Transcripts
1. Welcome Here!: Hey, have you looked into making sourdough and it was kind of intimidating, or did you try it and did it fail? Then this class is for you. My name is Deanna Paul's. I had been making sourdough bread for the last four years here in my home in Saskatchewan, Canada. This class follows along my step-by-step recipe guide that came out a year ago actually created this picture guided. Follow along, hold in your hands, write in the margins recipe book that of my, my method that I've perfected over the last four years, I wanted to create a class to go along with this, because there's, there's a lot that can be learned from the texture of the dough, watching the process of forming loaves. And it's fun to bake with someone. I will say that a lot of people use a scientific approach to making sourdough. And you're not going to find that here. This is very simple. It can be done in your very own kitchen. No fancy tools needed. All right, I think that's it. In the next class I'm going to go over a few basic things that you're going to need for this process. And then we'll get started.
2. What You'll Need: Before we get started, I'm just going to run through a few quick things that I feel are essential in order to making this happen. The essential ingredient is your sourdough starter, which we will learn how to create and maintain your very own. And one of these classes, you'll want a non-metal mixing bowl, quite a large bowl, and three tea towels. I use one to cover the bowl and two and my proofing baskets, which these are not essential. You can use a loaf pan, you could use a smaller bowl, but I find this very helpful to holding the shape of the dough. You're going to want a cast iron pot. I have to cast iron pots to go in the oven at the same time because this recipe does make two lobes. If you just have one, that's fine. You'll just do the baking process twice. You'll want to non iodized sea salt, a one cup measure, a spoon and some utility blades. Not essential but very helpful is a bench knife helps cut the dough and form the loaves. The total recipe uses eight cups of flour. I typically use five cups of all-purpose and three cups of whole wheat. I almost forgot to mention. The most important thing you need is time, a full 24 hours. That's how long it takes to make two lobes of sour dough. Obviously, some of that time you're sleeping and a lot of that time you're just waiting. If you're someone who works Monday to Friday, this is going to be a weekend activity, something that requires you being at home for a good chunk of four or five hours during the structure unfolds. Believe me, when I say it's worth the time that you put in for it.
3. Creating Your Own Sourdough Starter: This class are going to learn how to create and maintain your very own sourdough starter. So you're going to want a glass jar or a cup, some white or all-purpose flour and some water and a spoon. So you're going to want to combine one round a tablespoon of flour, and a splash of water. And it's about enough to make the consistency like pancake batter. If you've never made pancakes, go make pancakes. So you understand the consistency is like a loose pancake batter. You can see here. You also don't want your sourdough starter to become more than like a cup and a half. Because then this rounded tablespoon isn't quite enough to sustain more than that. So if it gets to be more than a cup and a half, I'd recommend dumping some out, cover it with a loose or breathable. This is like a mesh produce bay. You can use a breathable tea towel. Consistently do this. So consistent when I say consistently feed, I mean, within the same two-hour window every morning you give it round a tablespoon and some water that is maintaining your starter. That's all it takes. Rounded tablespoons and water stirred up. You do that for about a week. And you'll start to notice that it's smelling sour, that is bubbling a little bit. And congratulations, you've just created your very own, a sourdough starter. It's, it's literally that easy with that. Sometimes it takes longer for it to bubble, sometimes up to two weeks before you notice that it's turning sour. I would just recommend keeping it somewhere warm and being consistent with feeding it. Now if you're going to be going away for a bit, this is after it's been maintained. If you're going to be going away and you don't you're not able to feed every day, cover it with some plastic or a loose lid and put it in your fridge. And you can stay alive without being fed in your fridge for up to a week. I've left my maybe a week and a half and it's still fine when I come back. Just remember to pull it out of the fridge the night before you're wanting to feed it so I can get back to room temperature before you start up the process again. If you forget a day, just leave it for the whole day. Like let's say you're a member at two o'clock. Oh no, I forgot to feed my starter. Just leave it for the day. Started again the next morning in your consistent to our window of feeding.
4. Making the Levain: For this class, we're going to learn how to make 1111 is like the pre-deal. The starter dough is a smaller amount of flour that allows the starter to really get going to get active. I have with me six cups of flour. So I have five cuts, purpose and one cup of whole wheat. I have three cups of water and my active starter that has been sitting now for about 2.5 hours in a warm spot. I also have a melamine mixing bowl and a spoon. So this is my starter after two hours of, well 2.5 hours. So fermenting, you can see there's lots of bubbles in it. It's very fluffy and airy. I'm gonna put three cups of warm water and about half a cup of starter. It's okay if you do a little bit more, I don't measure this. Probably a minimum of half a cup is great. This is called the float test. So you can see that my starter is floating rate on the top. It did not sink to the bottom. The bubbles in it are keeping it rate at the surface. The float test is essential to knowing that your brand is going to turn out if your starter sinks or if it kind of sits halfway, I would recommend waiting a day before making bread. If your starter floats in a stirred into the warm water and add your six cups of flour. I tend to do more white flower then whole wheat. Just because I like a fluffier loaf. I'm going to mix this all together. So everything is wet. You'll see the dough is super sticky, kinda thick, hard to work with. Feel free to use your hands in this face to affect easier for you. And there's our 11. Now that we've got our London mix, you can cover it. Plays it somewhere warm for two hours. I usually put mine in the oven with the light on and leave myself a note on top of the oven saying 11 is in the oven. So you don't turn on your oven. You could also put it near like a furnace event or in a sunlit room. All of those are great options. It allows the bacteria to start to do its work.
5. Making the Dough: In this class we're going to turn our Lebanon into our dough. So with me, I have my final two cups of flour. I'm using whole wheat flour, two tablespoons of fine at sea salt, a cup of warm water, and my 11 spoon if he, if you want, you can use your hands. You're going to be taking my cup of warm water, adding it in along with the salt, two tablespoons and the flower. Mix it all up. So now that you've mixed your dough, you are going to cover it again with the cloth, put it back in the warm spot that you had it in before and leave it for one hour. And the next class we'll go over the stretch and folds. That's the process of adding air intention into your dough.
6. The Stretch and Fold Process: In this class, I'm going to show you how to take your dough and form it into loaves. So this is a process that takes a bit of practice, but it can be perfected. You're going to want with you, you are proofing baskets, some water just for the surface. And if you have a bench knife, it's really helpful. You also want a bit of flour and I use this t filter thing to spread some far and it works really well, but you can just use your hand as well. I've wet down my work surface just to prevent the dough from sticking. Can gently pull the dough. Whatever your bowl. I'm also wedding down my hands a bit just to prevent sticking. You're going to cut your dough into for the two lobes. The first shaping is pretty rough. You're just building initial tension for something called the bench rest. Where you allow the dough to sit for 10 to 20 minutes. To bringing in the sides. Flipping it over on itself. Will now cover these two lobes here with your tea towel and allow them to set for 10 to 20 minutes. All right. I waited my boat 15 minutes for the Ben trust. What my hands again, you'll see the loaves have spread out a little bit. That is totally fine. You're going to want to wet the tops of your lobes again to prevent sticking. I'm going to show you two different folding methods that I use. So making sure that the dough is stretched out a little bit, you're going to fold the top down, one side in, the other side in. And then roll that up from the bottom. I'm sliding the dough towards myself to build a bit of tension on the top. And then you pull down on the sides to make a nice flat top. I'm going to take that form loaf, going to sprinkle flower. I'll over the top of it. Make sure there's lots of flower in my basket. And place it. Bottom facing app. For this next slope. Again, spreading the dough out a little bit. One side in, the other side in helping the dot's stick to itself. And then this is called stitching. You take from either side and kind of stitch it all the way down the middle. And then a long roll up. This is like two or three roles. Again, pulling it towards myself to build a bit of tension and pulling the sides down to create a clean looking top. Again, making sure that there's flower. So nothing is sticky. And placing it seems side app. You can repair some of these seams if you want to once it's in the bin. And those are two examples of how you can form your loaves. Forming lobes is something that takes practice. So you might need to be okay with your lobes looking a little weird. Sometimes the more you do it, the better it'll get. You're now going to take your proofing baskets and put them in the fridge overnight. I typically make my love's first thing in the morning when I wake up, it would be okay if you waited a little bit longer, like till mid morning. But keep in mind, they are still developing even when they're in the fridge. The next video, I'll show you the process of scoring your logs and getting them ready to go into the oven.
7. Score & Bake: Hey, good morning. And this class I'm going to show you how to take your lobes out of the proofing baskets, how to score them. And I'll talk you through the baking process. I have with me my cast iron pot, two pieces of parchment, paper, my sharp utility blade, and then I've pulled my lobes that are the Frage the same time that I pulled a loaves out of the fridge. I'm also putting my pots in the oven and setting it to 500 degrees. Tip your loaf out on the parchment. My tip for this first cut is to just do it confidently. I sync my blade and about this far and then cut it about a 45 degree angle. Then I create a design on top just for fun, these are more shallow cuts. And there's my first slope. And again, I confident cat, from one end to the other. I read somewhere that they used to put these designs and the talks of their lobes because there was a community oven. You, to everyone who take their bread, bread to the community oven. You didn't want to lose which one was yours. So you do you, you'd put your unique design on top, which is kinda cool. And that is the process of scoring your lobes. Then lift the parchment, put it into the preheated pots. I always like putting a splash of water underneath the parchment just to help with the humidity levels in the pot, you'll put the lid on. And if you have two pots, that's great. If you just have one, do this process twice. But the lids on, put them in the oven, set a timer for 20 minutes and turn the temperature down to 450. So they'll bake at 450 for 20 minutes. Then you're going to pull the lids off, put a light-colored baking sheet underneath this protects the bottoms from getting super dark. So lids off light colored baking sheet on the rack below and set the timer for another 20 minutes, or the total of a 40 minute bake. You'll know your loaf is done when it has a nice golden brown on the top. And when you tap that, if you lift it up and tap the bottom with your finger, it should make a nice hollow ring sound. You might need to adjust the bake time depending on your oven. I personally do 20 about 22 minutes with the lids on and about 18 minutes with the lids off.
8. Hooray! You've Created Edible Art: Check it out. Aren't they beautiful? You have just created your very own loves of sourdough. I hope you feel really proud of yourself. I would encourage you to resist the urge to slice them down the middle. Well, there's still a hot, it'll kinda squash them sometimes if I ate, cannot wait. I cut the end off of one and eat it fresh hide out of the oven. And that's incredible. I have waited for these two cool, and I'm going to cut them open. Look at all those air pockets. Isn't that beautiful? I love how unique every loaf is. The smell of opening it up. Edible art really is the best kind of art. If yours is a little bit more flat, if it doesn't have these air pockets, continue to do research, continue to try new things. You'll get there.
9. Some Helpful Tips: In this class I'm going to offer some quick tips and tricks, things that I've learned along the way that really help the sourdough process. Tip number one is if your starter does not float, do not try making bread that day. It might mean that you need to do a float test a little bit earlier than the two-hour mark or a little bit later waiting for it to rise a bit more. You might need to use a higher-quality flower for your starter. I personally use organic flour and my starter might need to adjust the amount of water and it might just need some more time, more consistent feeding every day. This is something that takes time and research. Don't give up. Hope if you can't get yours to become active, you can always find some online or in a health food store. I'm sure there's probably a friend somewhere who had give you some of theirs. Tip number 2 would be to approach this like an art, approach it with creativity and give yourself grace. And if it feels kinda weird, just keep moving forward. Called my book the art that's in our bones because people have been making bread for all of history is something that is woven into us, a part of our humanity. It's something that you are fully capable of doing, but feels intimidating. Keep pressing forward. If the dough feels weird, keep trying new things. Allow yourself to be creative, to make mistakes, and to try again. To number three is to use a sharp utility blade. I use mine four times, twice on this side, twice on this side, and then I get rid of it. The purpose being that you want the cut to be nice and clean. If it's not a clean cut, then it kinda rips open. You don't get the nice oven spring that you're hoping for. I would recommend keeping your loaves in the freezer, either pre sliced or hole, or if you're working your way through a loaf, keep it in the fridge, it just stays more moist and fresh longer. Those are just some quick tips that I have that I have found helpful learning along the way. And I hope that they're helpful for you as well.
10. All the Best: Hey, I just wanted to say thanks so much for baking with me, for learning this process, for being patient with yourself and trying something new. I really believe that sour dough is something that anyone can do. If you look for me on social media, on Instagram or my website, you'll see that I actually spent a lot of time writing poetry. And it's because I enjoy not only feeding the body, but also feeding the mind and the soul. I am more than open to answering your questions about sourdough though. So you can find me on Instagram at Deanna dot Pauls or my website is Deanna Paul's dot com. And I always feel free to share and tag me on social media it when you create your beautiful loaves.
Deanna Pauls, Sourdough Baker
