Nineteen things I've learned from six years of experimentation with whole grain and wild yeast

 

In 2017, I posted an article on what I'd learned after three years of trial and error with baking whole grain sourdough bread.  It's now 2020, and as I predicted, I kept on experimenting and have grown wiser.  So here, after another three+ years is the updated wisdom. 

 I had been baking no-knead bread since Mark Bittman popularized the technique he learned from Jim Lahey of Sullivan Street Bakery in New York in 2006. All purpose (or bread) flour, water, salt, and a measly quarter teaspoon of instant yeast. Time—24 hours. A little attention once in awhile and bake in a super-hot covered dutch oven that brought a spectacular oven spring and crackling crust. The result was an incredible bread that rivaled any local bakery. Friends and family would ooh and aah.

Pretty soon I’d moved on from white flour to a 50-50 mixture of whole wheat and white bread flour. This was more robust as well as healthier, but it never quite rivaled the airiness and taste of a white flour loaf, but really didn’t want all that refined white flour. I would experiment now and then with different flours, checked out Jim Lahey’s book “My Bread”, but didn’t go beyond.

Michael Pollan’s book “Cooked” came out in 2013—a transformational book about the transformational nature of cooking. It is a cookbook with four recipes, one per chapter: fire, water, air, and earth – the ancient four elements. The “air” chapter concludes with a recipe for sourdough bread and was inspired. Sourdough is not just an alternative to commercial yeast, but also transforms (there’s that word again) the wheat so that it is more digestible and nutrients are more available. In short, sourdough bread is healthier. And it tastes good.

I made my own sourdough starter, which just needed a little patience and a little attention. I read books, some of which were confusing and some overly prescriptive. The time commitment seemed intrusive—when was I supposed to go to work? But I got over the hump, and now I’m a bona fide bread nerd who sometimes grinds his own grain, feeds his sourdough like a pet, and gets a little downcast when I resort to bought bread because my old bread ran out before I could create another loaf.

My sourdough starter is now over six years old. I’ve learned a few things along the way.

The most important lesson is that there are as many different ways to bake sourdough bread as there are bakers, and that once you get a feel for it, it’s hard to mess up. One loaf may be a little better or worse than the last, but the bread is most likely to be very good.

So, to help you get from the “there’s so much information out there, I’m overwhelmed” stage to the, “OK, I’m ready to give this a try, and I can’t mess up too badly” stage, here are some of the lessons that I learned, as of today.  Since I keep experimenting, tomorrow I'll be even wiser.  

(Note--this introduction is pretty much the same as three years ago).

No knead bread is an excellent way to get started.

1. Getting Started. No-knead bread is an excellent gateway. If you love making it, by all means continue. And if you’ve never baked, it’s a great place to start.
2. References. There are some tremendous references, some easier to understand than others. Start with one, but try others – there are different approaches. I heartily recommend Josey Baker Bread for its good humor, relaxed approach that encourages flexibility and experimentation. The website http://www.thefreshloaf.com/ is a great online community of bread bakers. And breadtopia.com, has great, detailed instructional videos as well as a terrific online store to get baking supplies such as the clay baker and oven gloves, as well as an active, informative, and welcoming forum.
   
3. Learn from doing. At first, it pays to adhere strictly to the formulas and the methods, but you’ll eventually get a feel for what works well for you and be confident enough to branch out.
4. Be prepared to have some crummy loaves. Try not to be too sad and chalk it up to experience.
5. Timing is flexible, and the refrigerator is your friend. Baking bread takes a lot of clock time, but the active time is not much. You do have to be around at certain milestones, but there’s a lot of flexibility, and the flexibility increases when you make intelligent use of the refrigerator. Creating a baking schedule that works around your other commitments takes a little forethought, and a little experimentation on weekends when you can commit to being around, so that you can get a feel for where you can push and pull the schedule.
6. Temperature matters. Pay attention to the temperature in your kitchen (or wherever you let your dough rise). I got the timing down on my go-to loaf one winter, and then spring sprung, and the warmer temperatures led to more yeast activity. By the time I got the loaf in the over it was tuckered out, over-proofed, and I had flat tops on my loaf. There’s a big difference between a 63 degree kitchen and a 75 degree kitchen!
7. When experimenting, change only one thing at a time. If you want to have any idea of the effect of different ingredients, ratios, and techniques. This is way harder than it sounds. Taking good notes will help you remember what worked and didn’t, and provide a basis for what to try next. I used a spreadsheet until I got a good feel for what I was doing. And ultimately, just try some new things and see how they turn out and don’t stress about it too much.
8. Making Sourdough Starter. Making sourdough takes a little faith and patience but once you have a starter, it’s pretty hard to kill. After awhile, you get to know how to treat your starter so it so is ready when you are. I learned how to make starter from Peter Reinhardt’s The Bread Baker’s Apprentice, but there are lots of places to show you how. I use rye starter. With low gluten, it’s less messy and easier to handle than wheat flour. You can also buy starter online, or now in the midst of COVID-19, you probably have a friend that has one to share--ask around!
   
9. Sourdough care and feeding. I use a teaspoon to a tablespoon worth of starter each time I bake, and then if the starter is looking reasonably active, just toss the remainder back in the fridge in a covered container until the next time I bake, usually within a week. Every other time I bake, I refresh the starter by removing all but a teaspoon of it, and add 50 grams of water plus 50 grams of flour (rye). Then I leave it on the counter for a few hours to get active, and then toss back in the fridge.
   
10. Skip the levain and the salt-free autolyse. Many techniques call for building a "levain" from your starter and a portion of the flour.  And many also insist that you must not include salt in the dough you build or it will affect the quality of your bread.  These are both steps that I've found I can live without.  I simply take my starter and all the other dough ingredients, mix together, and let "autolyse" for 30 minutes to an hour before creating some gluten structure with the stretch and fold technique.  I've found no discernible difference between this and adding those time consuming steps.  Keep it simple.
    
11. Making two loaves is no harder than making one loaf. If you make two loaves worth of dough, you have a few directions you can go.  
    - You can bake two loaves, and immediately slice one up and put it in the freezer.  This means you don’t have to worry about getting your next loaf baked before you current loaf runs out.  

    - You can also freeze the dough from the second loaf, then, just pull it out, defrost, form into a loaf, and bake.

    - You can split the second loaf into two half-loaf size dough balls and freeze them separately.  Then use it to make flatbread on a sheet pan or rolls in muffin tins at some point in the future.
    

    
    

    

    Making two loaves is no harder than making one loaf.

12. Think ahead. If you want a steady supply of home baked bread, you need to think about the next loaf while you’re still eating your current loaf. Think a few days out. But if you keep a sliced loaf in the freezer, you will always have your own bread around.
13. Sandwich loaves make sense most of the time. Boules (big round loaves of bread) look beautiful. But loaves in loaf pans are a lot easier to handle, taste as good, are less messy, and are also beautiful. You can bake any bread in a loaf pan. With loaf pans, use a light coating of oil on your work surface to shape your loaf instead of flour. It works just as well, and is a lot less fussy and easier to clean up. Stack a second loaf pan upside down on top of the first is a lot easier than covering with a tent of foil.
    
    

    
    

    

    Sandwich loaves make sense most of the time.

14. Clay Baker. The best is getting a clay bread baker for oblong loaves. Superb! Use rice flour for shaping the loaf at the end—it doesn’t get gummy like wheat flour (no gluten) and is easier to clean.
    
    

    

    This covered clay baker makes the best loaves!

15. Whole grain. When I started with sourdough six years ago, the artisanal baking books were oriented towards white flour. But the best books are now moving towards whole grains. Even now, so many formulas include quite a bit of white flour.  I bake exclusively with whole grains, and have been super-pleased with the result. 
16. Fresh milled flour. For awhile a local farm was selling red fife wheat berries at a reasonable price, and I would always grind my own flour.  They stopped showing up at the farmers market a few years ago, so I started using King Arthur whole wheat flour, which results in excellent loaves.  If I can find another reliable local source, I may switch back to grinding.  
     
    

    

    Fresh milled flour is a great option and gives you lots of flexibility with grain types.  That's my little tub of starter in the foreground.
    

    
    

17. Salt and Flavors. A little more or less salt can make a big difference in the taste. Too little, and it’s noticeably bland. Too much, and you just think “salty”. Pay close attention to the salt amount in the formulas. I’ve found that 12 grams for a loaf with 510 grams of flour and 420 grams of water is perfect. That’s 2 percent in bakers percentage terms.
    When it comes to complicated flavors, I like to keep it simple.  My one exception is an occasional hankering for a turmeric and black pepper loaf, pictured at top, that provides an unusual yellow color but with no additional effort.
    
18. Covering the bowl. Some sources say cover your bowl with plastic wrap, a towel, or a plate and some have different covering methods for different stages. I found that the plate works pretty well for all uses, and it’s easier to clean up. The “shower cap” bowl covers from Breadtopia are even better!
    
19. Keep at it. Read books, blogs, articles. Try different formulas, grains and methods. Share your enthusiasm (and sourdough starter) with others.
    
    

    Jeff's Current Go-To Sandwich Loaf

    
    

    Yield: 1 oblong loaf

      Total Time: 23 hours, or more. 

     

    This is my current go-to bread that I don't even have to think about.  Since I do keep experimenting, my current go-to loaf a month from now may well be different. Store the cut loaf cut side down on a cutting board.  Don't wrap in plastic.

     

     Ingredients

    Grams Bakers Percent Notes Rye starter 20 4% Give or take. A teaspoon to a tablespoon depending on how fast I’d like to ferment or weather conditions. Salt 12 2% Water 410 80% Tepid Whole Wheat Flour (King Arthur, or freshly milled hard red) 510 100% Optionally, replace 100 g. with another type of flour. Seeds (flax and/or sesame) 80 16% Hot water for seed soaker 80 16%

Method

 Start in the morning or early afternoon.

1. Mix seeds and hot seed soaker water in a bowl and set aside.

2. Mix water, salt, and starter in a large bowl.

3. When all or most of the seed soaker water is absorbed, add it to the starter bowl and mix.

4. Add flour to the starter bowl, and mix until combined. Cover, and let sit for ½ hour, up to two hours for a modified autolyse.

5. Do 10 aggressive stretch and folds.  After a 1/2 hour, do four gentle stretch and folds, then repeat at 1/2 hour increments.  Note that there's a lot of flexibility in the timing.  If it's 45 minutes or an hour between stretch and folds, that works too!  Don't stress.  Overall, let ferment at room temperature until bed time, then put in the refrigerator overnitght.

6. In the morning, remove from the refrigerator, and do one more set of gentle stretch and folds. Cover and let ferment at room temperature until “doubled in size” or thereabouts. Make sure it’s visibly risen quite a bit. In the summer, this might happen by lunch time. In the winter, by late afternoon or early evening. If it’s cold, put it in the oven with the light on.

7. Form into a loaf following one of two approaches and bake:

• Banneton and clay baker:

  • Dust an oblong banneton and the counter with rice flour.

  • Form dough into a loaf and put seam side up into banneton. Cover banneton with a towel.

  • Preheat oven to 500 degrees (F) (or 475 degrees on convection), with clay baker in the oven.

  • When the oven comes to temperature, pull the clay baker out of the oven (carefully, with sturdy gloves!), open the top, invert the loaf into the baker, make one confident slash along the vertical axis of the loaf, replace the top, and put back in the oven for 30 minutes.

  • At 30 minutes remove the top and bake for 20 more minutes, until the bread is at least an internal temperature of 205 degrees (F) AND it is a deep brown color AND it sounds hollow when thumped. In my experience with my oven, these all happen reliably at the 20 more minutes, but your flour and oven may be different, so pay attention to the clues.

• Loaf pans:

  • Preheat the oven to 500 degrees (F) (475 degrees on convection).

  • Oil one loaf pan and the counter, and form the dough into a loaf.

  • Put the loaf into the prepared pan seam side down, and cover with a second loaf pan.

  • When the oven reaches temperature, make one confident slash down the middle of the vertical axis of the loaf, replace the top, and put into the oven for 30 minutes.

  • Remove the top loaf pan, and bake for another 20 minutes. If you smell any burning during this period, reduce the heat by 25 degrees.

  • When the loaf reaches at least 205 degrees and is deep brown and the loaf sounds hollow when thumped, remove from the oven and from the loaf pan.

8. Let cool for at least 2 hours before slicing.  Resist the temptation—the bread is still baking.

9. Slice, eat, and store on a bread board face side down. It will keep this way for at least a week.

 

Farinata frittata turns farinata into a main course

This version featured sturdy greens and Greek sausage.

 

Even though I posted in January 2018 I thought I'd found the ultimate farinata technique, I've continued to experiment over the last few years, and have had my share of successes and "meh"s.  One day, though, I thought, "why not turn this from an appetizer into a main course", and merge the concept of farinata and frittata.  You'll find the basic technique here to be the same as for ultimate farinata, except with more batter, a couple of eggs, and lots more mix-ins.

 The result is a savory/eggy meal that stands on its own, and can be as boldly flavored as you like!

Farinata Frittata

The Basic Building Blocks

• 1.5 cups flour (usually 1 cup chickpea flour (besan) and ½ cup cornmeal, semolina, or something else that’s gluten free or low gluten)

• 2 cups water

• 1.5 tsp salt

• 2 eggs

• 1 onion, small or large

• 8 glugs of olive (or other) oil

Flavoring Add ins (optional, as many or few as desired):

• 1 tsp onion or garlic powder, or both

• ¼ c nutritional yeast

• 1 - 2 tsp seeds:  cumin or fennel

• 1 tsp harissa

• 1 tsp anchovy paste, or jarred anchovies

• Turmeric

• Kashmiri chili

Vegetables (and meat) examples:

• 2 cups kale, chopped

• Mushrooms, fresh or frozen and/or dried (rehydrated)

• Tomatoes, 

• Fennel, chopped

• Carrots

• Sausage or ground meat

• Cubed boneless/skinless chicken thigh

• Bacon

• Cheese

• You get the idea

Method:

1. Mix the flour, water, and salt in a bowl, and let sit for at least an hour (if you can) or all day.  This lets the flour hydrate.

2. Preheat oven to hot (say, 475 degrees on convection), with cast iron skillet, oil, and onions.  Heat until onions are sizzling and brown, approaching burned, about 10-15 minutes.

3. Add any whole spices (e.g., cumin, fennel) and let them bloom -- 30 seconds to a minute.

4. Add vegetables or meat and cook until mostly cooked through (they'll be cooking more shortly).

5. Mix the egg to the batter, and the swirl the batter into the skillet, making sure all the meat and vegetables are evenly distributed.  Put in the oven and bake for 15 minutes or more, until the batter is set and the farinata frittata starts to pull away from the edges of the skillet.

6. Remove the skillet from the oven and let sit for at least five minutes before cutting into wedges to serve. It's easiest to cut this right in the pan rather than trying to transfer to a cutting board. Be careful, and remember that skillet is HOT!

Ultimate Farinata (Socca)

This is a lightly baked farinata.  I usually let it go a little longer, so there are more burned bits. 

Farinata has been a regular feature of my cooking repertoire for almost 10 years, so it is a little puzzling that I've never written about it here.  I first discovered it as an unassuming recipe called Easy Whole Grain Flatbread in Mark Bittman's paradigm-changing book Food Matters.  It's simple--chickpea flour, onions, salt, water.  Perhaps some fresh or dried rosemary.  Perhaps some other flours such as whole wheat or corn meal.  Whisk it up, let it sit, and then cook in the oven in a blazing hot skillet drenched in olive oil until it is almost burnt.  The result is a crisp, unctuous, slightly salty, savory confection that always results in someone asking for the recipe.  It is equally at home as an appetizer on a cold winter day when it heats up the kitchen, or on a hot summer day cooked on the gas grill.  It travels well to neighborhood pot lucks, and people always seem happy that I've brought it.

I find the cast iron skillet the ideal cooking vessel.

It works well in a non-stick sheet pan too, but those sheets tend to warp, leading to an uneven outcome, which isn't all bad especially if some of your eaters like the burnt parts!  And non-stick is a relative term.

The original recipe was so good, that it took me awhile to experiment with variations.  At the beginning, I used different mixtures of flours to go with the chickpea flour, tending to gravitate towards corn meal.  The onions were always a must, but the rosemary was optional.  Other flavoring such as cumin and coriander mixed in the oil as it heated was interesting, but not earth-shaking.  And I also played with different pans, such as a square sheet pan, but keep coming back to my cast iron skillet.  I have not yet sprung for a specialty farinata pan.  But by far the best variation involved using dried porcini and shiitake mushrooms, which I'll get to in a moment.

Farinata is native to the northeastern Mediterranean Sea region.  In Italy, you find it in Liguria, in and around Genoa.  In France, you find it in Nice, where it is called socca.  I find the Italian farinata rolls off the tongue more easily and is more fun to say than the hard-c challenged socca.  When Susan and I traveled to that region in 2015, I was thrilled to realize that we were going to the birthplace of farinata, and that one of our goals should be to find the best farinata.  The first place we walked into in Levanto, at the northern edge of the Cinque Terre region was a pizza joint that had slices of farinata that was doughy, not crisp, and not very flavorful.  Truly a disappointment.   When we made it to Genoa, the our AirBnB host's recommendation for his favorite farinata was better, a little crispier, but still somewhat uninspired.  In Nice, we went to a socca place recommended by a nice couple (from Nice!) we met at a bar and found decent, but not spectacular fare. 

I was forced to reckon with the reality that my own humble experiments with farinata were far better than what I could get in its home base.  Since Susan would not let me turn our vacation into a  "hunt for the the ultimate farinata" project, there is a chance I've missed the best.  Further exploration will have to wait for our next trip.  But I am pretty certain the Ligurians and the people from Nice (Nicians?) have never tried farinata with dried porcini and shiitake mushrooms.

Ultimate Farinata (Socca) with Dried Mushrooms

Yield: Serves 2-8 as an appetizer, first course, or part of a simple meal

Total Time: 2:45, including 2 hours of resting time for the batter.

Simple, crispy, healthy, yummy, inexpensive, gluten free and vegan.

Ingredients:

• 1 small handful dried porcini and/or shiitake mushrooms
• Boiling water to cover mushrooms for soaking
• 3/4 cup chickpea flour (in Indian groceries, it's called besan or gram flour)
• Optionally, swap out 1/4 cup of besan for cornmeal
• 1 tsp. salt
• 1 cup water -- use as much of the soaking water from the mushrooms as you can
• 1 small onion
• 6 glugs of olive oil

Method:

1. Soak the mushrooms:  Put the mushrooms in a small bowl.  Cover with boiling water, and soak for at least 15 minutes, or until the mushrooms are soft and pliable.  Drain the mushrooms and reserve the soaking water for the batter.  Strain out any small particles, if any.  Chop the mushrooms into a small to medium size dice and set aside.
2. Make the batter:  Whisk together the chickpea flour, salt, and 1 cup of water, using as much of the soaking liquid as you can, adding water if needed.  Cover, and let sit for at least one hour, preferably more than two hours, and up to 12 hours. 
3. Slice the onion.  Slice the onion into very thin slices.
4. Prepare to sizzle.   Turn on the oven to 450 degrees.  Put the olive oil and onions in a 12" well-seasoned cast iron skillet, and swirl around to coat the skillet and the onions.  Put the skillet into the heating oven.  After a little while, it will begin to sizzle and smell good.  After 10-15 minutes, the oven should be up to temperature, and the onions should be thinking about browning.  Add the mushrooms to the skillet and put back in for a minute or two, taking care that you don't burn the onions, but don't be afraid if a few start to turn brown.
5. Add the batter:  Skim any foam from the top of the batter and whisk one more time.  Swirl the batter in to the skillet, starting around the outside, and gently moving to the inside, taking care that all the mushrooms and onions don't end up in one clump in one part of the skillet.  Rearrange them with a spatula or wooden spoon if necessary.
6. Cook.  Put the skillet in the oven and set the timer for 15 minutes.  Check the progress of the cooking.  It will likely be starting to set up.  Close the door and keep cooking and checking every few minutes until it is done.  Done should at least be that the batter is firm throughout, and the edges are starting to brown.  You might like to go even further.  Some people like some parts burnt. 
7. Remove, slice, and serve.  When done, remove the skillet from the oven using sturdy oven mitts.  Lift the farinata from the skillet and put on a cutting board.  Slice into pie shaped wedges or slice in half, then into "rectangles" for smaller serving pieces. 

Serve hot but it tastes good even if it sits out for a bit. It will keep covered in the fridge for a few days, warmed in the toaster oven on a tray (my preference) or in the microwave.

 

Print recipe.

Eighteen things I've learned from three years of experimentation with whole grain and wild yeast

I had been baking no-knead bread since Mark Bittman popularized the technique he learned from Jim Lahey of Sullivan Street Bakery in New York in 2006. All purpose (or bread) flour, water, salt, and a measly quarter teaspoon of instant yeast. Time—24 hours. A little attention once in awhile and bake in a super-hot covered dutch oven that brought a spectacular oven spring and crackling crust. The result was an incredible bread that rivaled any local bakery. Friends and family would ooh and aah.

Pretty soon I’d moved on from white flour to a 50-50 mixture of whole wheat and white bread flour. This was more robust as well as healthier, but it never quite rivaled the airiness and taste of a white flour loaf, but really didn’t want all that refined white flour. I would experiment now and then with different flours, checked out Jim Lahey’s book “My Bread”, but didn’t go beyond.

Michael Pollan’s book “Cooked” came out in 2013—a transformational book about the transformational nature of cooking. It is a cookbook with four recipes, one per chapter: fire, water, air, and earth – the ancient four elements. The “air” chapter concludes with a recipe for sourdough bread and was inspired. Sourdough is not just an alternative to commercial yeast, but also transforms (there’s that word again) the wheat so that it is more digestible and nutrients are more available. In short, sourdough bread is healthier. And it tastes good.

I made my own sourdough starter, which just needed a little patience and a little attention. I read books, some of which were confusing and some overly prescriptive. The time commitment seemed intrusive—when was I supposed to go to work? But I got over the hump, and now I’m a bona fide bread nerd who grinds his own grain, feeds his sourdough like a pet, and gets a little downcast when I resort to bought bread because my old bread ran out before I could create another loaf.

My sourdough starter is now almost three years old. I’ve learned a few things along the way.

The most important lesson is that there are as many different ways to bake sourdough bread as there are bakers, and that once you get a feel for it, it’s hard to mess up. One loaf may be a little better or worse than the last, but the bread is most likely to be very good.

So, to help you get from the “there’s so much information out there, I’m overwhelmed” stage to the, “OK, I’m ready to give this a try, and I can’t mess up too badly” stage, here are some of the lessons that I learned, as of today.  Since I keep experimenting, tomorrow I'll be even wiser. 

No knead bread is an excellent way to get started.

1. Getting Started. No-knead bread is an excellent gateway. If you love making it, by all means continue. And if you’ve never baked, it’s a great place to start.
2. References. There are some tremendous references, some easier to understand than others. Start with one, but try others – there are different approaches. I heartily recommend Josey Baker Bread for its good humor, relaxed approach that encourages flexibility and experimentation. The website http://www.thefreshloaf.com/ is a great online community of bread bakers. And breadtopia.com, has great, detailed instructional videos as well as a terrific online store to get baking supplies such as the clay baker and oven gloves.
3. Learn from doing. At first, it pays to adhere strictly to the formulas and the methods, but you’ll eventually get a feel for what works well for you and be confident enough to branch out.
4. Be prepared to have some crummy loaves. Try not to be too sad and chalk it up to experience.
5. Timing is flexible, and the refrigerator is your friend. Baking bread takes a lot of clock time, but the active time is not much. You do have to be around at certain milestones, but there’s a lot of flexibility, and the flexibility increases when you make intelligent use of the refrigerator. Creating a baking schedule that works around your other commitments takes a little forethought, and a little experimentation on weekends when you can commit to being around, so that you can get a feel for where you can push and pull the schedule.
6. Temperature matters. Pay attention to the temperature in your kitchen (or wherever you let your dough rise). I got the timing down on my go-to loaf one winter, and then spring sprung, and the warmer temperatures led to more yeast activity. By the time I got the loaf in the over it was tuckered out, over-proofed, and I had flat tops on my loaf. There’s a big difference between a 63 degree kitchen and a 75 degree kitchen!
7. When experimenting, change only one thing at a time. If you want to have any idea of the effect of different ingredients, ratios, and techniques. This is way harder than it sounds. Taking good notes will help you remember what worked and didn’t, and provide a basis for what to try next. I used a spreadsheet until I got a good feel for what I was doing. And ultimately, just try some new things and see how they turn out and don’t stress about it too much.
8. Making Sourdough Starter. Making sourdough takes a little faith and patience but once you have a starter, it’s pretty hard to kill. After awhile, you get to know how to treat your starter so it so is ready when you are. I learned how to make starter from Peter Reinhardt’s The Bread Baker’s Apprentice, but there are lots of places to show you how. I use rye starter. With no gluten, it’s less messy and easier to handle than wheat flour. And you can also buy starter online.
9. Sourdough care and feeding. I use a teaspoon to a tablespoon worth of starter each time I bake, and then if the starter is looking reasonably active, just toss the remainder back in the fridge in a covered container until the next time I bake, usually within a week. Every other time I bake, I refresh the starter by removing all but a teaspoon of it, and add 50 grams of water plus 50 grams of flour (rye). Then I leave it on the counter for a few hours to get active, and then toss back in the fridge. This may not mean much to you until you’ve started baking—sorry!
10. Making two loaves is no harder than making one loaf. You can keep ready-to-bake bread dough in the refrigerator for up to a week—or so I’ve read—I’ve only tried to do this for a few days though. And you can freeze sliced bread for a long time, which means you don’t have to worry about getting your next loaf baked before you current loaf runs out.
    
    

    

    Making two loaves is no harder than making one loaf.

11. Think ahead. If you want a steady supply of home baked bread, you need to think about the next loaf while you’re still eating your current loaf. Think a few days out. But if you keep a sliced loaf in the freezer, you will always have your own bread around.
12. Sandwich loaves make sense most of the time. Boules (big round loaves of bread) look beautiful. But loaves in loaf pans are a lot easier to handle, taste as good, are less messy, and are also beautiful. You can bake any bread in a loaf pan. With loaf pans, use a light coating of oil on your work surface to shape your loaf instead of flour. It works just as well, and is a lot less fussy and easier to clean up. Stack a second loaf pan upside down on top of the first is a lot easier than covering with a tent of foil.
    
    

    
    

    

    Sandwich loaves make sense most of the time.

13. Clay Baker. The best is getting a clay bread baker for oblong loaves. Superb! Use rice flour for shaping the loaf at the end—it doesn’t get gummy like wheat flour (no gluten) and is easier to clean.
    
    

    

    This covered clay baker makes the best loaves!

14. Whole grain has arrived! When I started with sourdough a few years ago, the artisinal baking books were oriented towards white flour. But the best books are now moving towards whole grains. Hurray! 
15. Fresh milled flour. Baking bread with freshly milled whole grain flour is way better than any flour you can buy off the shelf. It’s like the difference between freshly roasted and ground coffee and Maxwell House. And healthier.  And I've recently started playing with flour made from sprouted grains.
    
    

    

    Fresh milled flour is better than any  flour you can buy.

16. Salt. A little more or less salt can make a big difference in the taste. Too little, and it’s noticeably bland. Too much, and you just think “salty”. Pay close attention to the salt amount in the formulas. I’ve found that 12 grams for a loaf with 510 grams of flour and 420 grams of water is perfect. That’s 2 percent in bakers percentage terms.
17. Covering the bowl. Some sources say cover your bowl with plastic wrap, a towel, or a plate and some have different covering methods for different stages. I found that the plate works pretty well for all uses, and it’s easier to clean up. The “shower cap” bowl covers from breadtopia are even better!
18. Keep at it. Read books, blogs, articles. Try different formulas, grains and methods. Share your enthusiasm (and sourdough starter) with others.
    
    

     Jeff's Current Go-To Sandwich Loaf

    
    

    Yield: 1 sandwich loaf

    
    

    Total Time: 23 hours, or more.

     
    This is my current go-to bread that I don't even have to think about.  Since I do keep experimenting, my current go-to loaf a month from now may well be different.  And if you don't grind your own flour, use store-bought whole wheat.  Store the cut loaf cut side down on a cutting board.  Don't wrap in plastic.

    Ingredients

    Leaven	Grams	Bakers           Percent
    Rye starter	20	40%
    Water	60	120%
    Red Fife Flour, Freshly ground	50	100%
    Final Dough
    Leaven	all
    Salt	12	2%
    Water	360	71%
    Red Fife Flour, Fresh Grind, from Mistybrook	310	61%
    Another whole grain flour, fresh ground (e.g. Spelt)	100	20%
    Bread Flour	100	20%
    Total Flour	510	100%
    Total Flour	560
    Water	420
    Dough hydration	75%
    % Whole Grain	82%

    
    

     Method

    1. Make leaven by mixing together all the leaven ingredients, and let stand for a 4-5 hours (if it's warm) to 12 hours or overnight (if it's cold).  You should see some bubbles at the top.
    

    2. Add the final dough ingredients to the leaven. Let sit for ½ hour.  Do 10 aggressive stretch and folds.  After a 1/2 hour, do four gentle stretch and folds, then repeat at 1/2 hour increments.  Note that there's a lot of flexibility in the timing.  If it's 45 minutes or an hour between stretch and folds, that works too!  Don't stress.  Overall, let ferment at room temperature for 6 hours, or until it shows signs of a good rise.  This could be a lot longer if it's winter and you keep your house cold.

    3. Form into loaf, and put in a lightly oiled bread pan, with with another bread pan inverted over the top as a cover. Let rise 2 hours (or longer if your house is cold).

    4. Bake at 425 with convection, 20 min, after first preheating at 450.

    5. Remove covering bread pan, and bake another 20 minutes

    6. Remove bread from pan, and bake another 20 minutes

    7. Let cool for at least 2 hours before slicing.  Resist the temptation -- the bread is still baking.