Sourdough Baking

blurb by Oren Yaari @oren.yaari

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When was the last time you spent quality time with flour and water? Creating a product from scratch using less than 4 ingredients? How about watching something grow from start to finish?

For most people, it’s never.

What I love about flour and water is that they have existed for a very, very long time. Without them, humans would be screwed!

They remain vital for our survival - each containing powerful life force energy.

When mixed together with the help of surrounding bacteria cultures that naturally exist in the environment, you end up with fermented dough - and thus the sourdough!

So roll up your sleeves, sprinkle some flour on the counter, and put away your phone…it’s time to get to work!

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Sourdough Baking

Sourdough baking is the practice of making bread using a naturally fermented starter instead of commercial yeast. At its core, it’s a hobby built around baking (clearly!), slowing down, and learning how to work with a living process rather than chasing perfection.

The journey to baking sourdough often begins with a curiosity of sourdough bread and the unique properties it has when compared to the sliced white bread we’re used to. Aspects like fermentation, organic foods, gut bacteria, hand making bread — because of the extended process needed to cultivate sourdough, it is less processed and more natural than most bread you can buy at the store. In the last few years, it has become more and more common for people to make this bread at home after taking the time to cultivate a sourdough starter. Sourdough tends to reward that curiosity more than precision of baking the perfect loaf, especially early on.

And you get to have amazing homemade sourdough that can be used any way you want: pizza, cookies, pancakes, and more. 

What Keeps Sourdough Bakers Going

Beyond the delicious bread, sourdough baker will be the first to tell you there’s nothing like fresh bread.

And because of it’s unique process, sourdough has many less ingredients than factory bread. An element that many health conscious people are much in favor of being part of their lifestyle.

Then the actual baking is hand on and analog. Baking bread is a sensitive process in general, too much time in the oven and it may end up too solid to your liking. A slightly off mixture may not give a taste you like. There’s a craft to making sourdough bread to a quality of your liking and to do so, you often leave the recipe book behind and lean more on your intuition.

There’s also something grounding about working with a starter. Feeding it, watching it change, and baking with it over time builds a sense of continuity. The process becomes familiar, even when results vary.

Lastly, creating lots of bread often leads to sharing lots of bread. Sourdough baking can sometimes facilitate a sense of community as you invite others to try your bread and send them home with some.

So, what is sourdough starter?

It’s most likely the first phrase you hear about for sourdough baking.

Sourdough starter is a mixture of flour and water that, over time, naturally develops yeast and healthy bacteria. While a lot of baked goods use commercial yeast to leaven the bread (make it rise and fluff up) , this mixture captures the wild yeast in the air and activates it.  This mixture is referred to as a preferment because it is given time to ferment before being combined with ingredients to make dough that turns into bread.

Starter is the foundation to sourdough baking and getting it ready by “feeding” it and maintaining it is all part of the special process. You’ll a small piece of dough grow larger and start bubbling, release a unique aroma. It’s almost like maintain a house plan, but this one you’ll be eating soon enough.

If you want to bake your own sourdough bread but the starter process sounds like too much, you can look into purchasing sourdough starter at a local bakery. You can also get some starter from another person who has sourdough – ask your friends or post in your local Facebook groups to find someone who might have starter to spare! 

Tools, Ingredients, and Keeping It Simple

Sourdough doesn’t require much to begin. Flour, water, and time are the core ingredients. You’ll need an oven and a dutch oven to hold your sourdough.

Then it’s about learning the process and lots of experimentation.

As you gain experience, learning what is working or not working, you may choose to adjust hydration, flour types, or techniques. You’ll make big strides in the beginning, you baked too long so next one should be 30 minutes shorter or your mixture made a loaf that tasted far off your desires. When you get into refining the loaf, that’s where it gets magical. Though it can be frustrating as you commit your time and end up with a result that’s just more off than you’d like.

But remember, you still have bread either way. And it’s bread you can enjoy yourself or share with others.