Hello from Baltimore
Hey all. I'm Megan, a long-time home baker. I used to make bread quite often, but always with yeast. Recently, I've been trying my hand at sourdough. I have the starter from a friend, and I'm using the Hamelman book, specifically the Vermont Sourdough. My first attempt was okay, but not great. Today's try isn't looking promising either: my mixer couldn't really handle the dough and kneading by hand was a pain because the dough was extremely sticky (but not particularly slack.) Then I forgot the first fold, so I had to do just one, halfway through the first ferment. The dough had improved by then, so I'm still hoping it'll be a decent loaf in the end. I'll be reading the forums for a bit, and I think next week I might be ready post some pix and questions. I'm determined to get the hang of this bread thing!!
hi Meg! I'm originally from Baltimore, now live in North Florida, so as a former Bawlmorian, I thought I'd say hi!
I had an original rough start with sourdough, with inconsistent results, and then got the Tartine book. Robertson's book helped me to troubleshoot some problems, as well as receiving help from some very knowledgeably people on this website. The technique in his book mixes entirely by hand, but you aren't really kneading, just folding the dough, or grabbing bits from the bottom and pulling up and over the top of the dough, rotating the bowl around as you go. The dough ferments long enough that enough gluten is developed and you don't really need to knead (ha?) to get the gluten going.
MiniOven on this site told me she doesn't usually do a stretch and fold, or the pulling up and around as I mentioned above, until the first hour after the autolyze (or adding salt after a little rest after final ingredients have been added). Then do a stretch/turn every half hour after that until the dough has fermented sufficiently. For me, that's 3- 4 hours. If you wet your hand before dealing with the sticky dough, the dough won't stick so bad.
Just fyi, for timing, what works for me is I start the levain early in the morning. It's usually ready for final dough ingredients in the early afternoon. I ferment the dough through the afternoon, then 'put the bread to bed,' putting the loaves in the fridge overnight, then bake off the next morning.
hope this helps! Good luck!
Thanks! I think next time I'll try hand mixing.