Trials, triumphs of my sourdough journey

Making bread is hard. Okay, maybe not hard, but time consuming. And then I’ve found that things don’t seem like they’re passing the test but you push through anyway, shove it in the oven, and voilἀ — bread?

 

I started my sourdough journey this summer. I thought I was going to be all cute and baker-like, whipping up these amazing bread recipes and loving every second of it because I’m making delicious breads and treats and goodies with my own hands, starting my creations from scratch. 

 

Wrong.

 

First off, no one told me how needy sourdough starter is. Every day for a week, I had to dump half of the mixture (of just flour and water by the way, which seemed odd at first) and then add more flour and water. It just didn’t make sense. You dump half just to add more of what you just dumped. Explain that to me. It also took me a couple days to realize people don’t actually throw away the discard, they use it for other recipes. That only increased my doubts–it’s obviously perfectly good if it can be used in another recipe, so why is it being discarded? 

 

So when I finally wrapped my head around that and completed the more-than-a-week-long task of dumping and adding, dumping and adding, I had had enough. I needed a break from fussing over my sourdough. So I threw it in the fridge and decided I’d find time in the two weeks or so I had read that it could be stored. 

 

I didn’t. I was still using up the discard, and I didn't have any time to actually work with the real sourdough mixture I had created. It’s still sitting in the fridge, and frankly it looks ready to get even with me for abandoning it. Something that looks like a normal mixture is sitting at the bottom, but on top of it is an oily substance of an odd, grotesque color. I’m scared to open it, to be honest. 

 

Anyway, so I’ve been baking with the sourdough discard and I don’t want to toot my own horn, but I think some of the things I’ve made have been pretty tasty. The muffins and blueberry lemon scones have been my favorite. 

 

I could pause here and connect how the discarded sourdough could be like other things we deem unworthy but are actually good or useful in our lives, blah, blah, blah. I’m here to talk about bread, not feelings or life lessons. 

 

So with the last of my sourdough discard, I decided to just go for it. Let’s make some real bread this time. But did I decide to go with any normal bread? No. Chocolate cherry sourdough bread is the recipe I deemed a worthy challenge for my baking skills.

 

Mix everything together, let it sit. Fold it in, let it sit for another half an hour. Fold, sit, fold, sit, fold, sit. It took me all afternoon and evening to get through every fold-and-sit step, taking a minute every half hour to fold the dough and another minute to scrape all the sticky dough off my hands. The recipe told me I would eventually be able to pinch the dough up to form a transparent film thingy – basically it wouldn’t break when I stretched it. I’m guessing it was supposed to look like bubble gum when you blow a bubble. Mine did not look like that, and did not pull up nicely when I tried. But at that point it was my bedtime, so I stuck the dough in the fridge to let it be there for the required 14 to 16 hours. 

 

Once again, it took me the rest of the afternoon to let it sit between doing little things to it. Until finally it said I could put it in the oven. After all those hours and hours of preparation and fussing, it only took forty minutes to bake. Ridiculous. 

 

Needless to say, my bread didn’t rise. It baked, but stayed round and low. I didn't mind because it was my first attempt — I’m just happy it tasted good. My sister took one bite and spit it out because I guess I had somehow burnt the bottom. I told her to just eat the top, which she did and admitted it wasn’t too bad. I’m counting it as a win. 

 

I’m also done using sourdough, in case anyone is wondering. 

 

My Determination: “Life isn't fair, it's just fairer than death, that's all.” ― William Goldman, The Princess Bride