I've been using my Breadman Ultimate for a number of months to make almost all my bread.  I am now experimenting with sourdough.  It doesn't really rise fast enough for the breadmaker, so I have tried adding extra yeast, but that's a bit hit & miss - I had one loaf that sank, and I think it must have risen too much.

So I am now experimenting with overnight fermentation.  I had quite a successful first attempt.  The Breadman won't allow you to program any phase for more than 100 minutes, so I did the following:

• Set it on Dough

When the dough is made, reset the machine run a program as follows:

• 30 mins preheat to get it back up to temperature


• 15 s knock back


• 2 hours prove (by using both the Rise 2 and Rise 3 phases with no "shape" in between)


• bake

It was a loaf made with approx 1lb of flour (including sourdough starter) of which 2oz was wholemeal and the rest strong white, and would have risen for about 9 hours before the second program kicked in.

It was pretty successful - the crust wasn't dark enough so I will add a couple of minutes to the program.  tasted nice, with more sourdough flavour than a quicker fermented loaf, and a slightly chewy (but well risen) texture.

So - I just wanted to ask - am I doing it sort of right, or is there anything else I should be doing?  I'm in the UK and don't have the heating on overnight, so it gets reasonably cool.

And before anyone suggests I make the dough in the machine and do the rest by hand, I want to utilise the convenience of the machine and be able to get up to freshly baked bread.

Cheers,

Phil