Herb And Tahini Sourdough Bread Recipes

Steps:

• Sauté the herbs, garlic, and pepper in olive oil and set aside to cool. If you want impressive garlic power, use all four cloves (or more) and just warm the minced garlic in the oil. If you want muted garlic flavor, you can reduce the quantity of garlic and/or heat to the point of softness.
• Measure and prepare in a bowl the dry ingredients of the dough, including the cheese.
• Add the water, starter and sautéed ingredients to the dry ingredients and mix.
• Cover the dough and set it aside at room temp for one hour.
• After one hour, stretch and fold the dough four times as per the first video here. To summarize the video instructions: scrape the dough loose from the bowl with a wet scraper, lift it out with two hands, fold it in thirds. Then do the same from the opposite sides of the dough.
• Put the dough back in the bowl, cover and set a timer for twenty minutes.
• Repeat this three more times. This is four stretch and folds over the course of the second hour since mixing (1:00, 1:20, 1:40 and 2:00 hours). You should notice a big difference in the pliability of the dough over the course of the stretching and folding.
• Let dough ferment for an additional 6-12 hours depending on room temp (that is 8-14 hours total since mixing up the dough).
• Scrape the dough out of its bowl onto a well-floured counter. Gently spread the dough into a rectangle. Fold the dough in thirds and then in half. See this Breadtopia video for more details on folding and shaping.
• Let the dough rest for 15 minutes while you wash the dough bowl and prep your proofing basket. I sprinkled flour directly into an oval coiled rattan basket.
• Flour your hands and the dough, flip the dough, tuck under the edges while rotating it to create a batard shape.
• Lay your dough in the basket, seam side down and cover.
• Put the basket in the refrigerator for about 10 hours (up to 20) OR leave the basket at room temperature for about 1 hour.
• Preheat the oven and your baking vessel to 500 F for thirty minutes before the proofing time is up.
• Flour your hand and flip the dough out of the basket, and place it into the hot baking vessel. Score it with a razor or allow the existing seams to open up.
• Bake until the internal temp is around 205 F.
• 30 minutes at 500 degrees, lid on.
• 10 minutes at 450 degrees, lid off.
• Variations
• Eliminate the stretching and folding. The loaf may be a bit flatter, but the crumb will still be open and the taste delicious.
• Reserve the herb-garlic sauté until after the bulk fermentation, and then spread it onto the dough when you fold it in thirds. This works best if you strain or squeeze out the oil from the sauté. The crumb will have a swirly pattern of herbs.
• Use mozzarella cheese cut in chunks instead of provolone. The crumb will be open from the melting chunks and the cheese flavor is milder. Consider adding an additional 1/2 tsp of salt.
• Use provolone in slices that you add after the bulk fermentation and while folding in thirds. This creates a strange crumb with long open layers.
• (Pictures of these variations are below the photographic instructions.)

Steps:

• In a large bowl, combine flour, salt and butter. Mix lightly with your fingertips until dough forms pea-sized pieces. Stir in milk and lightly knead until dough forms a ball. Transfer dough to a buttered bowl, cover with plastic wrap, and let rest 1 hour.
• On a lightly floured board, shape dough into a log and divide into 8 pieces. Roll each piece into a ball and place on the floured board under a slightly damp towel for 30 minutes.
• Stir together the tahini, maple syrup and melted butter, and set aside.
• Roll four of the dough balls into 7-inch rounds, and coat the surface of three of the rounds with a thin layer of the tahini mixture and stack them on top of each other. Place the fourth, uncoated round on top and press the edges together to seal the stack. Place a towel over the top and repeat process with remaining four dough balls. (You should have extra tahini mixture left over). Let them rest for 30 minutes.
• Place one of the stacks on a lightly floured board, sprinkle with a little flour and gently roll into a larger 9-inch round, about 1/4-inch thick. Spread half of the remaining tahini mixture over the top, and roll up like a jelly roll. Use a sharp knife to cut into 4 pieces and place them under a towel. Repeat with remaining round. Let them rest for 15 minutes, then roll each piece of dough into a 6-inch square.
• Heat a cast iron skillet or griddle over medium heat and brush lightly with the melted butter. Place one square of dough in the skillet and cook for about 1 minute, or until dough begins to bubble and turn light brown. Brush bread lightly with melted butter, flip and bake other side for 30 seconds to a minute, or until slightly crisp on the outside but still soft. Transfer bread to a plate, cover with foil to keep warm, and cook remaining bread.
• Serve hot, drizzled with warm maple syrup.

Steps:

• Autolyse
• Mix the flours and water until incorporated. Cover and set aside 30-90 minutes.
• Measure your additions and set them aside unless you're doing all-in mixing.
• Adding Starter and Salt
• Sprinkle the salt on your dough, fold the dough over itself, and add the starter to the top of the dough.
• Work the salt and starter into the dough with both hands by gently pressing, stretching and squeezing. Pause if the dough starts to tear. When the dough is smooth and uniform, cover and let rest 30 minutes.
• Gluten Development, Additions, and Bulk Fermentation
• Do four rounds of gluten development with 30-minute rests in between. I recommend stretching and folding for the first round, lamination with additions for the second round, and coil folding for the last two rounds. Videos of these techniques can be found here.
• When putting the additions into the dough, you can fold and press them in, or dab them around the dough when it is stretched into a large rectangle during lamination. During the final two coil folds, the additions will spread more evenly through the dough.
• The dough should begin to feel bubbly and crackly by the final coil fold.
• When the dough has increased in size by 60-70%, it's ready to shape. My dough fermented about 5 hours at warm temps (low 80s) on a Raisenne dough heating pad. Depending on your starter strength and dough temperature, the first rise may be shorter or longer.
• Shaping
• Scrape your dough out of the bowl onto a lightly floured work space.
• Gently stretch it into a small rectangle and shape it into a batard, boule, or oblong loaf depending on your proofing basket shape.
• Flour your basket and place the dough inside seam-side up.
• Final Proof
• Numerous proofing strategies are valid. For this loaf, I proofed at room temperature for 30 minutes, and then in the refrigerator for 14 hours. I baked the dough straight from the refrigerator without warming it up first. You can also proof the dough entirely at room temperature; 1-2 hours should be sufficient. The dough should expand 1-2 cm up the sides of the basket.
• Baking
• Preheat your oven and baking vessel to 500F for at least 30 minutes.
• Flip the dough out of the proofing basket and onto a sheet of parchment paper or onto the base of your hot baking vessel. Score the dough, then cover and return the vessel to the oven.
• If your baking vessel is a ceramic cloche, bake at:
• 500°F for 20 minutes, lid on
• 450°F for 5 minutes, lid on
• 450°F for 10 minutes, lid off
• If your baking vessel is cast iron, bake at:
• 500°F for 15 minutes, lid on
• 450°F for 10 minutes, lid on
• 450°F for 10 minutes, lid off
• At the 15-minute mark, place a baking sheet directly under the cast iron on the same shelf. This will prevent the base of the bread from burning.
• When baking is complete, the bread should have an internal temperature of at least 205F and it should sound hollow when you knock on the bottom of the loaf.

Steps:

• Autolyse
• Mix the flour and water together in a bowl, cover, and let sit for 1-2 hours.
• Mixing, Gluten Development, and Bulk Fermentation
• Add the sourdough starter, salt, and oil to the dough. Fold the dough over itself and press and stretch the dough to work in these ingredients. Pause if the dough starts to tear.
• Give the dough a few minutes of Rubaud mixing (video above) to strengthen and fully mix it. When the dough is smooth and uniform, cover and let it rest 30 minutes.
• Do four rounds of gluten development such as coil folding, with 30-minute rests in between. During the first round of folding, I transferred my dough to a straight-walled container to track the rise. Stretching and folding or coil folding work nicely on this dough. There is a video link after this recipe if you want to see gluten development techniques on an even wetter dough.
• Let the dough rise until it has expanded by 70-80%. For a warm dough (low 80s), this was about 5 hours after mixing in the sourdough starter. At cooler temps, this may take longer.
• If you'd like to retard the dough i.e. refrigerate it overnight before shaping, do this at about 60% dough expansion, and let the dough warm up again in the morning for about an hour before shaping.
• Shaping and Final Proof
• Prep a piece of parchment paper that is about the size of your baking stone or steel (an upside-down baking sheet can be used if you don't have a stone or steel, but beware of temp limits on non-stick sheets).
• Heavily flour your work surface and then gently scrape the dough out onto it.
• Use a bench knife to shove some of the flour under the oozing dough as you stretch the dough into a rectangle that's about 1 inch think. With your hands, lift and maneuver the dough to determine that none of it is stuck to your work surface. If it is, add more flour to your bench knife and work it underneath the dough.
• Heavily flour the top of your dough and then cut it into two long narrow strips.
• Sprinkle flour on the two cut surfaces and ensure they are not sticking to your work surface.
• With a bench knife and a dough scraper (spatula might work too), scoop up both ends of a dough and transfer it to the sheet of parchment paper. The dough will scrunch up but as you lay it down, you can stretch it out again like an accordion. Repeat with the other dough.
• Flour the tops of the doughs again and cover with a tea towel.
• Let proof for about 1 hour or longer if your dough is cool. My dough was in the low 80s.
• Baking
• Set up your oven with a baking stone or steel on the second-to-lowest shelf and a cast iron pan (for steam) on the highest possible shelf, likely the second from the top.
• Preheat this oven setup for about 45 minutes at 500F.
• When the final proof is complete, brush off any excess flour on the doughs, and slide the parchment paper onto a peel or baking sheet with open sides like this one or upside-down baking sheet.
• Boil 1 cup of water and set it near your oven.
• Load the doughs onto your baking stone. Wearing oven mitts to prevent steam burns, pour the boiling water into the cast iron pan and close the oven door.
• Bake for 10 minutes at 500F.
• Lower the oven temperature to 410F and bake for 20 minutes more.
• If you want a darker crust, feel free to bake longer.
• Turn off the oven, crack open the oven door, and leave the bread inside for another 10 minutes. This helps the crust get more crunchy.