Hurray! My very first real, traditional sourdough (read: no yeast-from-a-jar) has been baked and is successful!
So here is what I did:
1) Refreshed my starter: The half-cup of starter from last time gets taken out of the fridge and mixed with 1 and 1/2 cups whole wheat flour and 1 and 1/2 cups water.
2) Let the mixture sit for "a while," 6 to 8 hours. Crucially for fitting this into my lifestyle: Timing is not actually all that important.
3) Set aside 1/2 cup of starter for next time, in a clean jar in the fridge. I have to feed it in a week. This leaves me close to 2 cups of fresh starter to use in recipes. Crucially for fitting this into my lifestyle: The exact amount is not actually all that important.
4) One cup of fresh starter went into an ordinary sandwich-bread recipe, right away, in my bread machine. That is just a side note.
5) I then modified a multigrain-loaf recipe to accept the sourdough starter. I calculated the proper amount of flour and water as instructed by the pamphlet that came in the mail with my starter: for each cup of starter, reduce the flour and the water by 3/4 cup each. And I didn't add any baker's yeast.
6) So right after sending half a cup to my fridge and one cup to my bread machine, I mixed the remaining cup of fresh starter with
- 1 and 1/4 cup whole wheat flour
- 7 Tbsp water
and then I let that sit around for a few hours again.
7) About two hours before bed, I put the flour-water-sourdough mixture in my bread machine with
- 1/2 cup rolled oats
- 1/4 cup oat bran
- 2 Tbsp wheat gluten
- 2 scant tsp salt
- 3 Tbsp molasses
- 1 Tbsp coconut oil
- 1/4 cup chopped pecans
- 2 Tbsp flax meal
and let the machine run on the DOUGH cycle. When the dough was done, I turned it out onto a floured board, kneaded it a few times, shaped it into a boule, and put it on an oiled baking sheet, covered with plastic wrap. Then I went to bed.
8) In the morning I stuck it in the oven at 350 degrees and baked it for, I don't know, 45 minutes or so.
Result:
Seriously good. It rose perfectly, with the long cool rise (it's probably 68 degrees in my house at night), domed beautifully, and has a fantastic tart-molasses flavor.
I can't wait to try this with a white bread.
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