Sourdough Bread Recipe

OK -- here is the bread recipe for the sourdough sponge that I wrote about yesterday. Unlike most sourdough sponges, you do use all of the sponge in this recipe for the bread.

So, take your fermented sponge and stir it down, then add 3 cups of flour (white or wheat or a mix) -- add 1 cup at a time until it all comes together being careful not to add too much flour and make the dough too stiff & dry. You can use a KitchenAid mixer to mix and knead the dough if you like. You would knead with the dough hook until the dough forms a ball on the hook, and is no longer very sticky. If you knead by hand, add enough flour so that it is no longer sticky, and when pinched a little, the dough feels like an earlobe. You'd knead by hand for about 10 minutes.

Grease a wooden, glass, or stoneware bowl, put the dough in, then turn over the dough so that the greased side is up. Cover the bowl with plastic wrap and/or with a towel. If you like, while you're kneading the dough, turn your oven on to 150 degrees and let it warm. Place the bowl with the dough into the oven and leave the oven at 150 degrees, also, you can place a shallow pan of water in the warmed oven to aid in the dough rising. Let the dough rise about 60 to 90 minutes until double in size. Punch down, and divide the dough into two 8 x 4 inch bread pans (cast iron bread pans work great), cover with a towel and return to the warm oven. Let rise until double, which will take about 60 minutes.

Take the bread pans out of the oven as well as the shallow pan of water if using, and preheat the oven to 425 degrees. You can leave the dough loaves as is, or you can take a very sharp knife and make 3 shallow diagonal slices on the top of the loaves so that the tops don't crack while baking. This is just optional. Place the bread into the oven when it is heated up, close the door of the oven, wait 15 seconds, open the oven door and spritz a little water onto the floor of the oven, close the door, wait 30 seconds and repeat with another spritz of water. This will give the crust a texture of French bread when finished baking. Bake the bread for about 35 to 40 minutes, checking at about that time to see if it's done. Rap on the loaves and if they sound hollow and are browned, then they are done. Remove bread from pans immediately, and place on a rack for cooling, and cover with a towel.

Hopefully soon I'll get my digital camera up and rolling and be able to post some pix of when I make this bread and other recipes.

Happy Bread Making!