Sourdough Success!

Yes, this isn't the prettiest picture...but by the time I had the bread baked Sunday night and the company went home...and the dogs got their dinner and pills....and the cat got her dinner...and I kept laundry going...and cleaning up the kitchen...on and on this list goes...I was too tired to remember to take a PRETTY picture of the most delicious bread I made!! So bear with me please...I'll take better pics...

This bread as you can see, didn't fit in my bread keeper that well because it rose so incredibly well and puffed out at the top...and you can see I started to try to put it in a bread bag, and lost that battle, so just went with smooshing it a bit, covering it with foil and going to bed.

This is the recipe from my previous sourdough posting...half whole wheat half bread flour...and at the last minute I tweeked this recipe and added 2 tsp of vital gluten (a grain protein that helps bread rise). After the couple bricks I baked recently, I wanted to make sure this batch rose well, and boy did they ever!

The texture is perfect! Light and airy but firm and stable, not crumbly at all. A nice crust too. I am very please with this test run. The only thing is it doesn't have alot of sourdough taste, and I'm trying to figure out why. This bread is a nice go between for Chuck and I since I want whole wheat and he wants white. But I may try to make white next and see where that takes me, now that I know this method is a winner.

I am feeding my starter tonight and leaving it out for 7 days as opposed to 5 days to see what effect that has on the flavor of the starter/bread. I'll let you know how that works out next week. Now that things are hopefully going to quiet down I can bake each weekend now...my GOAL is to get the bread ready on Friday night and bake Saturday...still working on that goal.

So here I am, after work Monday, first thing is coming to post my results of the Sourdough Excursions! As this will be an ongoing adventure in BREAD BAKING here on Kitchen Weekend Warrior and I hold this project very important to me and hopefully I'll get some readers soon?? You can see what I'm having for a snack...the most wonderful homemade bread I've had in a long time...real butter and Pomegranite Herbal Tea (mixed with a little green tea too). Awwwwwsome!

Chuck ate a couple pieces before going to bed last night, and I packed his lunch sandwich with this bread and he loves it...but would rather have white bread, he is now requesting I learn how to make Italiana Bread like SaraJanes...a bread we get at Raisin Rack, it's all natural and incredibly good. I am addicted to her Onion Rye Dill bread, it's a round free form loaf and has incredible taste you can eat it plain no butter it's that good. I started getting him the Italian and he's hooked too now.

This adventure in baking all natural breads (hopefully no yeast) has just begun, and we'll see what we end up with...hopefully an easy versatile recipe, fantastic bread, and better health for not taking in all the preservatives and "stuff" they put in bread these days!

IS ANYONE READING???

Comment, and even better, become a follower so I know someone is listening?

Looking forward to hearing from you,

Janie