Best bread ever

Amelia Hohl’s Sourdough Bread

NOTE: for my wheat bread, I just use home ground wheat flour, pour an arbitrary amount of natural pumpkin seeds, brown and golden flax seeds, and whole oats into the mixture. Occasionally I put in crasins. I have also rolled olive oil, salt and herbs into the regular sourdough loaves. My favorite is olive oil and sage.


Starter

Takes 5-10 Days to get it started. Get a large plastic pitcher with a lid that opens and closes completely.

Mix 1 Tbs. Yeast

½ cup warm water

1 Tbs. sugar or honey

Stir with wooden spoon and let sit for 10 minutes

Add 2 cups warm water or milk

Add 2 cups flour and let sit for 5-10 days.

Pour off extra liquid, close lid and sore in the refrigerator


To replenish

Add 1 cup milk, 1 cup flour and 1 Tbs. sugar (you may add as many cups as you need to fill the container about ¾ full. Mix thoroughly with a wooden spoon. Leave out for a couple days or until you can tell the fermentation has spread throughout mixture. Store in refrigerator. Pour off liquid and skim top when necessary.



Bread recipe (in kitchenaid mixer)


Two heaping Tbs. yeast, not fast rising.

4 Cups warm water

1 Tbs. Sugar sprinkled on top. Do not stir yet

Let activate for 5 minutes


Add 2-3 heaping cups of sourdough starter

1 heaping Tbs salt

½ Cup sugar

½ Cup oil

4 Cups flour (to begin with)

Handful of instant potato flakes if you have them.


Mix on low until everything is combined (make sure yeast comes up from bottom of bowl)


Begin to add more flour until it just starts to pull away from the sides. Seriously under-add flour even though it may look really runny. Put on low/medium speed for at least 20 minutes. Pour mixture out onto a well floured surface. Dough will be pretty runny. Knead dough until it’s just firm enough to form into balls. Divide dough and set in greased bread loaf pans. Preheat oven at 350. Put loaves on your warm oven and let rise until dough just reaches top of your bread pan. This bread has a lot of yeast, so it will rise quite a bit more in the oven. Bake for 30 to 40 minutes, but check to make sure it’s cooked all the way through. I usually have to cook it longer because I make huge loaves. Take out of pan immediately and put on a cloth and cover to cool. Enjoy!