Fermentation Part 3- Sourdough

In this episode of our fermentation series, we dive into our third topic: sourdough. Discover the rich history, nutritional benefits, and step-by-step process of creating and maintaining a healthy sourdough starter.

Resources: 

Sourdough 101 : https://extension.illinois.edu/sites/default/files/2024-11/sourdough_101_final.pdf

Homegrown: https://homegrown.extension.ncsu.edu/2020/04/23/sourdough-bread-making/

Discard Recipes: 

Sourdough Biscuits: https://pinchmysalt.com/buttery-sourdough-biscuits/#:~:text=are%20spaced%20apart.-,Notes,in%20the%20recipe%20by%20half.

Discard Crackers: https://our-family-cooks.com/everything-bagel-sourdough-discard-crackers/

Discard Pizza: https://www.farmhouseonboone.com/how-to-make-easy-sourdough-pizza-crust/

Transcript

Lindsey Edwards: 0:01

Welcome back to the Extension Connection Podcast, where we connect our listeners to research-based resources to help them build better lives. Hello everyone. This is Lindsay Edwards, your family and consumer science agent in Polk County, and I'm coming at you today with the third part of our fermentation series, which we're gonna be talking about sourdough. So let's talk about the history of sourdough a little bit. Sourdough was thought to be invented by accident in h Ancient Egypt. Sourdough is widely considered the world's first leavened bread. Sourdough bread was the only type of bread that was produced until commercial yeast was started to be produced around 1868, interestingly enough, bread was made almost exclusively at home in the 1890s, which they said about 90% of all bread was made at home. But by 1930, the number was reversed, where 90% of bread was made in factories and shipped to supermarkets, which made a very large demand. For companies to have that commercial yeast product so that they can make bread very quickly. Sourdough had a resurgence of popularity during the COVID-19 pandemic when people were stuck at home and wanted things to do. And also when you went to the grocery stores, you couldn't always find all the ingredients you needed to make bread like yeast. The process of making sourdough can be very lengthy, so being at home during that pandemic time gave people the amount of time that they needed to be able to produce a loaf. At home, interestingly enough, sourdough uses very minimally processed ingredients. The only ingredients you need to create a sourdough loaf are flour, water, and salt. So let's talk really quickly about the nutritional benefits of sourdough. According to Colorado State Extension. Sourdough has a lower pH than standard bread, which gives it that sour flavor and makes it easier on your gut. Allowing the dough to ferment helps you to break down the nutrients giving you. What they call a head start on digestion, so it makes it more easily digestible. It also reduces the FOD map, which are carbohydrates that are hard for some people to digest, especially if they have something like irritable bowel syndrome. So lowering the FOD map would make it more easily digestible for more people. Also, the minerals and bread are more available in sourdough than in traditional bread. More research is needed and ongoing for topics such as can a gluten intolerant person eat sourdough and how does it really impact blood glucose levels? So we're still waiting for more research on those topics, but. There is research that shows that it is more easily digestible for many people. For me personally, one of the biggest benefits for making sourdough is knowing exactly what is going into the bread that my family consumes. Like I said previously, it only contains three ingredients flour. Water and salt. That's it. I'm not putting anything extra into it, and I know exactly what my family's eating, so let's talk about the process of it, well, before we start, let's discuss some terminology that I'm gonna be using, so that if I do use it, hopefully you understand what it means. The first word I'm gonna say is a starter. Your starter is basically what acts as your yeast in a sourdough bread. It's equal parts of flour and water, and it's what you start with. To catch the wild yeast and bacteria in the air, which actually is gonna make your bread rise, stretch and folds. That is a technique that you use to actually stretch and fold the dough in place of kneading, and that's what is going to create that chewy texture of the bread crust. Most of us know this word is the outer layer of bread. Crumb is the inside texture of bread. Proofing, fermentation, those two words, I might use interchangeably. This is allowing the bread to rest and rise. You'll hear me use the term discard. That is a portion of the starter that gets removed before feeding. Feeding is giving your starter equal parts, flour and water. The term scoring is when you are cutting the finished dough before baking to allow some of that steam to escape. That might be all for now for my terminology. I might throw in another word or two in there, and I'll try to define it as I go if I haven't already defined it. So let's get back to the process of creating sourdough. So sourdough, like I said, it starts with that starter. If you don't have a friend that can give you a sourdough. Starter, then you would have to begin that process at home. This process is gonna take, I would say, probably four to five days to produce that starter before you can start creating a loaf of bread. So if you do have someone that you know that makes sourdough. And can give you that starter. You can skip right to making the bread. But how you create the starter is you're gonna mix two tablespoons of water and two tablespoons of flour and a mason jar, you're gonna not wanna cover it because you do want it to get to the air, but you want, you wanna cover it enough where like bugs or gnats can't get in there. So I'll use like a paper towel or a. Like a cloth and cover the top.'cause you want it to be able to breathe. That's all you do on day one. Day two, you're gonna feed your starters. So you're gonna remove one tablespoon of the starter, and then you're gonna feed it two tablespoons of water, two tablespoons of flour. Make sure that when you're removing any discard from your starter, that you do not put it down your sink because it can clog your sink. So if you're getting rid of that starter, just throw it in the trash can. So that you don't end up messing up your plumbing in your house. All right? Day three, you're gonna repeat that process. Take out a tablespoon, add in two, add in two. At day four and five, you're gonna, again, repeat those processes. You'll start to know that your starter is gonna create bubbles and it's gonna start rising and falling on itself. That means that it has caught some of that wild yeast and that is about ready to start cooking with. So once you start to see that it's rising and falling, you're gonna wanna start feeding every 12 hours. A lot of people will actually name their starter because it's basically a pet at this point.'cause you're trying to keep it alive and On the Homegrown extension website, there's a great video that you can watch to help you with this process. If you wanna start doing this at home, and I'll post a link to that in the show notes. Once your starter is active and alive, you can start making bread with it. So you wanna feed your starter 12 hours before you use it to make your bread. You're gonna combine a third of a cup of the sourdough starter, one and a half cups of warm water, not hot. And then you're gonna add. Three and two thirds cup of all purpose flour, and then a one and three fourths teaspoon of salt. You're gonna mix all your ingredients together until a dough is formed. Then you're gonna begin your stretch and folds. I like to do at least three to four sets of stretch and folds spaced out 15 minutes apart. Some people will do them longer. For me, it's a, it's a texture feel. Once I can feel that, that dough is really elasticized and that gluten is gonna be able to catch those CO2 bubbles produced from the starter, I feel comfortable enough to let it sit and ferment. Then you are gonna wanna use an oiled bowl. So just take a bowl and put some oil on it. You are gonna put your dough in there. Cover it and let it rise at least four hours, and then you can place it in the fridge overnight. The next day, you're gonna preheat your oven to 500 and put in your dish that you're going to use to cook it in. I like to use a cast iron or enamel cast iron pot that I have at home with a lid. You're gonna score your loaf. So basically cut your loaf, reset your oven to 4 75, take out that pot that was preheating in there. You're gonna cook your loaf at 4 75 for 25 minutes, take off your lid, lower it to three 50, bake another 25 minutes, and then you wanna allow it to cool before cutting, which to me, for my family is probably the hardest part that cooling. Part because when you cut into bread too quickly after it's baked it, it releases a lot of the steam, the trapped in steam, which is the moisture in the bread. So it's gonna make the bread. Dry out faster. That recipe that I just gave you is from the NC State Homegrown, which again, I will attach in the show notes. It's not actually the recipe I use at home. I have one memorized in my head and I like to use a scale to measure it produces less dishes, which is really nice. And I just feel like when you're baking. Sometimes people don't measure properly if they're using measuring cups. And if you're using a scale, you just get a more accurate measurement. So the recipe I use at home is 500 grams of flour, 300 grams of water, 100 grams of sourdough starter, and then I do a teaspoon of salt, which is about six grams of salt. I just have this recipe memorized in my head so I don't have to constantly look it up. I use all purpose flour, but I have found that my loaves turn out better when I'm using bread flour'cause it has a higher gluten content, but it is a little more expensive. So I use whatever type of flour I have on hand at home. But again, bread flour will produce usually a better product. Now this is the most basic information that I can give you when talking through the process. You can get really in depth about sourdough and talk about d hydration and other information that you might find on the internet. I encourage you to do some of your own research, watch some videos, take a class. You will get a really good idea of what you're doing before starting the process, especially if you're a visual learner, if you watch those videos and or take a class on it. On the homegrown NC State Extension YouTube channel, they have quite a few videos on. Sourdough. When I started my sourdough journey about five years ago, that's exactly what I did. I found videos, I started my own research, and then that's how I started that process. So let's go back to our starter for a second, because. I know for me, I'm not producing a loaf every 12 hours, so I don't want to continually have to feed my sourdough starter every 12 hours if I'm not creating a loaf of bread. So what I actually do with mine is I store it in the fridge. I will store mine in the fridge, that way I don't have to feed it every 12 or 24 hours. And I usually will feed it once. A week or so. So I'll take it out. If I'm gonna create a loaf of bread 24 hours before I will feed it, and then I will let it sit for 12 hours. I'll feed it again, I'll discard feed it again, and then after that second feeding. After 12 hours, after that, I will start to make bread with it. I've had great success with this. One thing you will notice though, if you let your sourdough sit long enough, is it'll create this black liquid. That does not mean it's bad. That is hooch. It's an alcohol that's produced. What you wanna do with that is you just stir it back in and then feed it. It is not mold, it is not gonna hurt it, it just means your sourdough starter's hungry and needs to be fed. So it's a perfectly normal side effect of letting it sit in the fridge. So I just stir it in, feed it. And then go on my way. Now, if you do see mold growing on your starter, you will indeed need to throw it away and start over. That starter is no longer good if there is any mold growing on it. Another topic which I could probably do an entire podcast episode on is the discard. A lot of people, including me, have a hard time throwing that discard away'cause it just seems like you're wasting food. There are tons and tons and tons of recipes on the internet for specifically sourdough discard. I'm gonna attach some recipes for discard in the show notes, but if you don't wanna just toss that. In the trash can look up some recipes. I've seen recipes. For crackers, we make a biscuit that's not a fermented sourdough biscuit, but it uses the sourdough discard as like a substitute for buttermilk, basically in a biscuit. So there's lots of different things that you can do with that discard and. I don't want you to get overwhelmed with all this'cause there is a lot that goes into making sourdough and I know that this process can seem a bit daunting, but once you get into the swing of things, you can create beautiful homemade bread and it's not very difficult at all. And if you have any questions about any of this, please feel free to contact me at our Polk County Extension office. And I look forward to talking to you next month on the Extension Connection Podcast.