First Sourdough Entry!

I've been making sourdough for just over two years now, starting when my wife and I moved to Santa Barbara. While out exploring our new city we wandered into a bakery (D'Angelo's Bread) off State St. and had some amazing sourdough. When I got home I got online and fell into a sourdough "rabbit hole" where I discover that all one needed to make his/her own bread was flour and water! I threw together a 50/50 mix and left it on the window seal for a couple days and the yeast bubbles started rising. I have been hooked ever since.

After a few months of pancakes and varying degrees of oven spring, I finally was able to get a consistently nice looking, and tasting, loaf of sourdough. I even started throwing in walnuts and apricots (familiar items from my upbringing in the Central Valley). 

Then we moved back to San Diego....

Unfortunately, my 6 month old starter did not survive the journey :( For probably a year and a half, every so often, I would try to grow a new starter, but to no avail. Every time it would fester into foot cheese. I kid you not, probably close to 2 dozen attempts failed. I tried changing the flour/water/temp/location in house - but all failed inexplicably. Then one day this spring, who knows why, the sourdough gods smiled upon me and a starter emerged and survived longer than a week! I had some success but ultimately it was pretty weak. Then a friend brought me over some of her starter and ever since then I've had a pretty good run and made some tasty bread.

I have used several recipes and methods from bloggers/authors around the interwebs. I'd say my favorite and most successful was the "High(er) Hydration Sourdough Bread." Maurizio has an excellent website, excellent recipes, and a great Instagram feed.  I've also tried the recipe in the appendix of Michael Pollan's book "Cooked." It's a great audio book for long road trips (I listened to it over a week traveling through Washington for work) and an even better Netflix series.

I most recently stumbled upon dmsnyder's recipe for his "San Joaquin Sourdough" baguettes. I really wanted to make some bread that would make a great sandwich so I thought I'd give his recipe a shot. I found the lower hydration/longer fermentation dough to have great body and feel after bulk fermentation. It pre-shaped nicely and I appreciated its workability, not being so sticky. While the baguettes weren't super pretty (short and "dog boney") they tasted wonderful.

This experience also led me to TFL and the greater "bread community" that exists online. There are a lot of talented and creative bakers out there. Thus far, most of my exposure and communication has been through the Instagram community (I highly recommend following Maurizio, alchemybreadco, tartinebakery, ibisbakery, thebreadkiln, and of course, mdhilburn)

So I thought I'd give the San Joaquin Sourdough another shot today (side note: I grew up in Patterson, CA, 5 mins from the San Joaquin river and have seriously considered naming our first son Joaquin... after the river and the infamous California bandit). 

Here is a photo progression: 

 I doubled the recipe and here is the dough after bulk fermentation and about 19 hours in the fridge.

Two 950 gram pre-shaped loaves (in retrospect, I should have split it in four!)

Final shaped loaf after 30 mins rest. My attempt at a batard. 

Just put in the oven with some scoring and some steaming wet towels in a pie dish below. 

Finished loaves. Not my prettiest but huge oven spring. No ear or grigne to "ew and aw" about. 

Crumb shot. Anyone want to go spelunking? I'll bring my GoPro! Yikes, these air pockets got out of control. Not quite sure why they didn't release through the score I put down the middle. Oh well. The texture was great, soft and chewy. The flavor could have been a little more sour. 

Anyway, here is my first post. I am hoping for some feedback and welcome your advice/insight!