November 19, 2015 - 1:26am
sour dough recipe to fit my schedule
Can anyone assist with a sour dough loaf formula that I can do during the week around my work schedule
I work a pretty regular week, and am out of the house between 08:30 and 6 pm. I am really struggling to find a recipe for a great sough dough loaf that I can do during the week. All the required timings seem to need me to either get home during the day or get up in the night if I was to follow them religiously. Ideally I would like to have something to bake in the morning or in the evening.
My attempts so far have meant I've over proved or under proved the dough and hence poor loaves are baked.
Any suggestions?
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Here is one idea...
In the morning before you go to work build your starter and allow to bubble up through the day.
Just before bed make the dough and bulk ferment overnight.
In the morning shape into banneton or loaf tin and refrigerate till you get home. Finish off the final proof when you get home and bake that evening.
Prepare your starter and make the dough to finish by Sunday evening. Then refrigerate at the bulk fermentation stage. Then for the next two or 3 days take enough out for one loaf when you get home from work, shape and final proof when you get home and bake that evening.
I follow Abe's first suggestion, the build the starter in the morning, let it ferment during the day at room temp, make the dough at night and bulk ferment at room temp overnight, then shape the dough in the morning and refrigerate, then bake in the evening. It helps to take lots of notes of starter amounts, time and temp to get the timing right - especially as the seasons change since a change in a few degrees over such long times can have a big impact.
That's not far off the timings of my breads, although shifted by 12 hours...
Say you want to bake bread on Tuesday evening.
Start on Tuesday morning before leaving for work. Mix 150g starter, 500g flour, 285 (or more) water and 8g salt. Leave that half an hour, knead it and leave it covered in a bowl in a coolish place (18°C).
Come home from work, tip dough out, give it a quick stretch & fold then shape into a rough boulle. Leave to "bench rest" for 10 minutes or so then shape into whatever you like - banneton, basket, etc. This will then take 1.5-2 hours to prove in a nice warm place before its ready for the oven. So make sure the oven is really hot by 8pm and in it goes. It's out and cooling down by 9pm (hopefully well before), so you can have a warm slice for supper, or breakfast. Should last a few days - depending on your personal consumption rate :-)
The trick here - keep at least 200g of starter in the fridge. Take 150g directly from the jar, top it up (75g flour, 75g water) then you could leave that in a cool place through the day then into the fridge in the evening. That'll let it get going well, then you put it on hold in the fridge.
This is essentially what I'm doing here: http://www.thefreshloaf.com/node/44111/easy-sourdough-part-1 just shifted to the other side of the clock.
(And I've just finished that loaf FWIW - nice toast for my lunch!)
-Gordon
It is amenable to a great many schedules as you do a lengthy bulk ferment in the refrigerator prior to baking. I have adopted his approach but use the recipe for Hamelman's Vermont sourdough which uses a 130% starter. You can get this going early in the morning and when you return from work get the dough going which will take three hours before it goes into the fridge. The next evening you form loaves, proof and bake which for me takes two hours. Unfortunately, there is no getting around the time needed for sourdough culture to do its work even though the amount of prep that you spend is relatively small.
Yes, the SJSD is a fine way to go about this task. One of many, but a good starting off point.
Build your levain on your own timetable. When it is finished, if you are not ready to use it for your mix, just put it in the refrigerator. It will be ready when you are, for a few days anyway. I do this ALL the time with my standard 75% hydration levain, as well as other hydration levains, and never have a problem.
Next. When ready to use from the refrigerator, either warm it up to room temp again, or use warmer water in your mix to take some of the chill off the levain.
Next. Once you bulk retard the dough you can pull it out of the refrigerator a number of hours later to divide and shape. Then back into the retard again.
Finally, if you do the above step, you can bake directly from retard, no need to final proof. Again, I do this virtually all the time. For me, it works like a charm. Using the above steps, you control the schedule rather than the schedule controlling you. Try it, maybe it will work for you too.
SD is very forgiving and the fridge can be used to fit just about any recipe to your working schedule. You can fridge a built levain, use the fridge for bulk ferment and for final proofing , Sometimes we al get caught with life getting in the way of bread making unexpectedly, When this happens to me, I just chuck the SD bread at what ever stage it is at into the fridge - no worries and just pick up the process when I have time.
Happy SD baking during the work week
Check it out. I thought of you when I did this, after I read your post here. Hope this helps you out with some ideas.
Cheers!
http://www.thefreshloaf.com/node/44141/red-fife-x-4-awesomeness-matching-my-work-schedule