Multigrain Bread-Mix Sourdough
Have you ever used shop-bought bread pre-mixes to make sourdoughs? I have several unfinished bread mixes at home from those days when I used bread machine to make pan breads; they are all reaching their use-by dates and I really don't want to waste them.
The Multigrain Bread Mix I have is soy (10%) and linseed (5%), whole rye, maize polenta, in addition to unbleached wheat flour. It has many "dough conditioners" added in: ascorbic acid, enzyme, emulsifier, etc., to assure of its performance. And the salt (2.4%) has also been added in. The box says its protein is 12.6%. All that you need to add is water and yeast, and way you to. For a home sourdough there is nothing wrong with using it (I am not concerned with my label!).
This is how my multigrain bread-mix sourdough has turned out:
My formula
- 700 g mature white starter @75% hydration (ie, 300 water + 400 g flour)
- 700 g Australia's Laucke Multigrain Bread Mix
- 8 g salt (for the flour portion of the starter)
- 492 g water
Total dough weight 1900 g and total dough hydration 72%
- Mix by hand
- Autolyse 30 minutes
- Bulk fermentation 3 hours with 5 folds every 30 minutes
- Proof for one hour
- Retard in refrigerator for 14 hours
- Bake with steam as usual
Using bread pre-mixes to make sourdough is quite a fool-proof way to make a nice tasting bread.
Shiao-Ping
Comments
Hi Shiao-Ping,
First of all, my compliments on your beautiful bread! I always enjoy reading your blog posts.
Interesting to hear that someone else is spiking their sourdough with shop-bought bread mixes. I often add a small quantity of shop-bought sunflower bread mix to my no-knead sourdough bread (I make it from a mixture of bread flour, wholewheat flour and light rye flour and bake it in a pre-heated covered iron pot). As you say, the mix contains several bread enhancers that do wonders for the flavour and texture of the finished bread.
Happy baking!
best regards, Eva
Your Swedish LIMPA bread looks REALLY nice.
Best regards
Very clever idea, using a bag mix. In the US the King Arthur mixes offer quite a selection. Like you, I used to use them when I first started learning to bake using a bread machine. I haven't bought them in years but they do have quite a wide range of specialty flavors to choose from. If you found one you really like you can figure out what to order to create your own mix later.
A very handsome loaf. Can you expound on the chop?
Eric
白雲蒼狗 means something like a wandering dog under thousands miles of white clouds.
The 4 characters in blue are the modern Chinese characters whereas those in the chop are in an ancient font mostly used in Han Dynasty between 200 BC and 200 AD.
Waste not-want not!! I would have never guessed this was a mix. It made a lovely boule in your hands! I have a bread machine from years ago and had tried a couple of mixes and then went on to making my own dough...but the funny part is I remember wanting to learn how to make a sourdough bread. I was looking to buy a dried sourdough...not really knowing where to look other than the grocery store. I couldn't find a package of dried sourdough so I bought a packaged mix of sourdough bread and threw out the mix and kept the dried pack of sourdough!! I don't remember it was so long ago..what I did with it!
Sylvia
the dried sourdough powder. This reminds me of something in the Artisan III class. As half (or maybe more) of the class members work in production, our instructor Didier Rosada would be explaining some technical aspect of some ingredients and he would quickly add something like "you can keep your lable CLEAN because the thing you are adding is natural" or something to that effect. With the awareness of artisan baking and sourdough in particular these days, everybody wants natural ingredients in their breads. But really as far as breads go, there are nothing wrong with using the "wonder" bread mixes.
I agree! What I meant was I didn't know how to make a sourdough starter and the only powder form of a starter I could find was in a package of sourdough bread mix. Times and options for shopping have sure changed! : )
We have a shop here in fremantle where you can buy in bulk just weigh and pay.
There is a multigrain there that is a mix, when i first started using it i thought it was just a multigrain flour rather than an all inclusive mix. i used it as a straight flour and made a poolish with all the liquid for an overnight ferment with a scant amount of yeast. Next morning adding white flour and the inredients for the total flour weight which in actual fact would have been 50% more than normal assuming the mix had the right percentages. The bread turned out really good and was enjoyed by everyone that got a loaf.
i will use the mix again but will adjust the ingrediants down 50% in future, the overnight poolish is great for softening all those hard grains in the mix. no retardation is required if the yeast is reduced to a small amount.
love your bread shiao-ping and your globe trotting stories, when are you coming to Perth
Lovely to hear from you. I read about your story and am looking forward to more posts of yours. Australia is so big; it's sometimes embarrassing to admit that we have not been to such and such a place within our own country. I've been married for nearly 24 years but it's only last year that I've been to Melbourne for the first time. I heard that Perth is a lot like Brisbane, one on the east coast and the other on the west. Hopefully one day I'll visit Perth.
You are so right it is a vast country i have recently just visited Broome in the KIMBERLEY it was a great place, i had hoped to visit a remote community at Lombardina they have a community bakery and bake mon/wed/fridays.
As it turned out i didnt get my invite through till after i returned from my holiday but hope to keep in contact with them regarding their bakery. i have already suggested this site as a great source of expertise and interest still waiting for further correspondance from them about their community bakery that i can then pass on or get them to tell us.
If you ever get the opportunity to visit please do, im sure we get a baking day going at TAFE.
Thank you Shiao-Ping,
I knew there must be an interesting meaning that goes with the Chop. I love that the ancient Chinese were able to create a word picture and philosophical statement in a small written symbol. Using them on your breads elevates your work from merely wonderful to artistry in my opinion.
Eric
that is well put. Thank you. That picture (or rather, chop), however, is one of my collections. In Ancient China, the literary men who were officials at the emperor's court, often were poets and artists themselves who sculpted their own chops for pleasure in addition to writing calligraphy (ink and brush) and painting (ink and color). These chops were personal and were often affixed on their painting or calligraphy works. In the Palace Museum in Taipei, you see ancient Chinese paintings with numerous chops on the actual paintings; these chops become evidence of ownerships throughout the ages as chops, like art works, are traceable.
The literary men choose which of the six basic Chinese writing styles in which to do their chops. These six basic styles (or "fonts") go from the standard to the mad running style which is hard to recognize unless to a trained eye.
The chop on my bread was blown up 400% in my copier and then cut out like a stencil. This was the second time I did it on a bread. At the time, I was deciding whether I do the "yin" or the "yan" (the latter is to have the characters exposed and the former is to have the rest exposed); and in the end, I chose the "yan." An example of a "yin" chop was the 2.3 kg Miche that I did before I went to San Francisco.