Baking sourdough bread has been a centuries-old tradition, and it's making a comeback among some of Weyburn's hobbyist bakers.
Robin Davison said learning how to bake sourdough has been the result of a lot of trial and error. Having only learned to bake since moving to Weyburn four years ago, and with no previous bread-baking skills, she said the learning curve behind baking sourdough has been quite fulfilling for her since getting started just over a year ago when her mom gave her a sourdough starter.
"It's an enriching experience, because you're creating something that is feeding people, and you're saving money at the store," she commented. "You've got that creative outlet, and for me, baking is so therapeutic. I love to get my hands in the dough. I love to crank my music and just get in the zone, and when it starts baking, I love that smell. When I share it with people and they enjoy it, that makes me so happy. So the whole process, it's like therapy for me."
She said she usually makes about three loaves each week.
"I've started experimenting with what you call inclusion loaves, which can include anything from bacon to pickles, to raspberries to chocolate. Anything you can think of can go in sourdough and make it better. So I've been making a lot of dill pickle loaves and I substitute a little bit of pickle juice for the water, and they've been getting rave reviews. I really enjoy a dill pickle grilled cheese. I think it's probably my favourite type of sourdough that I've made so far."
As every oven is different, every recipe is different, and every baker has their own style throughout the process.
"Once you start learning about sourdough, you learn that there are a thousand different methods," she noted. "The bread is equally delicious, but once you start Googling, you realize there are so many different tried and true methods, but it's all up to the individual because there's so many different ways."
"My mom has her own method, and I couldn't even tell you where I concluded my method. I think it was a combination of Googling and just getting tips and tricks from them, and I have my method all typed out and saved in my phone and I've shared it with people before and they will sometimes not have success with my method, which works for me in my oven, but those directions might not necessarily produce a nice loaf of bread at somebody else's house. It's good to research for a starting point, but it's a lot of trial and error."
Lifelong baker and graduate of Moose Jaw Polytechnic's Professional Cooking course, Melissa Wright has been trying out all the different ways of baking sourdough, including having created her own starter after years of trial and error.
"It was about a year and a half ago and been baking with that one ever since," she shared. ''There are definitely no preservatives in it, and for myself, I am definitely cautious about what I'm eating and putting my body as well, so that's why I chose to do sourdough. Not because of the health benefits. That's just an extra greatness about it. But it was just to see if I could make it, and then it tasted really good, so I was like 'ohh'."
Wright's experimenting has resulted in so many extra loaves of bread, she said she's given away about a hundred loaves in the past year, "mostly because I was experimenting. Not that they were failing, and they were all really perfect, but at the beginning, it was really a big experiment to try to get the perfect loaf. 'What happens if I cut it this way?', 'What happens if I do it at this temperature?', 'bake it in the Dutch oven?', 'Try the open oven bake?'."
"So all of a sudden I'm getting a whole bunch of loaves accumulating and I'm like, 'okay, well, here you go, guys, eat my bread'."
Sourdough was not a topic covered in cooking school, and while Wright did begin baking bread at the age of 12, she echoed Davison on the point that experimentation is certainly a big part of the process for every baker.
While Davison uses loaf pans, Wright places her boule-shaped loaves onto a stone; Davison faithfully feeds her starter every week, while Wright will let her starter go dormant in her fridge sometimes for months, feeding it every other day to revive it.
However, both bakers will share bread and sourdough starters with friends. They also both recommend researching sourdough, joining sourdough baking Facebook groups, and taking the time to learn through experimentation with a variety of baking methods.
You can find both bakers' methods and recipes below.
Melissa's sourdough recipe & method:
100 gram starter
300 grams water
500 grams flour
10 grams salt.
Mix starter and water. Add flour and salt, mix it until it just comes together. Let sit for 30 minutes. Then mix for eight minutes. Let bulk ferment on the counter for four hours. Shape into a round loaf, place in a bowl, and put in the fridge for 24 to 36 hours. The next day, preheat the oven to 450 degrees for a solid hour before baking. Dump the loaf out onto parchment paper. Score the loaf, put it into the oven, and bake for 30 minutes. Turn the oven to 405 degrees and then continue baking for another 10 minutes.
I have a good healthy starter, and now that she's established, I feed her only when I'm going to bake. She'll sit in the fridge in a jar for MONTHS before I feed her again. Everyone's different on this. If your starter is out on the counter it needs to be fed daily.
Tips: Use unbleached flour; Use unchlorinated water, Measure by weight, not cups. Have fun!
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Robin's sourdough recipe & method:
Step 1: feed your starter 1:1 flour and warm water (Lukewarm, NOT hot). Stir thoroughly with a fork. Let the starter sit out at room temperature to activate. Activation causes bubbles to form. Cover your starter with a damp cloth. If I want bread Sunday morning, I feed my starter around 9 a.m. on a Saturday. Starters are active four to eight hours after feeding. I usually do five hours and if you are unsure, you can perform a float test. A dollop of starter should float to the top of a glass of water when it is ready to use.
Step 2: make your dough around 2 p.m. on Saturday. The recipe I follow makes two medium sized loaves. Recipe is 4 cups of flour, 445 ml of warm water, 1 tsp salt, 1/3 cup active starter.
I mix the wet ingredients first until I have a cloudy liquid in a large mixing bowl. Then I add the flour and salt. Mix with a fork until all the loose flour is absorbed into a shaggy looking dough. Once it is mixed well, cover with a wet towel and let rest for 30 minutes. This resting period allows the dough to autolyze (the flour is moistening and the gluten is activating).
After it rests, use wet hands to form the dough into a ball. Gripping one edge with both hands, pull and stretch the dough upwards, and then fold it onto itself. Rotate the bowl and now pull and stretch the other edge. Keep stretching and folding for 30 seconds. Once it’s been thoroughly stretched out, form into a ball again, cover with the wet towel and let rest for another 15min. (This process is called stretch and fold; YouTube has helpful videos of what it might look like if my wording is confusing lol). Repeat the stretching/resting process until dough is smooth with no visible clumps. (The more times you stretch it, the more the gluten activates. The more the gluten activates, the more your dough will stretch and accommodate the rising process. I stretch it twice. You can stretch and rest up to 5 times).
Once the dough is forming a nice smooth ball, cover with the wet towel and let it rise in the cold oven, with the light on, for 3.5 to 7 hours (I usually do five, your dough is ready for step 3 when it’s jiggly and has bubbles forming) Do not turn the oven on! Just close the door so the dough is protected from any cold drafts and the towel stays damp. This stage is called 'Bulk Fermentation'.
Step 3: once your dough is doubled in size and bubbly from the fermentation stage, you will transfer the dough to the vessel in which you are baking. For me, this is standard loaf pans. Divide the dough into the pans and transfer them into the fridge. Cover them with plastic wrap or a plastic shower cap works great. This stage will begin around 8 p.m. on Saturday. You can “cold-proof” your dough for anywhere between five and 48 hours. I leave it overnight (roughly 12 hours). The longer the dough chills, the fluffier your bread will be. Do not exceed 48 hours though, or your bread may overextend and fall flat.
Step 4: around 8 a.m. on Sunday you will take the pans of dough out of the fridge to reach room temp. preheat the oven to 450 degrees (about 30 minutes).
Fill a tray with water and place on the bottom rack of the oven. Once your oven is preheated, you’re going to bake your bread @ 450 degrees. After 20 to 25 minutes, turn the oven down to 375 and bake for another 25 minutes. I like to use glass loaf pans so I can check the bottom. You want the bottom of the loaf to be slightly browned. Adjust baking time for larger loaves. Make sure to add water to the bottom pan if necessary. This keeps the bread nice and soft.
Once your bread is baked, let it rest and cool. As tempting as it may be to cut and eat the warm bread, the resting part is crucial to the bread’s consistency. Once the bread has cooled down (about an hour) slice and enjoy!! I store my cooled loaves in ziplock freezer bags. Don’t bag them if they are still warm or condensation will form and this may promote mold growth and your bread won’t last as long.
Analyzing your crumb:
You will notice that many different breads look similar and yet they are considered under or over proofed. My best advice to you is to bake it anyways. Chances are it will still be delicious! Many factors affect the sourdough results including the temp of your house, the type of flour you use, and even your elevation. The process involves a lot of trial and error. Experiment and have fun!
