I really love bread, and since recently more and more articles about the dangers of modern yeast have begun to appear, I decided to make the sourdough myself. I will say right away that I am very pleased with the result, the bread turned out, and it turned out very tasty, much tastier than any store. And, most importantly, it is useful, and I know exactly what the composition is. And what a scope for imagination. Of course, you should not eat it in large quantities in the active phase of losing weight, because it is still high-calorie and satisfying, but what could be tastier in the morning of fragrant bread with a crispy crust, soft inside ?!

Perhaps my bread is not quite perfect in appearance, but I will experiment more than once, because the sourdough that I prepared is eternal. She is "alive", stored in the refrigerator and every 1-2 weeks she needs to be "fed". At first it may seem that all this is long and complicated, but, in fact, it is elementary and the effort is definitely worth it!

So, how to make sourdough starter with whole wheat flour?
On the first day, mix 50-70 g of whole grain flour with warm water. The consistency should be like sour cream. Cover the container with a towel and leave in a warm place for a day.
On the second day, add the same amount of flour and water, mix and leave again in a warm place. On the third day we do the same. You may need three or four days. The sourdough is ready when a lot of small bubbles appear in it. Now you can make bread out of it. Let's make a brew first.

How to make a dough for sourdough bread?!
We take 4-5 tbsp. sourdough, add flour and water so that the consistency is like thick sour cream. Cover with a towel and put in a warm place overnight. Pour the remaining starter into a jar, make holes in the lid (to "breathe") and store in the refrigerator. It is recommended to feed the sourdough once a week - from a part you make a new dough for bread, and add flour and water again to the rest.
During the night, the dough should rise and fall. In the morning, you can already make bread dough from it.

How to make healthy sourdough bread?
In 1/2 cup of warm water, add 1 tsp. honey, pour into the dough, mix. Then add salt, 2 tbsp. olive oil (or any other to your taste), and then to taste: spices, seasonings, etc. Then pour in the flour. I added wheat bran. Baked from whole wheat and corn flour. Knead the dough, leave for 2-3 hours - it should rise.
When the dough is ready, form the bread. I smeared with beaten egg yolk and sprinkled with poppy seeds (baked challah), but this is not necessary. Bake bread at 200 degrees for 40-60 minutes. The time will depend on the size of the bread and your oven. Check readiness with a wooden stick. It is not recommended to open the oven for the first 20 minutes. It is best to put a bowl of water down the oven during baking - then the bread will turn out even better.

Wrap the finished bread in a towel and leave for several hours.

Bon appetit!

PS: for bread you can cook very tasty

Julia, of course, will raise! Flour is not as important as it seems, especially when you have a normal working sourdough :)

Have a wonderful day! Can you please tell me if the 1c flour dough will rise the dough from whole wheat flour?)

Thanks for the tip! I thought I read the entire blog, but it turns out not the whole one! Thank you

Hope, you can do everything and get a different result that may or may not suit you :) Read this article site/blog/byt-v-forme before making a form
Be in shape - BREADERS

Elena, good afternoon! Please guide me how to bake this bread in the form (I didn’t get whole wheat bread as beautiful in the hearth version as yours, they float and the incisions do not open at all, even if I do proofing in the refrigerator). The main question is: is it necessary to mold when laying in a mold, is it necessary to pre-mold, or can the dough be immediately spooned into the molds? Or maybe it is possible to carry out fermentation and proofing immediately in the form, as in the recipe for Lithuanian wheat-rye bread? Whether to make an incision in the form? Thank you in advance!

Hope, very happy 🙏☺️

Thanks a lot for the recipe! This is what I was looking for! Everything worked out the first time, I already had my own starter) Now once a week I bake delicious bread at home. Bless you!

Lyudmila, anyone is good, the main thing is to be strong)

Is the starter rye or wheat?

Lena, thank you very much, I understand!)

Katya, good afternoon! Start from this: salt interferes with the swelling of the protein and inhibits the work of enzymes, therefore, if autolysis is short-lived (30 minutes, for example), then without salt. But if it’s long (5-10 hours and it’s necessary in the cold), salt is needed, otherwise the dough will crawl, especially if there is a lot of tsz-flour)

Lena, good day!
I have been studying for a month now and often take notes on your blog, thank you very much for the sea of ​​\u200b\u200binformation !! So far, unfortunately, there is no stone, so for now I am only making molded ones. But I have a theory question: in many recipes you add salt after autolysis. But in one of the articles you quoted, as far as I remember, Hamelman, that salt should be added just before autolysis, otherwise there will be a taste of "rag"))) And so these words sunk into my soul, that every time I have doubts: when everything salt should be added. (and since my bread is still sooo far from perfection, it will not be possible to evaluate it purely by comparison - my results are too unpredictable every time even without salt...)
Please, clarify this question, which haunts me))

Olga, hello! Sorry, I missed your question for some reason.
Perhaps undercooked if the dough is lush at the same time. Pay attention to this:
- Did you warm the cauldron with the stone?
- Did the dough before shaping, that is, during fermentation, fit well?
- Did it increase visually during proofing? Did you feel the splendor when pressed?
The bread could simply not be baked, because there was not enough time / temperature, or it could loosen poorly. Poorly loosened dough (poorly approached) is poorly baked.

Lena, hello! Thank you so much for the articles and recipes! I baked a whole grain wheat bread today. Outwardly, it turned out to be very nice, it rose (which had not happened before with wheat), the cuts opened up, and a nice crack appeared on the side. Tapped on the bottom - like a booming sound. I rejoiced. The crust, however, seemed pale in comparison with your photos, but the bread looked fluffy and very pretty, which inspired optimism and hope for large pores. Alas, I was happy only before I cut it ... The crumb was raw, unbaked, without holes (((And at the same time it rose noticeably, with such a hat-pea ... Why could this happen? During the kneading, the dough kept its shape, did not float , at proofing for 1 hour 15 minutes at 22 degrees (I deliberately made it colder) it didn’t float, the shape of the kolobok was preserved. tender (olive oil affects) - but raw ... especially closer to the middle. What do you think, why could this be? The heat was not enough? Electric oven, with an upper heating element, baked at 250 degrees for 15 minutes under a hood + 20 minutes without it .or undermixed, gluten did not develop?

Dana, hello!
- It happens that more water is needed for the dough, it depends on the moisture content of the flour.
- If your dough did not become smooth - they simply did not knead it, it becomes smooth, moreover, with any whole wheat flour :)

I kneaded the dough, but it turned out to be a completely different consistency than in the photo. Not a smooth surface. As the kneading progressed, the dough became less smooth. It seems too tight, maybe my flour needs more water?
And the more kneaded, the more sticky the dough became, at first it was almost not sticky. What's wrong?
I deviated a little from the recipe: I ran out of whole wheat flour, so I had to add 60 g of white instead of whole grain. And I also added soaked sunflower and pumpkin seeds 60 g.

Ilnara, hello! You can proof on a dense, lint-free cloth, sprinkle with flour and provide lateral support to the bread. This is how ciabatta and baguettes and often any hearth bread are stirred)

Hello, what should I do if there is no such utensil for proofing? How can I replace it?

Alex, actually, everything is quite simple :)
1) If you bet at night, take about 5% starter for sourdough, that is, 5 gr. per 100 gr. flour, this will be enough to ripen for about 10 hours at a temperature of 23-25 ​​degrees. The sourdough will not ferment much, even if it falls off a little. In addition, as it ferments, gluten is destroyed in it and in structure it becomes more like rye.
2) If it is difficult for you to determine visually or using the float method, smell the sourdough and taste it, the lactic smell and sour taste will indicate that the sourdough is ready. However, it will most likely be quite loose.
3) It is difficult to talk about the degree of sourness on the Internet, but there should not be much acid in wheat bread, it should not be felt brightly, but easily, like a nuance of taste.
4) Make steam either using a cap / cauldron / bowl, or heat a cast-iron pan at the bottom of the oven and, having put the bread in the oven, immediately splash about 2/3 cups of boiling water into this pan. You can look for a hole in the top of the oven for steam and moisture to escape and plug it with foil.
This method works if you heat up the oven well (and for a long time) and, if it heats correctly in your oven, if convection turns off in your oven. If not, then just a cap. Saucer with water - do not bother at all, it does not play any weather.
The upper heating element without steam will make the crust burnt and not tasty)

Thanks for your reply, Lena! Yes, it’s not the same with foil, it’s better to put a saucer with water at the beginning without it, I read it somewhere here, I already tried it, though I don’t know how much it worked - the usual crust came out. I’ll still try to turn on the upper fire in the oven for the last 10 minutes, this is how they do it, I apologize for the stupid question? As for the sourness - apparently this is how it should be in normally fermented bread - in fact, this bread is the first where I withstood the right time for both fermentation and proofing. At the very beginning, I already tried to bake whole grain wheat bread, but by greatly reducing both fermentation and proofing to 1 hour and 1. That bread came out not at all sour, but very dense. Now I understand that this is wrong too. Yes, of course, I read your article about rye sourdough - very interesting! Another purely practical difficulty for me is that it is only experimentally possible to determine when wheat dough with such and such an amount of rye sourdough will be at its peak - everything depends on many reasons, and if you do it at night, you can easily miss the moment. And if you do it during the day, you almost have to be on duty! I understood one thing for sure, if I add a large spoonful of rye sourdough without a top to 100 grams of wheat flour - the peak is a little earlier than 4 hours. But if a tea or half of it - it is not clear. I put both options at night - in the morning after 10 hours the float test did not work - either there was a peak or it will only be, but it was not even after 12 hours. And I also understood from your very valuable articles that after all, a longer fermentation and, accordingly, a smaller amount of sourdough (I mean the fermentation of dough) is better for taste, right?

Alexey, I don’t like the option with foil at all, it’s better to bake at a good high temperature (230-240 for the first 15 minutes, then you can lower it), and then grease the crust with plenty of water, immediately after the oven. The rind will be shiny, firm, and tastier than no lubrication at all.
The sourness in this bread, if you remove the peculiarities of dough, for two reasons: you have rye sourdough and whole grain flour. Rye sourdough itself is prone to the accumulation of acids, and in small quantities it gives a more noticeable rye flavor and sourness. Plus, whole grain flour and bran contribute to it. But I don’t really like wheat tsz without sourness at all. Ideally, it should be lush, with a slight sourness, but it should not look like rye)
Have you read the article "Rye Sourdough Rules for Wheat Bread"? ;)

Thank you Lena for the suggestion! Although I'm still very far from your perfection. As for baking a hearth bread, it's great, but I still can't quite get the tin bread, but I'm already close to getting a set for a hearth! In the meantime, I tried to bake this recipe again. But I took a lot of sourdough (rye) to speed up the process, about 25 grams - the dough reached its peak in just 4 hours, I used the float test again. I kneaded the dough, left it to ferment for 2.5 hours and then for proofing for 1.5 hours. The dough rose strongly both during fermentation and during proofing - I tried it with my finger - it seems like a lush dough. I bake in a gas oven in the form. I heard somewhere that instead of a saucer with water, you can wrap the form with foil on top for the first 15 minutes - the effect will be even better. That's exactly what I did. Then I removed the foil. The dough still rose in the form by itself. As a result, after cooling, I noticed that the crust crumbles and it is somehow damp - it is the crust. It may be necessary to turn on the upper fire for the last 10 minutes, but then the lower one will have to be removed - this is the design of the oven. And one more thing - the bread still turned out with sourness, not strong, but it is felt. It may take less time to ferment the dough and proof! But then the dough will not rise. Or do you still choose the option of long fermentation, that is, the fermentation of sourdough with a small amount of sourdough? Although there may not be an explicit recommendation here, you should try ..

Alexey, CONGRATULATIONS!!!))) Everything worked out for you, I'm very happy) Here's what I can say:
1) Molded whole grain bread will not be very porous and fluffy, so that it is more fluffy, bake on a stone in a well-heated oven, with steam (under a hood), so that the crust is delicious and beautiful.
2) By pressing the dough at the end of proofing, we evaluate not how the recess returns, but what the fingers feel: splendor, softness, maybe even bubbles under the surface of the dough) Together with other signs: increased in volume, sounds voluminous and empty when tapped on the bottom, this can be considered an indicator that it's time to bake.
3) For tin bread, the proofing should be almost complete, otherwise the roof will tear, so the dough should feel very airy and soft to the touch.
Good luck, hope everything works out :)

Thank you so much Lena for your feedback! While I was waiting for your answer, I tried to bake bread again, but in a smart way, before that I thoroughly read many articles on your site. So, I realized that yes, there is no point in making sourdough 20% of the total volume. I took the same recipe for sourdough wheat bread in the oven. Before that, after reading your article about night proofing step by step, I thought, why not also try to increase the amount of sourdough in the dough and see how many hours the dough really reaches its peak, not relying on the principle until the morning, but make sure experimentally. I used 100g whole grain flour, 100g water and 1 tbsp rye sourdough at the peak - about 22-25 grams. So, the peak of the dough reached after 5.5 hours, the float test confirmed this, although there were not many bubbles in appearance. In addition, I slightly changed the recipe by adding buckwheat flour to whole grain flour at the rate of no more than 15% of the whole grain flour and increased the water too, since the moisture content of the dough with buckwheat flour should be higher. As a result, I added 60g to the dough. buckwheat flour (ground buckwheat), 400 gr. The humidity of the dough turned out to be 75%. Mixed, stood for 30 minutes and kneaded by hand. I must say that the dough turned out to be more moist, but not much stronger than before. Maybe it was necessary to add even more water and bring the humidity up to 85%, but I doubted how such a dough would be kneaded. The dough, in my opinion, was kneaded well - of course, I compare it with my previous experience - it was medium elastic and dense at the same time. I left the dough to ferment for 2.5 hours, during which time it increased by about 2 times. And then, since the time was already late, I removed it for a night proofing, having previously carefully formed it and placed it in a mold (I bake in a mold). In the morning I took it out of the refrigerator after 9 hours. The dough came up a little, not 2 times true. Turned on the oven at the same time. An hour later, when the oven warmed up, I checked the readiness of the proofing (the dough has increased even more during this hour in the kitchen). You recommend pressing with your finger and if the dough is sluggishly springy, then it’s time already - here after pressing the trace was not removed. Probably stopped? However, I put the dough in the oven. As a result, what am I talking about, it turned out to be very soft bread without a hint of sourness. The consistency is still not quite airy, as you would like, that is, there are no obvious holes, but the taste is pleasant. Certainly not perfect, but better than before.

Alexey, hello! We made it))
1) Bread with 40% flour in sourdough will sour in any scenario - there is a lot of sourdough. 20%, as for me (for wheat) is the limit.
2) If the dough has risen a lot in two hours, then you may have misjudged the degree of maturity of the sourdough. Did she smell sour? In theory, it could ferment and settle, then you can not expect bubbles on the surface or inside, especially if you took tsz-flour.
3) After fermentation, the dough is not kneaded and not crushed so much. It is enough that you put it out of the bowl, divide or shape it - you already crush it. Although, for example, this is quite possible for pies, just for bread, we often want to get a more lush and porous crumb.
4) About the taste. In theory, it shouldn't be too sour. It seems to me that here it is necessary to deal with the leaven better, and with the dough. Try to make this bread as described on the site, but look more not at the graph itself, but at the dough: it should be suitable at any stage. become porous, but do not settle. Theoretically, yours could ferment on proofing, 2.5 hours for tsz is quite a lot, especially if it went well during fermentation. Study the dough and sourdough organoleptically: smell and taste, feel, checking the soft dough or rubber, tap the bottom of the bowl with your palm and listen to the sound. Approached dough sounds voluminous, empty, not approached - flat, almost like hitting a table. All this will allow you to get to know him better and better navigate the bread.
Well, knead until gluten develops. The fact that after fermentation the dough becomes less sticky is a common thing, but ideally it should become non-sticky and elastic as a result of kneading))

Hello Lena. Unfortunately, this wheat bread did not come out at all, though I cooked it on rye sourdough. Apparently, I made all the mistakes that are possible. I must say that I feed my sourdough regularly and now it perfectly raises the rye dough. I have already tried to cook wheat bread on it, but with a share of sourdough not 20% of the total flour, but 40%, and when kneading such bread was a good, desired consistency. The only thing is that the resulting bread was sour, a little, but still. And so I decided to make bread according to your recipe at the rate of 20% dough from all flour. I took according to the recipe 100 gr. whole wheat flour, sourdough, though I added a whole teaspoon, 15 grams (I took it at the peak of the sourdough). In the morning, after more than 12 hours, there are almost no bubbles on the dough and visually it almost did not increase, just in case, I checked it and after 8 hours - the same picture. I tried to make a test of the float - a piece of dough immediately sinks. The place where there is a container with dough with a temperature of 24 degrees. Realizing that something was wrong, I nevertheless kneaded the dough. As expected, the dough was very sticky, torn, kneading did not change it much. I left it to ferment, the dough rose a lot, after about 2 hours, oddly enough, pulling out a piece of dough on the table, elasticity and gluten appeared to the touch. Then I took advantage of the situation and kneaded it properly - that is, not just slightly shaped it, but kneaded it, since the first time the dough did not actually knead. After that, I put it in a mold - I bake pan bread. In the form, it almost did not rise - I even increased the proofing time to 2.5 hours, but the same picture. Baked - as a result, the dough is noticeably sour, the consistency is very dense like a cake. Where are the mistakes? Could it be that the dough was not fermented, and not peroxide? Can essentially the second batch I did remove all the bubbles from the dough and cause it to lose consistency? Or is it something else wrong? Annoying!!!

Vitaly, hello! They add it to make the bread a little softer and the butter slows down the staling a little. Well, it can also affect the taste if it has a pronounced aroma)

Elena, hello!
Very often I see in recipes the addition of vegetable oil to whole grain bread.
Tell me, what is the purpose of adding it? And what happens if you don't add it?

Leah, hello! Bake as is, or think about what to replace. I won’t tell you about kvass, because I have no idea what it really is)) Try to put a dough on it first, replacing all the water in it with kvass.

Rosa, unfortunately, I can’t see what kind of music, YouTube has stopped showing such information (

Hello Lena! And tell me please - what to do if there is no stone or cover? How to bake?
And another question - I have an unusual starter (I wanted to make kvass from the remnants of stale black bread, but it didn’t work out). Standing warm on the table in the kitchen (right now). There is a lot of thick, but there is also liquid - about a quarter of the capacity (5 l ") is. Can it be used and what about the proportions then?
I hope you will answer today - it is a pity to throw away the living, but it will not last long.

Elena, please tell me the name of the musical accompaniment on the video here. Thank you in advance.

Ilona Angert, hello! If you are a complete beginner, then most likely you just do not mix the dough, do not develop gluten, so it sticks. How was it mixed? the silicone mat only gets in the way during the kneading)) Do you have a bread machine to knead there and see how the dough with developed gluten looks and feels?

Hello Lena. I am an absolute beginner. Today I baked my first sourdough bread. It was very difficult to work with the dough: it stuck to the dough, to the bowl, to the silicone mat and even to the baking paper. I can't figure out why.

Vera, hello! I answer here too :) Most likely, flour with a part of tsz or tsz in general is very finely ground, with a high sugar-forming ability, so adding it to the dough costs up to 30% somewhere)

Lena, thanks for your reply. There is no data, except that the protein is 14%
All. Flour is very delicate cream color. To the touch is small and without grains. The dough was white, but the crumb after baking was brown. What a mystery. In a mixture with other flour, everything is fine, but in its pure form I'm afraid.

Vera, hello! It is always interesting with you)) If the crumb was dark, then most likely it was tsz, if tsz is finely ground, it is almost white in color. Or some seeded tsz, is there information about the ash content?
What was the crumb? And they don’t write about white malt or malt preparations in the composition?

Lena good afternoon, forgive me for bothering you, but it itches, and without your help I can’t cope. I showed the American Hyaden mill flour in IG, it is super duper traditional in the same fields, using the same technologies, etc. I bought a bread mill and thought that it would behave accordingly. But already when she was kneading the naala dough, she realized that something was wrong, she took 91% of moisture and could still. During the kneading process, the dough was not shiny, but somehow matte and not smooth and speckled to the touch. It’s as if I’m working with tsz flour or semolina, but it’s written bread, in my understanding this is a kind of 1st grade. But when it was fermented, the threads were such when I shifted from the bowl to the table, which I had never seen before. I calmly molded the oval blanks without problems, everything tightened up and did not float, and sent it to the refrigerator for 13 hours. I transferred it to the mold (they rose a little, became shiny, smooth), cut it, everything was as always and into the oven 260 degrees under the lid. I take off the lid, and there the pancake is the most natural, with the second everything is the same. I don't quite understand what happened. If this is tsz flour of especially fine grinding - or a kind of such flour, then where is the mistake - in a long cold proofing or high temperature? The crumb of the pancake was the same color as yours in this post, which is why I am inclined to the version that it is still a special kind of flour. How do you think? If this is really tsz, then the second pack will be waiting for you, because only you can appreciate it (it's true)

Igor, I repeat here about the bowl. Cover with a floured cloth. And in the process of baking, yes, or steam, or a cap. The cap is also steam humidification, one of ways. It locks in the moisture that the bread evaporates during baking and moistens the crust.

Ludmila, hello! As for the opening, it's also about the cap (baking conditions), and the molding, it should be tight with a strong tension on the surface of the dough, which is possible if you knead well. Well, the cuts themselves should be made with a convenient sharp blade)

I don’t understand, then remove the cap (or remove the steam !!!
those either with steam or under a hood?

Can I use a glass bowl instead of a proofing basket?

Great recipe. The bread came out right the first time. The only thing is I can not achieve such a disclosure of the crust. Looks like I'll have to buy a cap. Thanks to your team! I am a regular customer.

Peter, thank you very much :)) And according to the conditions of fermentation, if everything suits you, the dough does not float, you like the taste, then do it! Everyone has their own way to bread :)

By the way, he began to upset in the warmth, at a temperature of 30-35 gr. Approximately 40-60 minutes, everything rises perfectly, and does not blur. True, I use strong grain for flour, if you finely sift it turns out rubbery bread and does not gain taste, but for whole grain it is just right.

Thanks, already tried it. I liked the safe bread more, it turns out richer. And pancakes from leftover sourdough are something in general. Your blog is a real treasure. Keep writing, and from the video I'm bastard))

Peter, hello! And look, please, here in the blog about "safe" sourdough testing. And think about cold proofing, it can be very convenient. There is an article "Cold Proofing Step by Step" that may not be useful to you.

Elena, hello! I noticed that you bake all the bread in 2 stages, first a large amount of dough, and then about 6 hours for bread. Do you have any recipes from the bins not for housewives, but for very busy people?) To knead the dough in the evening, shape it in the morning, leave it for an hour and a half and put it in the oven?)

Bake molded! The main thing is that it brings you joy and inspiration, that it is tasty and healthy! On the contrary, I still won’t come to the form, I go from complex to simple - in the same tortuous ways))

In general, in your new article about undermining the crust, you are right in everything))) in my case, all factors are present))). But I decided not to be driven, I can’t carry it to the market))) I’ll bake with molds, and that’s all !!!

Thanks, Len, it's so nice that you answer))) don't think that I'm criticizing!!! I clarify for myself))) It turns out that I usually leave it to the last, because I’m afraid that suddenly it won’t bake inside, and probably that’s why the cuts haven’t opened so beautifully yet ... We need to somehow find a middle ground)))

Ira, hello! If everything was so unambiguous and simple with the opening of the cuts, if it depended only on the degree of proofing)) It should be the way you like it, the way you like it, proceed from this. I love beautiful bread, I love it when it turns out better than yesterday, but these are my personal criteria, etc., they may not coincide with someone else's. At the same time, the proofing should be such that the bread does not tear anywhere and that the crumb has time to loosen and cease to be dense - this is just critical.

Len, hello. And tell me, I thought that if the bread opens up so much during baking, then probably it was necessary to stand still, to distance better. And if it doesn’t open up very much, but the top just rises in the oven, then it’s just right))) It turns out, on the contrary?)))

Kuznetat, hello! I took unrefined mustard, it was felt in the finished bread, and it was delicious for me and everyone who tried it. Similarly to vegetable - I take either raw, unrefined, or fragrant, it manifests itself quite clearly. But with refined it is not very tasty, as if some extraneous tasteless aftertaste appears in the finished bread.

Hello, Elena.
Oil question.
Refined or not?
I baked whole grain with pumpkin seeds, but I don’t like the taste of sunflower oil there (I took refined).
I still don't understand how oil behaves depending on processing. I don't want to spoil the dough.

Hello! ___123___Sourdough Whole Wheat Bread___123___

Natalia, less water is better! If it’s liquid and difficult to work with, make cakes, you don’t even need to melt them: the dough came up, divided, greased with oil, stretched on parchment with your fingers, sprinkled with salt and herbs and put into a heated oven on a stone! Super focaccia turns out))

The dough itself turned out very liquid! Is it better to add water or less water?

Thanks for the answer)

Oksana, hello! Sourdough should always be fresh and at its peak, because it is in this state that it has the most optimal balance of yeast and lactic acid bacteria.

Hello! Please tell me if I need to update the starter if I use it immediately after growing. I have rye. I'm just trying to bake with sourdough for the first time) Thanks in advance

Elena, but they couldn’t make a video on shaping bread, it doesn’t quite work out, I think for this reason, there is little information about shaping!

Alena, in order for the dough to keep its shape, it is necessary to mold it tighter so that there is a tension on the surface of the dough. But, if you want to deviate from the recipe in order to get a dough that is comfortable for you, reduce the amount of water, but do not add flour.

Tell me please, if I do everything correctly according to the recipe, and the dough turns out to be a little liquid or something, that is, when I put it on a baking sheet, it spreads in a layer, and not a round ball ... Maybe you need to step back from the recipe and add more flour so that it kept in shape?

Elena, thank you very much for your blog. My kids can only eat whole grain sourdough bread, and for half a year I baked sour, tough, tasteless crackers instead of bread. And thanks to your advice, to the delight of the children, I finally got delicious, soft, whole grain bread)))) If you have any other recipes for all kinds of cookies and sweet pastries based on whole grain flour, share))) And thank you again for the valuable information)))

Olga, I use the Emile Henry ceramic set as a cap, it is very convenient to bake in it, and there is one in the store, you can have a look. It consists of a bottom and a large cap with a handle. But, in general, the principle is to lock moisture around the bread. You can try to cover the bread with a large bowl, but it will not give you the unique conditions that a well-heated ceramic dish creates, but it still improves the quality of baking.

And under what cap they baked, if I can take a photo of it, I have been looking for a long time with what to cover bread during baking.

Hello! I have already baked bread according to your recipe more than once, thank you very much! Home appreciated). But I decided to replace the flour of the highest or 1st grade with flour of the 2nd grade, but I don’t know how to do it in my mind. The amount of water in the recipe will not change with such a replacement ?

Knead :))) there is twice as much flour as water, as it should be. Successful bread :)

Hello! To refresh the sourdough, I mixed everything according to the recipe, and I got a dense bun of dough. I put it overnight at room temperature (20-21g), overnight it became slightly more magnificent, there are no bubbles. The sourdough is supposed to be like this?? It seemed to me very thick …))) Rye starter. Is everything right to continue kneading the dough?

Ilona, ​​I'll be waiting :))

Okay I will try. Thank you! I'll be sure to post the results here ;)

Ilona, ​​try to take from a source or from a tap. Bottled water can be highly purified from impurities of salts and minerals, and for yeast their presence is very important, for them it is a nutritious material and conditions for normal growth and development. For bread, it is better to take the most ordinary water, it contains about 100-150 mg of these salts and minerals per 1 kg of water, in purified water ten times less. If you don't have a source, fill a large bowl with tap water, leave it overnight to let the chlorine evaporate, and try baking bread with this water.

Thank you very much! I use bottled water, not carbonated.

Ilona, ​​500-100 is really a lot. I'm just trying to understand this issue and understand why this happens. By the way, what kind of water do you use for sourdough and bread?

You know, yes - with a starter volume of about 50-100g, bread is obtained, but sour (I wrote to you in another topic about this). I have a rye sourdough aged about 3 weeks. Operated strictly the above process and recipe, the flour is good. What can be wrong?

Ilona, ​​and if you take more starter, does it rise normally?

So I still can’t get bread with exactly this amount of starter. the starter is perfectly updated, the dough turns out, and as soon as I knead the dough, that's it - the dough barely rises. As a result, grow not 2 hours, but 3 (I baked the bread, but it is not as tall as in your photo. And a little damp inside. What am I doing wrong? ((Tell me, please! (

Hello Alexandra! Room temperature, about 23-26 degrees, but can be higher, up to 30 degrees.

Elena, hello. Can you please tell me at what temperature should the fermentation period take place?

Anastasia, hello! Your bread does not go out of my head, I really want to figure it out. There may be several reasons. I saw in the photo that the bread has a dark brittle crust, and under the crust there is a poorly loosened crumb that has settled, plus a strong temper at the bottom. And you baked in the form or without, it seems that there was some kind of form from below and the bread grew out of it a lot. Can you find out more about what and how you did? I understand that you baked on rye sourdough, can I have an adapted recipe in more detail? With how much and at what temperature the dough fermented and parted and how it looked at the same time, under what conditions it was baked, was it not that you added hot water to the dough? Was there such a thing that the workpiece was hit or shaken before landing in the furnace?
I read about similar defects, if you exclude sourdough, this may be due to low-quality flour from germinated grains or freshly ground, or dried at high temperatures. It may be that the dough came up a little, then it was baked in a very hot oven, a dense crust immediately formed on the bread, the dough in the oven went up sharply, forming a lot of gas, which did not come out due to a strong crust, but remained inside, forming a lot of moisture, because of which the crumb fell right under the crust and hardened. You see, this may be one of the reasons for this very large hole in the bread, but why the dough did not fit well is a question rather of sourdough and fermentation conditions.

Anastasia, I saw your pictures. This is not a defect in proofing, moisturizing, oven or something else external, in my opinion, the problem here is either in the sourdough itself or in the flour. Have you baked anything with yeast or sourdough before with this particular flour other than this bread?

The bread has cooled down .. I cut it .. there was one big air bubble under the top crust .. and under it a layer of unbaked crumb .. I can’t make friends with white breads .. everything is much better with rye 100% ..

Anastasia, hello :) And how is the bread inside, what is the porosity? How does it taste? In general, it is possible that these are the features of the oven and on the one hand it heats more, on the other less.
In addition, there is such an inexplicable thing as the human factor) I somehow trained to bake bricks, I was sure that it couldn’t be easier, but the bread, no matter how I danced around it, strongly undermined on the one hand. And then it started to work out by itself.
Do you make cuts? Revealed? Is there enough moisture at the beginning of baking? What crust does he get? Another reason why bread can tear is the lack of steam at the beginning of baking. I baked ugly bread with a rough pale crust for a long time until I covered it with a large bowl in the first 10-15 minutes of baking.
Can you send me a photo of the bread, if you have them? my mail is thecreep on Yandex (if I write a full e-mail, my comment will not be published, sorry))

Elena, thank you for your detailed response! Today I tried to take into account the comments .. I added 60g less water .. the dough turned out to be of a good consistency .. I baked the oven together with the baking sheet .. I put the bread from the board onto the baking sheet right in the oven .. but it still reared up and tore the side ... I feed the leaven and I update daily, she lives with me at room temperature in a locker ..

P.S. It turned out funny with T9))))

Hello, Anastasia :) I'm glad that you liked the blog, it's very nice)) About the bread. Your dough must have been quite wet since you used w/c? Whole grain flour takes more water, so if you bake with high water, add water not all at once, reduce grams by 30-50. The dough could become loose due to moisture, but you should not make it dry. The bottom of the bread cracked, most likely due to the cold hearth. Did you bake on a baking sheet? Did you preheat the pan with the oven? If you put the bread in a hot oven, but on a cold baking sheet, the bottom will tear - checked many times :)
Try to bake with such proavka, look at the holes :)
Does your sourdough stay in the fridge or at room temperature?

Oh, this T9! .. rye sourdough!! Not terrible..

Thank you for such a helpful blog!! I've been reading for 2 weeks now and can't put it down! I want to try everything! She brought out a terrible sourdough .. it turned out good, strong. I baked bread according to this recipe, only the flour was all ordinary wheat of the highest grade. As I already said, such bread was expiring .. can you help with questions? It tasted delicious, the appearance .. I’ll start with the fact that the workpiece was still blurry .. don’t cover it during proofing, but rather so that the dough dries up? .. and when baking with a plate of water at the bottom of the oven .. my loaf wildly swelled, became so round .. torn from below and bulged out like that.. it turned out so sideways!.. when cut.. very large holes.. just like in volcanic rock.. I can show a photo.. what did I do wrong? Could I have it?

Well :-) the bread is already ready and there is no half a loaf :-) I was very worried about the result, because. the second time I’m baking on sourdough and it’s kind of scary that the dough won’t rise or something will come out wrong ... mmm, everything is ok-very tasty + incredibly useful! Thank you for the recipe and prompt support :-)

I usually bake another 35-40 minutes, but my oven is frail, I baked in another, which keeps the temperature better, the bread baked almost twice as fast. But you know your oven better, look at the bread - by how the bottom and crust blush and, of course, by the total baking time.

It’s clear :-) well, maybe this is something I’ve done, the scales didn’t work yesterday, carrying glasses, tablespoons and teaspoons ...
And how long to bake after lowering the temperature to 200 degrees?

In general, I looked at the ratio of flour and water, it should turn out to be a rather dense dough. I had this if I made a mistake in the calculations and did not notice it myself, and then an error was found out when repeating the recipe. But, in fact, there is nothing to worry about if the consistency is not very different. Ttam, most likely, a difference in 10-15 gr. pain, nothing more.

Thanks for the detailed answer! There was a combination of wheat and rye flour in that bread, but I don’t remember the ratio.
I also wanted to ask, maybe it’s that the dough turned out not to be a ball, but just a viscous mass?
I kneaded the dough now, put it on fermentation, I didn’t find it in the recipe, tightened it with a film, covered it with towels and put it in a warm place?

And what kind of rye did you bake, what was the ratio of rye flour there? The fact is that rye dough is not particularly cut, otherwise there is a high risk that it will corrode, tear or simply fall off during baking, depending on the degree of proofing. The more rye flour in the bread, the worse the gluten of the dough can withstand cuts and retain accumulated gas. But bread made from wheat flour, especially when it contains a lot (30-40% at least) of white flour, can be cut deeply. Again, depending on the proofing. In general, if you follow this recipe one-on-one, then an incision is desirable, but several can be done at once) In general, I'm sorry if it's confusing, I'm just afraid to give some categorical advice without knowing the exact source.

I see. Thanks:-)
I already put the dough for the night :-) :-) :-)
Tell me, do you need to make a deep incision? I baked rzhangy on sourdough, I wanted cuts, maybe very deep ones, the roof was torn a little anyway ...

It’s possible, it freezes wonderfully, like any other bread) I myself do this often, I bake different breads and freeze them in quarters and halfs, in one piece or already cut into slices. I defrost either just at room temperature, or in the microwave, and the bread is like fresh. By the way, for sourdough bread, if it has been baked a lot, freezing is very relevant. As it is stored, it accumulates acid and sometimes it is felt, and so, if you freeze, this will not happen.

Thanks for the recipe! The loaf looks yummy!

Here I continued to study the sourdough, tried to bake bread from the same dough in 2 ways: in a proven way in the form and try to form bread without a form, as it should be according to the recipe ...
I am very pleased with the result, the sourdough is getting stronger and the dough holds its shape better. Sourdough 17 days...

The recipe is also from Carina-forum:
"BREAD FROM WHOLE GRAIN FLOUR ON NATURAL SOURCE

Another successful experiment with NATURAL STEADER -PASTA MADRE- LIEVITO NATURALE DELLE SORELLE SIMILI.

300 g fresh starter
- 300 g whole grain bread flour (I have 14% protein)
- 200 g warm water
- 2 tsp salt

Dilute the starter in warm water (dissolve)
- add flour in parts and knead the dough (slightly sticky to hands)
- leave for 10 minutes, then add salt and knead again
- form a ball, transfer to a bowl, cover with a film and leave for 6-8 hours at 20 C.
- shape the bread, make cuts and bake for 45-50 minutes at 210C.

I cut the bread and put it in the freezer, then Yulchik and I decided to write this recipe anyway, since the technique is a little different. So in the photo there are illiquid crusts that remained unfrozen. With this method of using sourdough and baking, the crumb turned out with uniform holes of medium size. In general, I decided that this sourdough is very grateful, lends itself to experiments and the bread always comes out very tasty.

And now my experiences:

1 time:
Everything is according to the recipe, but the flour was white bread ... The sourdough is 17 days old, I am very pleased with the result:

2 times:
I did everything according to the recipe, with whole grain flour (bran, malt, etc. are also there). There was not much time, so to speed up the process, the dough came up on a warm floor for about 5 hours, then I formed bread and for 20 minutes in a warm oven (about 50 ° ), then into a hot oven ... Everything turned out, but there is no photo ....

3 times:
I made it from "Volkoren extra" (from the magician "at the lions") and from white flour "Pain Blank +" (it is slightly grayish, due to additives). All according to the recipe. The bread turned out to be tall, the sourdough is gaining strength, but now a new problem has arisen: when baking, my bread becomes lopsided and sometimes with small cavities ... probably I need to fold 2 times 3 folds when forming a loaf, i.e. obviously it is necessary to expel excess air and give more time to come up after molding. Otherwise, it will quickly fit in the oven and there will be cavities and skewness ... that's what I think, but how it really is, let's see ...

These are the loaves I have now (this is white bread)

Next time I will try to fold it 2 times in 3 bends in the middle of the test approach and let me come up again.

4 times (02/12/10):
I let the dough rise for 6 hours, it increased by about 2-3 times, folded 2 times in 3 folds, it just turned out to be the right round bread! I gave him another 8 hours (night) at 22 ° to rise. By the morning it was high again, it increased confidently 3 times, the crust of the dough was soft, I also smeared it with water. I baked for 40 minutes, everything is fine, but the crust is hard and dark. After I left the bread to cool on the table in a towel, the bread began to crack! later cracks appeared on the crust! Crumb --- SUPER!
Conclusions:
--- after all, the sourdough is still young, 1.5 months, it is necessary to give more time to rise the dough.
--- after rising 2 times (after 5-6 hours), shape the bread and give time to rise again.
--- lubricate with water before planting (to soften the crust) and cover with foil!!! Mandatory!!!

I've made it a couple of times now and both times it's a little different, but equally delicious. The first time there was not enough whole grain flour according to the recipe, I had to hand-craft and mix regular wheat flour with wheat bran. The bread turned out to be very fluffy, airy, with large holes, it rose perfectly in the oven, with a crispy breathtaking crust. The second time went up less but was no less amazing. I added a little dried apricots for testing and rolled in oatmeal.

The recipe is taken from Jeffrey Hamelman's book "Bread. Technology and Recipes"

For one loaf:

For wheat sourdough:
75 gr. whole grain flour
75 gr. warm water
15 gr. starter

For test:
250 gr. premium flour
175 gr. whole grain flour
270 gr. water
9 gr. salt

Cooking:

For the starter, mix water and flour with the starter in a bowl, cover with cling film and leave overnight.

The next day, add the remaining flour, water, salt to the sourdough. Knead a smooth dough until moderately developed gluten. I don’t have a combine or a bowl, I knead everything with my hands, I even get a certain buzz from it :) I like the dough kneading technique from Richard Bertinet, which allows you to saturate the dough with air as much as possible. Add all additional ingredients like dried fruits (which should be soaked in water for a while, by the way, that is, they should not be hard) add at the end of the batch, knead for a few more minutes until they are evenly distributed in the dough. Roll the dough into a ball, literally with a drop of olive oil to grease its surface, so that later you can easily remove the dough from the bowl. Cover with cling film to keep dough from drying out.

Leave the dough for two to two and a half hours, during which the dough should be kneaded (i.e. folded) twice with an interval of 40 minutes, the dough should rise, it should feel fluffy and soft to the touch. Let him rest for the last half hour.

Form a loaf from the risen dough, lay it down with a seam. Let it stand for 1.5-2 hours, I parted for about three, it depends on the temperature in the room and on the flour. The loaf should roughly double in size. Readiness for baking can be determined by simply pressing the dough. If the dough rises easily after pressing and returns to its original shape, it means that it has not yet risen enough. Make cuts in the bread with a knife or blade.

Bake bread in an oven preheated to 250 degrees with steam. I put a bowl of boiling water on the bottom of the oven, spray the walls, and only then put the bread inside. It is important that the baking sheet on which the bread will be baked is also hot, otherwise the bread may tear at the bottom. I sinned this several times, well, a kind person suggested :) In the first 15 minutes, the bread should rise a lot, especially if you folded it correctly. After 15 minutes, reduce the temperature to 190 degrees, remove the bowl of water from the oven and continue baking for 35-40 minutes. I periodically open the oven door for ventilation. The readiness of the bread is determined by tapping on its base. If the sound is deaf, the bread is ready!

Cool the bread on a wire rack. You can sprinkle it with water and cover with a towel. You can eat after a few hours. MMMM! Outrageously delicious with butter and cheese. Eh.

He is like that in the light :)

And this is the second, less leaky