Whole Wheat Sourdough with milk and honey

I love bread, especially the sourdough kinds. Their flavors are tasty, sophisticated, subtle, changing, and long lasting. There are literally trillions of varieties of sourdough bread, and each of us can devise our own formula from experience to suit our tastes. The kinds of flour for sourdough bread can range from all sorts of wheat: soft, hard, whole, red, white, to semolina, spelt, potato, rye, and just anything you can imagine. Each time i feed my little starter, i feel like feeding my baby, keeping it alive, in the hope that it will turn into another brilliant offspring. And the process of breadmaking? Exciting, observative and precision aiming, sometimes tiring, sometimes anxious about whether it's going the right way. It is mostly happy to see when the dough rises, pissed if it deflates as you turn it over onto a baking sheet after long hours of fermentation, (thinking about what to do if it does), and exciting to cut through the bread's very crispy crust to its pillowy crumb. Siting more, it is interesting to find out how different combinations of ingredients and the different mixing/folding/shaping methods in different environments arrive at the bread's designated taste/texture. Like in many areas, practice makes perfect in sourdough bread making. The tasting process is marvelous of course, the taste is almost different every time! Therefore, I like baking sourdough bread and appreciates all who shares in this field. The Fresh Loaf has a recipe for a simple whole wheat sourdough with buttermilk and honey Sandwich bread w/ slight sweetness, not so sour, and soft. I've altered it a bit as followed, and this bread is good with jam, honey, butter, or many sandwich fillings. (Try lobster, mayo and lettuce! ;p)



Whole Wheat Sourdough with milk and honey

Ingredients:

Whole Wheat Flour.......................................2 cups
Bread or All Purpose Flour............................1 1/2 cups
Sourdough starter (about 60% hydration)......200g
Water........................................................150ml
Milk(or buttermilk)...................................... 150ml
Honey.................................................... 1 1/2 Tbsp
Butter or Margarine......................................15g
Sea Salt.........................................................10g

Steps:

1. Place both flour and sea salt in the bowl of stand mixer and mix thoroughly.

2. Add milk, water, starter and honey to the same bowl and turn mixer on low speed to mix for 3 minutes.

3. Add the butter to the bowl and knead on machine at medium speed for about 8 minutes. Rest dough for 8 minutes and knead again for 8 minutes. The dough should be elastic and pull away from the bowl when done mixing.

4. Divide the dough into two equal pieces, and do a stretch and fold and shape the dough into sandwich loaves like this. (video at the bottom)

5. Place the dough, covered with plastic film or clean wet cloth and let rise for 4 to 5 hours till almost double in size. Preheat oven to 350F. If you like a crispy crust, place some hot water in the oven in a small heatproof container to generate steam.

6. Bake in preheated oven for about 55 min. or until bread sounds hollow when tapped (bread is very hot!)

7. Cool bread on wire rack and let cool for a while if you can wait before slicing.

** Notice that usually making bread involves two fermentations, the first in bulk and then shaping followed by the second rise. However, the above method is faster and the bread still taste soft and good with a less sour and less springy characteristic. You may also proceed with the twice fermentation method as in the original recipe.