Part and parcel of being a software developer in San Francisco is looking the part. So with that in mind I’m sharing a streamlined version of the sourdough notes I’ve been using for the past couple years, minus the one part condescesion that’s usually mixed in with this sort of thing.

Good resources

• Tartine Bread (Tartine)
• Flour Salt Water Yeast (FSWY)
• Artisan Sourdough Made Simple (Artisan)
• Heirloom: Time-Honored Techniques, Nourishing Traditions, and Modern Recipes (Heirloom)

Maintaining Starter

• Feed equal amounts water and 50/50 flour mix of white and whole wheat with 20% of previous day’s starter

Basic country loaf ingredients from Tartine that makes 2 loaves (Directions below)

• Water (80f) - 700 grams plus 50 grams
• Leaven - 200 grams
• Total flour - 1000 grams
  • White flour - 900 grams
  • Whole wheat flour - 100 grams
• Salt - 20 grams

Directions

1. MAKE THE LEAVEN
   • 12 hours before discard all but 1 tablespoon of mature starter
   • Feed 200 grams water and 200 grams flour
   • Should smell sweet in an overripe fruit kind of way and have risen about 20%
2. MAKE THE DOUGH
   • Fully incorporate ingredients, reserving salt and a little bit of water
     • Add water and leaven, stir to disperse
     • Then add flour
   • Let sit for 20-40 minutes
     • For high hydration and whole wheat sourdoughs up to 1 hour
   • Add salt and reserved water (50 grams-ish), mix
   • Use scissor method to disperse salt, squeezing and separating dough
   • Fold dough over several times, pressing fingers into center as you go until dough begins to tighten
   • For high hydration dough you can repeat this process a couple of times to build strength and make it easy to handle
3. BULK RISE
   • Cover bowl with damp towel
     • 3-4 hours at 78F-82F, watch for 20-30% increase
     • One trick is to put the bowl in the stove with a pot of just-boiled water to raise the temperature.
   • Stretch and fold regularly
     • Every 30 minutes for the next 2 hours
     • Don’t touch dough in last couple hours of rise
     • In third hour, stretch and fold less regularly
4. SHAPE
   • First shaping
     • Pull dough onto un-floured work surface
     • Flour surface of dough and flip over and cut in half if doing 2 loaf recipe
     • Fold the cut side (or whichever side if not cut) onto itself, sealing unfloured dough inside loaf
     • Work dough into round shape
   • Bench Rest
     • 20-30 minutes
   • Second shaping
     • Lightly flour top surface of dough
     • Flip dough over with bench knife so that floured side rests on counter
     • Take third of dough closest to you and fold over middle third
     • Stretch dough horizontally to right and fold third over center. Do the same on the left.
     • Stretch out dough farthest from you and fold toward center, over previous folds, anchoring it in place with your fingers
     • Then roll dough away from you so that seam is on bottom
     • Cup under dough, rounding it out
     • Let rest for a minute
5. SECOND RISE
   • 3-4 hours in warm environment (75F-80F), 12 hours in fridge
   • Use first rise as benchmark, the longer it too the longer the second rise should take
   • Can use poke test: poke dough and if it springs back slowly it’s ready to bake
   • Use 50/50 mixture of rice flour and wheat flour to prevent sticking in banneton
6. SCORE
   • Large square slash has worked best for us
7. BAKE
   • Preheat oven to 450F (FSWY says 475) with Dutch oven in it
   • 20 minutes covered to steam
   • 30 minutes uncovered for color
   • 10 minutes baked directly on rack to crisp crust
     • We’ve found this step burns bottom of bread in our oven sometimes
     • FSWY does 30-20
   • It’s ok to give your bread an extra ten minutes to get nice brown color
   • You can also turn off oven and let it sit