Wild Bread: That's Sourdough

Making sourdough once was a complicated process, up to twelve tricky steps and many days. However, with our new scientific understanding of sourdough you can produce an artisan sourdough loaf with less than 30 minutes active time in the kitchen, after you have developed a starter. The main secret of high quality artisan sourdough is in the starter, a truly wild one based on solid science. Other secrets are the use of natural ingredients, extensive use of parchment for ease of handling soft dough, the slow low temperature development of the dough allowing the microorganisms and enzymes naturally present in the flour to do their work and last of all baking in a Dutch oven to best duplicate the conditions in a French steam oven. This e-book will guide you through how to build a sourdough starter and new techniques for the home bread baker. The introduction will take you on a historical journey of bread followed by numerous recipes representing the entire range of sourdough baking...breads, rolls, biscuits, pancakes, pastries and desserts! Sourdough baked goods keep longer, taste better, are more easily digestible and there is much evidence that sourdough consumption confers better health as well.