Starting Something Sour
I fell in love with baking bread my second year at college when my dear friends, Eliz, Megan, Les, Rachael and I formed a little club called the FFA (Food Freaks Anonymous). Living doors down from one another, Eliz and I would often sneak over to the library basement where we would procure Le Fabuleux Destin d’Amélie Poulain from the small rack of our library’s DVD’s and take it back to our suite to accompany us while we made some of our favourite “No Fail Wheat Bread.” There was nothing quite like a hunk of hot bread straight from the oven (although, you’re technically supposed to wait until it’s completely cooled) drizzled with a touch of honey while watching Amélie Poulain and Nino Quincampoix ride off on their moped.
Anyway. It has been several years since my love affair with bread and Amélie began. I am now moving onto trying some new techniques. Well, new for me. Sourdough bread baking (or at least using a natural starter) has been around since the Egyptian times in 1500 BC. Using a starter of naturally occurring bacteria gives breads regional distinction. [Of course we all know about the famous San Francisco sourdough breads (yum!)] After several failed attempts when we first moved to Madison (the bread just never rose) I put the project on hiatus. Thankfully, Clotilde*, of Chocolate and Zucchini, has been writing several posts about sourdough bread products and her little starter named Philémon. Her triumphs in the kitchen inspired me to resume our little fermentation project. Afterall, we should be good at this since Robb has been brewing beer with Eric, of late… and I am getting my Masters in Cheese. One of the easiest and sure-fire ways to have a happy, healthy stater is to procre some from a friend or a bakery. Since the Madison Sourdough Company seems to have their starter on lockdown [aside: they have the most amazing croissants!], I looked elsewhere. After some perusing on the internets, I discovered a nonprofit organization whose entire business is giving away a starter that has a very long history.
For the price of a stamp, Carl Griffith’s Oregon Trail will mail you a 150+-year-old sourdough starter culture that was brought west by a pioneer ancestor:
All I know is that it started west in 1847 from Missouri. I would guess with the family of Dr. John Savage as one of his daughters (my great grandmother) was the cook. It came on west and settled near Salem Or. Doc. Savage’s daughter met and married my great grand father on the trail and they had 10 children. It was passed on to me though my parents when they passed away. I am 76 years old so that was some time ago. I first learned to use the starter in a basque sheep camp when I was 10 years old as we were setting up a homestead on the Steens Mountains in southeastern Oregon. A campfire has no oven, so the bread was baked in a Dutch Oven in a hole in the ground in which we had built a fire, placed the oven, scraped in the coals from around the rim, and covered with dirt for several hours. I used it later making bread in a chuck wagon on several cattle drives - again in southeastern Oregon.
(via BoingBoing)
I sent away for my starter several weeks ago and it arrived just before my birthday (what a great little gift!) Following the set of instructions, I revived my little zombies (see Alton Brown) and now they are happily procreating in my fridge in a little applesauce jar. Here is a photo-log of their revival.
Meet Nino, the starter:
Nino, the starter, in its hibernating (aka-dried) state and its awaiting bowl.
Dissolving Nino, the starter, in 3/4 cup 90ºF water. (This took a bit of time…)
Preparing the ingredients for Nino’s first feeding: 3/4 cup bread flour and 1 tsp. sugar.
Mixing…
Ah, finished mixing. (It’s OK if there are a few lumps.)
An oven with the pilot light on is supposed to be a good incubating space, but my oven doesn’t have that luxury. Instead, our spare room and a desk lamp proved a suitable spot for it. I let Nino ferment for ~48 hours. The room smelled delightful!
Post-fermentation. Look at all that alcohol on the surface. Stir it back in a feed Nino again.
Getting Nino ready for its transition into the fridge.
It now lives in my fridge and I’ve made one loaf using the directions for the Alaskan sourdough bread which can be found here. But, as tasty as it was, it was not sour enough for Robb or myself. This weekend, I am planning to start another batch but this time using the recipe from the King Arthur Flour Blog for Extra-Tangy Sourdough Bread. I love that the basis for the lack-of-sourness goes back to simple microbiology:
What makes the sour in sourdough bread? It’s a combination of lactic and acetic acids, created as the dough rises and ferments. Refrigerating the dough encourages the production of more acetic than lactic acid; and acetic acid is much the tangier of the two. Thus, sourdough that’s refrigerated before baking will have a more assertive sour flavor.
(Via King Arthur Flour)
It looks like our dough will be spending more time in the fridge than on the counter. Hopefully this loaf is more to our tasetbuds’ liking. Otherwise, our freezer won’t be able to hold much more bread!! (Or we will be having a French toast party pretty soon…)
Ah, and if you are in the market for your own, already thriving starter… let me know! If you live in the Madison-area I would be more than happy to give you some of Nino’s offspring.
I suppose while the yeast is doing its work, I will go skip stones like Amélie…
* Did I tell you that I once saw her at a book signing in Seattle? That is me in the maroon shirt… har har.
4 Comments