When I started out baking sourdough bread, I used the flour we had in the house – we had a big bag of all-purpose flour.
I have learned a lot since then and here are the ingredients and tools, books and anything else I recommend.
Recipes
Artisan Sourdough Made Simple
Emilie Raffa
This book has been a game-changer for me. After trying recipes I found online, someone gave me this book and I use it almost exclusively now.
The methods are simple and I easily adapted them to my schedule.
This book has been a game-changer for me. After trying recipes I found online, someone gave me this book and I use it almost exclusively now.
The methods are simple and I easily adapted them to my schedule.
King Arthur Baking
Other than the Emilie Raffa book, I get all my recipes online.
My searches for new recipes often lead me to King Arthur Baking. Aside from bread recipes they also have very nice recipes to use discard.
Naturally King Arthur wants to sell their products. Most of the time you can bake the recipes without their proprietary ingredients or easily substitute.
Ingredients
Bread Flour
Rogers Mills in Armstrong, BC is my preferred source for fresh bread flour. It has a high protein and gluten content and is a good choice for bread. You can get the white flour at Costco. But the bulk store also delivers for a reasonable fee.
Seven Grain Cereal
I found the seven-grain cereal from Anita’s Organic Mill in Chilliwack BC works great for multigrain recipes.
Anita’s has a store in Chilliwack but they also sell in some local stores and on Amazon.
Tools
Dutch Oven
Baking in the Dutch oven keeps the steam rising from the dough in and helps the development of oven spring.
Before I had the Dutch oven, I poured a cup of water in a dish in the oven. It worked but the bread did not rise as much All you need is a oven proof container with a lid that is big enough. My cast iron Dutch oven is one my mother-in-law got from a garage sale and used in the garden.
Digital Scale
As in most baking, accurate measurements are important. Cup measurements are difficult to get accurate and my old analogue kitchen scale was not ideal.
Then we bought this scale on Facebook Marketplace and things got so much easier. It has a button to set the scale to Zero – this is very handy!
Bowls
I love using large pudding basins but you can use any vessel large enough. Make sure they are big enough because the dough often doubles in size or more.
Some people say that you should not use metal bowls. I have not tried this.
I use kitchen towels to cover the bowl during the rise times
Banneton
The banneton is a nice to have. You could also use a colander lined with a towel. You can get round and oval bannetons in different sizes.
The liner keeps the dough from getting stuck in the grooves and I use it over and over.
A shower cap from the dollar store makes it easy to cover the banneton during the fermentation in the fridge.
Danish Dough Whisk
Before I got this dough whisk for Christmas, I thought it was a gimmick. Turns out the whisk works much better for stirring together the ingredients than a spoon.
You can use a wooden spoon but the dough can be quite sticky in the beginning. Using a metal serving spoon works in a pinch but this Wisk is better.
I use it a lot in cooking and other baking now.
Oven Gloves
Bread is baked at high temperatures – between 450 and 500 Fahrenheit.
Especially handling the hot cast iron lid of the Dutch oven the gloves keep me safe.
Bread Sling
You want to prevent the bread from sticking to your Dutch oven and you want to be able to take the finished loaf out to cool down.
In the beginning I used parchment paper for this. The problem was that it got brittle in the hot oven and could not be re-used.
I bought a silicone oven mat that can be cut to size and cut this shape. You can see the handles that help getting the loaf in and out.
Bench Scraper
This handy tool is a bench scraper. It comes in handy to transfer the dough into the banneton, especially for softer loafs It works great for cutting dough and scones too.
Lame [lahm]
We score the bread just before baking to aid the steam leaving the bread and help the loaf get a nice, high oven spring. Many bakers make very elaborate and fancy designs that look very pretty on the finished loafs.
To score the bread, you need a very sharp blade. I find that holding the safety razor in my hand works well for me.
There are many designs for lame handles around and I am still dreaming of making myself a really fancy one.
Bread Knife
Especially when you start baking bread regularly, a good bread knife makes a big difference.
This one is a Mercer Culinary Millennia 10″ Wide Bread Knife. A good knife is a bit on an investment, but it stays sharp a long time, and it will be worth it to get it sharpened in a few years.