Julian invited our friend Bruce over to pick his brain on another home improvement project. As a reward, Bruce gave me a bit of sourdough starter he got from Sea Wolf Bakers. The starter has bounced to life quite nicely after a feeding or two. Not wanting to throw away perfectly good starter when I fed it, I decided to experiment by making some semolina bread with a portion. I admit that I worked without a net on this. I didn’t add any yeast to the starter. Although I semi-followed a recipe that instructs one to make a sponge with yeast, water, and semolina flour, I mixed the semolina with the starter and water and put it in the refrigerator while I was at church to avoid the sponge oozing out of the bowl and onto the counter. The results were quite good. I took a loaf to work and the cube farm cronies devoured it.
The second experiment involved making a porridge of sorts with oatmeal, then adding the starter to it and incubating in the fridge overnight. I then added a little water, oil, maple syrup, whole wheat and bread flours. The bread was good, but we couldn’t eat through it before it got fuzzy.
The third experiment was a failure. I tried to make a focaccia with some starter that I needed to discard to reseed the rest. I should have added some yeast to oomph the rising. Next time…
Recent Comments