sourdough

Unbelievably Great

In the small town where I spend some (not nearly enough) time, there is a used bookstore. It is almost always open, but the owner has never been there whenever I’ve stopped in. He does, however, leave a price list posted next to the money jar:

Ordinary Books: $1.00
Good Books: $2.00
Extraordinary books: $3.00
Great Books: $5.00
Spectacular Books: $10.00
Unbelievably Great Books: $20.00

I always like to browse the cooking section, and occasionally, amid titles like “1001 5-Minute Meals” and “The 1983 Annual Campbell’s Tomato Soup Cookbook,” which bear faded covers that belie the near-perfect-condition pages that show just how much they were (not) loved, I discover a gem.

I had never heard of the little unassuming volume entitled Favorite Breads From Rose Lane Farm, nor of its author Ada Lou Roberts, but that didn’t stop me from fishing into my pocket for a $5 bill. It was in good (not perfect!) condition, and it’s generally a good bet that any 40+ year old bread book will turn out to qualify for Great Book status.

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A Good Rye

I spent the first few decades of my life believing I did not care for rye bread. Clearly I had a bad experience somewhere in my childhood, and those early associations are nothing if not tenacious. It’s a bread that’s fairly easy to avoid in this country, if one is so inclined, and I was.

The breakthrough came when we made a version of this lovely simple rye bread in my first class at SFBI. At the end-of-the day tasting, not wanting to eschew it completely and risk exposing myself as a bread wimp, I opted for the smallest piece on the cutting board. Happily, I found myself won over by its rich, earthy flavor and chewy texture, and kicking myself for all those wasted years of rye abstinence.

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Lemon Barley Loaf

Does “lemon bread” conjure for you an image of sugary, cake-like, bright yellow slabs that make a fine dessert but a lousy ham sandwich? This lemon barley bread, adapted from the Lemon Barley Cob recipe in Dan Lepard’s The Handmade Loaf, is nothing like that. This is real bread, with a strong lemon flavor that goes well with anything from a drizzle of honey to slices of tomato with a basil leaf or two.*

The Handmade Loaf is a book well worth owning. It showcases dozens of unique breads and bakers from across Europe, as well as Lepard’s minimalist mixing method. This generally consists of 20–30 minutes of doing nothing more than allowing the dough to rest and collect itself, punctuated by two or three short bursts of hand kneading.

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Cranberry-Oat Sourdough Scones

My brilliant, talented, and beautiful niece R moved into her dorm at Berkeley this past weekend. I wanted to send her off with something as sweet as she is, yet also, like R, health-conscious and a little unconventional. (OK, these scones aren’t quite what I’d call healthy, but I tried.) I love you R!

To make sourdough scones, I consulted recipes for buttermilk scones (from Tartine and King Arthur Flour Whole Grain Baking), substituting sourdough starter instead of buttermilk to contribute acidity and liquid (as well as a good proportion of flour) to the dough. The result was a lighter, moister, less crumbly scone than those typically found in coffee shops around here. Not as exceptional as R herself, but still pretty good.

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Whole Wheat – Polenta Sourdough

I’ve been a little accident-prone lately. Which is to say, careless. In the past five days I’ve managed to smash a tailbone, a toe, and a finger (I’m fine, really). Luckily, my latest accident involved no bodily injury and resulted in a very nice bread.

My intention was to use 400 grams of whole wheat sourdough starter in this whole-grain bread, but instead of weighing it out I blithely dumped in the whole lot of it, which I’m pretty sure was about 550 grams. By the time I realized the error of my ways, it was too late and there was nothing for it except forge ahead and see what developed.

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Sourdough Ciabatta Rolls

For sandwiches, sliced bread is great, soft rolls are wonderful. But sometimes nothing but a crusty roll will do to make you feel like you’re holding a meal in the palm of your hand. And sometimes it just needs to be a ciabatta roll, with those nice big holes to harbor whatever filling is your pleasure of the moment..

But I confess I had more than good eating on my mind when I made these particular rolls. The high-hydration (i.e., wet) doughs that produce those accommodating holes can be especially difficult to handle, and I’ve always relied on my trusty mixer to see me through. I was curious to see, here in this bare-bones kitchen where all the mixing is by hand (and all the yeast is wild), whether I could pull it off.

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