At this point the sourdough had doubled. Then in the bowl of my kitchenaid I put 1 and 1/4 cups bread flour. With the bread hook attachment I set the speed on 2. I slowly added 2/3 cup of bottled water. Just bringing the dough together. I ended up having a little bit of water left in the measuring cup. I kneaded the dough for 3 min at this speed. Then removed the dough ball from the mixer and set it aside to rest for 20 min.
I had to do this six times because of my initial decision to use as much of the starter as possible. I figured the more bread the better. I can always freeze some. Next time though I might just take her advice and throw some of the starter out as I go. If it were not for my Kitchen Aid I would be very tired at this point. I never knew it was possible to love an inanimate object so much.
After 20 min rest. I returned the dough ball to the mixer. Then I pulled the sourdough starter out of the jar. Removing 2/3 cup and tossing the extra. Then I tore the sourdough into equal pieces and added it to the bowl of the mixer. On a low speed I kneaded the dough for 2 min. At this point you add 1 teaspoon of salt. Then continue to knead the dough for another min. The dough was very smooth and elastic. Removing it from the mixer I placed it into an oiled container.
As you can see from this picture I had six batches of dough. So the above instruction were repeated six times. The tuperware containers would be the best, but I only had two available so I used some regular bowls. At this stage the dough must rise for an hour or so.
After an hour I removed the dough from the container and place it onto a floured board. Pushing the dough out I did what Rose Levy Beranbaum calls a business letter turn two times. When I first started using this book for what ever reason this concept or her description would not form in my mind. So for those of you who need pictures like I do I am including a step by step of the business letter turn.
After doing that I actually placed the dough onto a sheet of parchment paper. She suggests placing back into an oiled container, but I didn't have anymore containers and the ones that I had just used were very sticky with some of the dough that had clung to the sides. So to save time I just used a sheet of parchment and covered all the dough with a kitchen towel. After one hour I did exactly the same thing again. Two business letter turns later I returned the dough to the parchment. Covered it again for another hour. After this hour I then carefully took the dough and shaped it into a round loaf. Trying not to deflate it at all. She suggests placing the dough into a rising basket, which I guess is a basket with a floured piece of cloth inside of it. I didn't have anything like this so I just decided to place the formed loaves onto a baking sheet covered in parchment paper. I then covered the loaves with a towel and let them rise again for another couple of hours.
She asks you to preheat the oven to 350 for an hour before baking. She also wants you to use a stone baking sheet and preheat the stone. I don't have one of those although I really wish I did. So I just used a metal baking sheet. I did not preheat the baking sheet. I had already let the loaves rise on the parchment lined baking sheet so I just place the sheet in the oven on the lowest rack. I did however place a small metal pan in the bottom of the oven before preheating. So when I put the loaves in the oven I took a 1/2 cup of ice and threw it onto the metal pan and shut the oven door very quickly. This creates steam in the oven and helps to create a nice crispy crust.
The end result. Very very tasty bread. It had all the subtle flavor that sourdough bread should. Warm out of the oven. Crispy, sweet, tangy, and some what addictive! Added bonus my house smells amazing right now. Cool fall air coming in from the open windows met with the warm fresh baked bread smell. A fresh cup of coffee. This is a joyful morning! An ode to fall and the shifting of seasons.
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