Sourdough Days 5 -10 & Our trip to Berry

It's coming along quite nicely, it's got a distinct sour smell and looks nice and bubbly still. I'm still not quite sure if I'm doing it properly, but it's not mouldy yet so I'm guessing I'm doing something right (better not speak too soon though!).

I've been feeding it my mix of strong bread flour, spelt and rye for the last 10 days now, just with tap water. I had another reduction the day before yesterday and again instead of discarding the excess mix, I made a little tester dough just to see how it tasted.

Day 8 of sourdough

The sourdough flavour is definitely there now- I actually prepared this one properly by kneading for about 10 minutes then allowing it to prove in a warm spot for 3-4 hours. It didn't show too many signs in the way of rising, and was extremely dense when I pulled it out of the oven, which basically tells me the dough still has loads of yeast to capture, also that I may need to incorporate some other kind of flour perhaps? Maybe one that will result in a slightly lighter bread. I'll have to do a bit more research into that!



I also think I need to learn a little patience and that the dough may need a full 12 hours to prove, and I also want to work on my dough presentation. I saw on the River Cottage Australia finale last night that you can buy special proofing baskets that give your bread a lovely pattern- I'll have to look into getting a couple of these!

So while my breads slowly making its way to glory (too slow for my patience!) I decided to cheat and go pick up some sourdough from my favourite Bakery. It's about 25 minutes south from where I live in a little township called Berry. I love everything about this Bakery. They make awesome artisan breads, as well as gorgeous savoury and sweet pastries. It doubles as a cafe so you can pop in for lunch or just munch on a pear and chocolate tart with a lovely coffee.

http://berrysourdoughcafe.com.au/
We weren't really interested in being inside for lunch on Sunday because it was such a beautiful day, so we took our coffees, ham and cheese croissant (there's really nothing like it- it has bechamel in it!!), and apple and blueberry muffin and went to 'our park' for a picnic. It was the best day!


We took our wholewheat loaf and baguette home for dinner and smashed half of them between two of us with loads of butter and cheese from the Robertson Cheese Factory we purchased last weekend! It made me really excited to think in just a month or so (hopefully-all going well!) I'll be able to eat my own sourdough and hopefully it will be almost as good as the one Matt and I bought down in Berry, all because I made it myself :-)

Then I'll be on to my next trial, maybe I'll look into making my own cheese to go with my own bread!!

View on the way to Berry

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