Note: This recipe assumes you already have an established sourdough starter and a kitchen scale.
Ingredients
- 120g sourdough starter
- 1 1/3 cups warm filtered & non-chlorinated water
- 500g (about 4 cups) and 50g (1/3 cup) organic or unbleached all-purpose or bread flour, separated
- 2 tbsp sea salt
Directions/Rough Timeline
DAY 1
8:00pm: If starter has been stored in fridge and properly maintained, remove from fridge the night before preparing a loaf and feed. (50g water & 50g flour. Stir into starter.) Let sit on counter loosely covered overnight.
DAY 2
9:00am: In a bowl, combine 120g starter and 1 1/3 cups water. Stir gently to break up the starter until mostly combined.
Add 500g flour and 2 tbsp sea salt. Combine with spatula into "shaggy dough", aka "just combined". There WILL be clumps of flour throughout.
Cover with damp towel and let sit on counter for 1 hour.
10:15am: Uncover. Wet fingers with cold water. Reach under dough to unstick from bottom of bowl. With bowl in front of you, grab edge of dough furthest from you and gently pull upwards about 2 inches, then fold over towards you. Spin bowl 90 degrees and repeat. Do this 2 more times so the bowl completes a full 360 degree spin. Recover and let sit for 20 minutes. Repeat this 2-4 times.
11:00am: Shape slightly better into a ball and place into a new, clean bowl. Cover with plastic or beeswax. Let sit on counter 6-12 hours. (Warmer location = less time). When it's ready for the next step, it will be puffed and bounce back when gently poked with a wet finger.
7:00pm: Uncover dough. Wet hands. Pull dough out by grabbing underneath it in the center so it folds in half over your hands. Place onto lightly floured surface. Gather sides together and pull together on top. Brush with flour. Turn it over and brush with more flour. Create a tighter ball by scooting it toward you and gathering it underneath.
Line a clean domed bowl with a smooth towel (like a tea towel, not a hand towel) and liberally sprinkle towel with flour. Place dough within bowl smooth side down. Cover and seal with plastic wrap. Place in fridge to rise for 12 hours. (Can also leave out of fridge to rise for 30 min)
DAY 3
7:00am: Remove from fridge and allow to warm up. Place baking pan or dutch oven in oven and set oven to 500 degrees. Allow baking pan to preheat with oven for 1 hour. (I attempted to do this with a dutch oven and the lid would not come off so I ended up having to bake the loaf in a regular bread pan. Don't do what I did. Leave the lid off, but still in the oven. Or just use a bread pan right away cuz that worked fine, too.)
8:00am: Uncover dough and sprinkle flour on "bottom" where it was pinched together. Put parchment paper over it and flip the bowl over. Remove bowl and towel. Lightly score top of bread for expansion. (Supposedly a razor blade works best for this as opposed to a knife).
Remove baking pan from oven and place dough into it, parchment paper and all. If you are using a lid, cover.
Place into oven for 20 minutes, then reduce heat to 450 degrees. If there's a lid, remove lid at this time. Bake for 20 more minutes.
9:00am: Remove from oven. Carefully tip loaf from pan. (How do you know it's done? It should be golden brown and if you knock on the bottom of the loaf, it should sound hollow). Place on wire wrack and ALLOW TO COOL FOR 4-6 HOURS even though I know it's killing you inside.