Simply bread

In many variations bread is a staple of human diet almost anywhere in the world. Below recipe is a base on which I have started experimenting with bread baking. I highly recommend it to everyone.

Preparation of sour, this needs to be done only once.

Mix 50g of flour (I use wholemeal but i think it can be any kind except bleached) with 50g of tepid water (best filtered or boiled) in a clean jar. After 24hrs you should noticed it slightly increased in size, scoop out 60g and discard it, add 30g of flour and 30g of water, repeat that procedure for a week. After a week you should have 100g of sour, it smells slightly acidic and has consistency of a very thick custard. From now on it should be kept in the fridge, every now and again it needs to be "fed" by adding water and flour, I usually feed my sour when I take some sour for my bread baking which is usually 2 times a week.

Step 1

Approximately 12 hours(I do it when I wake up in the morning) before planned bread making session put 40g of sour in a bowl and mix it with 50g of flour and 50g of water and cover with a plate, if it's kept in cold place, ie. below 15C allow up to 24 hours. After 12 hours mixture will double in size and you should have bubbly lively starter.

Step 2

200g white flour (organic, unbleached)
220g wholemeal flour (organic)
280g of water (g not ml)
6g of salt
140g of starter

Mix starter with water and flour with salt.

Pour water/starter mixture into flour and mix it well

Keep mixing it until it forms loose dough, scoop it out of the bowl on work surface.

There is no need to flour surface, dough should be wet and sticky with consistency of thick porridge.

Step 3

Start kneading the dough, there is so much advice of the net how to do it but really there is no need to get too scientific about it. I just slap the dough on the surface pull one side of it and fold it on top, at first it may be difficult to "fold" the dough as it will break and stick to your hand.

Do not worry about dough being to wet and keep kneading for about 10-15 mins, after that time dough will start stiffen up and gets more pliable and easier to work with. It will also stick to hand alot less.

Best advice about kneading I got was "when you think your dough is ready knead it for another 10 minutes". Keep kneading your dough and after another 10 minutes it should be relatively easy to form a dough ball. It will still be sticky and a bit wet but do not worry about it, it's perfectly normal.

Put dough in a bowl, cover and leave for 3 hours.

Step 4

Your dough should raise and almost double in size, in general if you add more white flour it will raise more.

Now flour work surface, take out dough out of the bowl and spread it on work surface.Try to scoop your dough as one piece and try not to "stretch" it too much, however even if you break it, don't worry it's still perfectly workable. 

Fold your dough in 1/3 and then over.

Press it down and try to squeeze any air bubbles out of the dough, keep spreading the dough and folding it up, if it starts sticking to the surface, flour it and keep folding about 10-15 times until it forms nice tight parcel.

For final proofing I use cane basket but before I had cane basket I used bread baking tin or bowl lined up with linen cloth. Simply put your dough parcel in profing basket/tin/bowl put it in plastic bag and leave it for about 2 hours. Alternatively put it in the fridge, it can stay in the fridge for 8 to 12 hrs.

Step 5

After about 2 hrs (or 8 hrs in the fridge) dough again should almost double in size. Pre heat your oven to about 220C, when using baking stone make sure that oven was heating the stone for at least 30 minutes.

I bake my bread on the terracotta baking stone, but it can be baked in baking tin or pizza tray. Eventually I recommend baking stone, crust from such bread is unbeatable. Tip your dough over on pre-heated baking stone and scare it couple of times, be careful with hot stone and use oven gloves for handling it! Scaring is purely for aesthetic reasons, bread will raise in the oven and scaring will force it to growth in particular fashion rather than breaking uncontrollably during baking.

Put your dough in the oven and spray some water inside the oven, humidity is necessary for crust to develop nice brown colour. After 15 minutes reduce temperature to 180C and bake for further 30 minutes. After baking is finished let it cool on airy tray for at least 30 minutes. You now have healthy, fresh, crumbly and awesomely yummy bread, best dipped in olive oil and balsamic vinegar, enjoy!