Easy Sourdough Boule
Every humans alive has the capacity to bake a loaf of bread. It's written into the fabric of our ancestral story. This easy sourdough Boule is where we continue that story. It comes together with flour, water, salt and naturally leavened yeast, and no mixer. Baked in a Dutch oven. Leaving you with a crust that is chewy and firm, and a crumb that is soft and pillow-ey with just the right amount of tang.
Ingredients
- 950 grams of unbleached all-purpose flour
- 650 grams of Filtered Water - We use a Berkey Water Filter
- 200 grams of mature sourdough starter Active and bubbly
- 20 g of a good Quality Salt- I use this Pink Himalayan Sea Salt or this Celtic Sea Salt
Instructions
- Make sure your starter has been fed within the last 12 hours- It needs to be active and bubbly. I like to feed my starter before bed, and mix up my ingredients in the morning.
- In the morning, weigh out room temperature filtered water into the bowl that you will be working with for the remainder of this process. Then add you're active starter. The starter will float in the water if it's active. I use a whisk to mix it all together.
- Weigh out the flour and salt and add into the starter/water mixture. At this point I use my hands. I mix it all together until it's fully incorporated. This is not kneading, this is simply mixing it together. It should be kind of a doughy blobby mess at this point. Have no fear. Place a tea towel over your bowl and let it rest for 30 minutes on the counter. This 30 minutes is considered an autolyse. A technical word that means letting the flour soak up the water.
- After your flour has soaked up the water it will be a little easier to work with. Now you will perform a series of stretch and folds. After you perform the first series, cover with a tea towel and let it rest again for another 30 minutes. Then perform a second series of stretch and folds, and cover with a tea towel. Then, after 15 minutes you can do a third set. Every 15 minutes after that until 6 sets of stretch and folds have been performed.
- Stretch and Fold Schedule for a Sourdough Boule:
- After a 30 minute Autolyse Stage- Stretch and Fold
- 30 min. - Stretch and Fold
- 15 min. - Stretch and Fold
- 15 min. - Stretch and Fold
- 15 min. - Stretch and Fold
- 15 min. - Stretch and Fold
- Next, place a damp tea towel or beeswax wrap or plastic wrap over your bowl and let sit on the counter. I use a damp tea towel. Let is rise and ferment on the counter until the evening.
- After your dough has been proofing most or all day, with wet hands turn your dough onto a clean counter top. With a bench scraper cut your dough down the middle so you now have two mounds of dough. Now one at time, pull the sides of the dough into itself and flip over. Then take your hands around the sides and pull towards you and turning at the same time to create a nice round loaf. Do this same technique with the other dough mound. Cover with the tea towel and let sit for 15-20 minutes.
- If you are using bowls, place tea towels inside the bowls. Then uncover your loaves and one at a time slide your bench scraper underneath the loaf and flip into the bowl/banneton basket. Repeat with other loaf. Your loaves should be upside down in the banneton/bowl. Place your banneton or bowls inside the plastic bags and tie the bags, releasing any air.
- Now, you will transfer the plastic bagged wrapped bowls into the fridge overnight.
- In the morning, place the Dutch oven with the lid on, in the oven on the middle rack, and preheat your oven to 500 ℉. While your oven is preheating, take one loaf at a time out of the fridge (unless you have two Dutch ovens, you can only bake one loaf at a time). Turn your dough out of the banneton/bowl onto a piece of parchment paper. When your oven is preheated, take your Dutch oven out of the oven, and take the lid off. Grab both sides of the parchment paper creating a sling around the bread and gently place the bread in the Dutch oven. Place the lid back on, and put the Dutch oven back in the oven. Set a timer for 20 mins.
- After 20 minutes, take the lid off and keep baking until golden brown. This varies depending on your oven, but anywhere from 10-20 minutes. I begin checking the bread at 10 minutes.
- My family can never wait to start slicing into a fresh loaf. But at the very least wait for it to cool enough that you don't burn yourself and ENJOY!