Slide the slashed loaf into the Dutch oven and bake, with cover on for 20-25 minutes. Remove lid, and bake until bread reaches 200F, about another 15 minutes, watching carefully. Times vary depending on the size of the loaf, and how hot your oven gets.

This recipe is adapted from King Arthur Flour

Real Sourdough Bread made with Sourdough Starter

I have finally overcome my fear of sourdough starter and making sourdough bread!  This past summer, I ordered a sourdough starter from a seller on Etsy. The starter arrived in dried form, ready to have water and flour added to begin the activation process.  Then, a broken wrist aborted my sourdough plans.  A few weeks ago I found the envelope with the starter packet and decided to see if it was still good.  I've been feeding it according to the excellent directions that I received from the seller plus finding other tips online to keep it healthy and active.  And healthy it is!

Now I was finally ready to bake sourdough bread, but what recipe to use? I viewed countless recipes online and those included with my starter.  Then, I found one that used a spin on the the no-knead format and I knew that would be a great recipe for a beginner to use.

The starter was prepped and mixed with flour and salt, covered and left on the counter overnight.  The next morning, I was amazed to find a beautiful rise had occurred in my dough - without any yeast, just the magic of the live sourdough starter doing its thing.

After tucking the dough under and giving it two letter folds with oiled hands, I plopped it into my small enameled cast iron oval dutch oven and covered it for another two hour rise. 

Using the standard no-knead instructions that you may already know, the dutch oven was heated in a hot oven, the dough placed in the heated pot, parchment and all, and later, out came this gorgeous loaf of bread...

It did get a bit too brown on top but I followed the directions exactly instead of taking a peak into the oven a littler earlier.  Lesson learned. I was so excited to see how would it look inside that crusty exterior and most importantly, how would it taste?

After the first bite into the shattering, crisp crust and soft, sourdough-infused interior I was so amazed and delighted that I wanted to yell, "Look what I have created!", just like Tom Hanks in the movie "Cast Away" when he finally made a fire.

Yesterday, I made two more loaves.  Another regular sourdough loaf and a cranberry walnut sourdough, using a portion of starter that I had been feeding with rye flour. 

 

The latter didn't rise quite as well as the regular bread flour version but it was so delicious that I will be working on perfecting this recipe - perhaps with a whole wheat flour starter rather than rye. 

Even though it's too late to get a starter going and make this bread for Thanksgiving, if you love to bake bread as I do and want to try nurturing a sourdough starter, this is a great recipe and a fun project for the winter months.

In the meanwhile, I would like to wish all of your who celebrate Thanksgiving this week a very happy and safe holiday!  Coincidentally, this is what wandered through our yard early yesterday morning! This is only the second time we've seen turkeys in our yard and both times it was right before Thanksgiving. Are they trying to tell us something? 

No Knead Sourdough Bread

Printable Recipe

I bought a sourdough starter called Black Hills Gold Rush Sourdough Starter from WorldSourdoughs on Etsy.  This is not a paid promotion, I just recommend the product based on my experience. The shop offers several different varieties of sourdough starters.  

1 lb bread flour (use a digital scale to weigh the flour)

2-3 teaspoons salt

1/4 cup freshly fed sourdough starter

Luke warm or room temperature water

In the morning, remove your sourdough starter from the refrigerator (where I keep mine).  Remove 1/4 cup of starter and place in a small bowl or jar. Feed it with 1/4 cup of AP flour and 1/4 cup of room temperature water.  Stir and cover loosely with plastic wrap.  Keep on the kitchen counter until late afternoon.  Check to make sure it has bubbles and has increased in volume slightly (active). 

In the afternoon, weigh the flour and place in a large bowl with the salt.  Stir to combine.

Measure out 1/4 cup of starter into a 2 cup measure.  Add enough slightly warm or room temperature water to make 1-1/2 cups total liquid.  Stir together until blended. 

Pour the starter-water mixture over the flour and mix together with your hands or a large spoon, until no trace of dry flour remains.  You may need to add another tablespoon or so of water if your kitchen is dry.  Cover the bowl with plastic wrap and then a kitchen towel and allow to rest and rise overnight on the kitchen counter, about 12 to 18 hours. 

The next morning, prepare the dutch oven by placing a large piece of parchment paper over the non-handle sides and then pushing down along the bottom sides and folding back over the top sides, created creases where needed.  This will be your 'lifter' and also create a non-stick surface in your pot when baking.  I use a small, 3-1/2 quart Le Creuset oval Dutch oven but any small enameled cast iron Dutch oven will work.

By now, you should have a good rise, hopefully doubled in volume.  With lightly oiled hands, fold the edges of the dough into the center, all around.  Then, pick up the dough and pull it into a rough rectangle and fold one end over the other (an envelope fold) and then repeat with the opposite sides.  Tuck any rough edges under and place the dough into the prepared parchment-lined dutch oven.  Cover again and allow to rest for two more hours.

30 minutes before the 2 hours is up, remove the dough from the dutch oven and place it into another container temporary. (I used a rectangular plastic storage container but you could also use a casserole dish or glass bowl) Place the dutch oven with the cover on in the oven and preheat to 450F.  

When the oven has preheated for 30 minutes, very carefully remove the Dutch oven and take off the top with oven mitts. Place dough in it's parchment carrier into the hot dutch oven. Your may slash the top of the dough with a sharp knife if you wish but it is not necessary. (I've done it with slashing and without). Put the lid back on (it's HOT), and place the dutch oven back into the oven and bake for 30 minutes, covered. 

After 30 minutes, remove the lid and continue to bake for another 20-30 minutes, or until dark brown on the top.  Watch carefully during the last 10 minutes making sure the crust doesn't burn. When bread is done, it should be about 190 degrees F if you have an instant read thermometer.  

Remove pot from oven and carefully remove bread by lifting it out with the parchment paper.  Allow to cool completely before slicing. 

Adapted from Duonyte's No Knead Sourdough Bread