Starting to get serious
Hello all!
I've been baking bread for some time but never really serious about it. The past few years I've been working on trying to be more self sustainable, so a lot less processed/prepared grocery and more ingredients and staples. I finally got past the hurdle of the sourdough starter. I had tried and tried unsuccessfully for weeks to get one going with a fluctuating temperature household (no central air). I built a proofing vessel and was able to get mine off and going in 7 days as per the instructions.
Fast forward about 3 weeks, I decided to make an account and participate with you all. My most recent revelation was how poor a lot of the consumer grade flour is. I had been using a lot of gold medal bread flour, even king arthur bread flour and never got the right feel in the dough, and never had the flavor and texture I associated with a small town bakery. So during this pandemic, it's been hard to find flour, especially whole wheat or bread flour in my area. I decided to bite the bullet and spend a pretty penny to have a 50lb bag of General Mills All Trumps bleached bromated enriched high gluten flour, the shipping was nearly twice as much as the flour itself, but the total still came out to around the price of 5lb sacks of King Arthur bread flour, so I suppose I'm not complaining. After using this dough now for 2 loafs and 1 pizza, I don't think I'll be able to go back to a consumer flour. It made the most tender, moist crumb full of flavor, great browning and incredible rise. I was sure to knead the dough less than I would have King Arthurs due to the bromate, and it was just a dream to work with.
Now I want to make a starter from it, to experiment with vs my 50/50 whole wheat/all purpose starter.
I don't have any plans for a dutch oven bake this week to try out the All Trumps with my 50/50 starter, but I do plan to make another 2 loafs of King Arthurs Sourdough Sandwich bread which has been a home run at the house. I didn't have any of the powdered milk available as per the recipe, so I sub'd out all the dry milk and water for 1 1/2 cups of 2% milk.
https://www.kingarthurflour.com/recipes/sourdough-sandwich-bread-recipe [1]
I want to experiment and be able to replace the commercial yeast in the recipe for only the leaven.
I really enjoy whole wheat sandwhich bread, sourdough boules, rye sandwich bread, pumpernickel, rolls, biscuits anything made with flour!
Shane