What three years of baking bread taught me
· 1 min read
A friend once described sourdough as quiet work, and the phrase stuck. Thanks for reading, and for the generous notes that keep arriving. Below are a few notes, roughly in the order I found out them.
The short version
Most of the flavour comes from a steady hand rather than ingredients. I keep coming back to citrus, for the most part because it rewards a steady hand. This keeps for a week in the fridge and improves by day three. Salt early, taste often, and do not rush the onions.
I like pickles that shows the marks of how it was made. A kitchen scale shifted my baking more than any recipe did. Somewhere between the market and home, the thought finally made sense.
What did not work
The dough should feel soft and slightly tacky, not sticky. The seasonal part is rarely the hard part; consistency is. Here is what shifted, and what stayed exactly the same. Use what is in season and the recipe for the most part writes itself.
sourdoughseasonal greens