The sourdough diaries: Good morning Mr Baker

February 11 – 7am

Following my sourdough adventures of late, i fully intended  bake a loaf of sourdough each week. I  reckoned it would force me to practice and hopefully improve, and also master the skewed temperature settings in my cranky old oven, which sabotaged my first sourdough efforts last week. But i’ve already stumbled in the second week and just bought a loaf! Why?

Well my partner is starting a new job today and i wanted to send him to work with a sandwich for lunch. We adore the crusty Rosetta rolls baked by our  local Vietnamese baker, Nam Viet Hot Bread, in the neighbouring suburb of Five Dock. And the stale remains of my first home-baked loaf certainly aren’t sandwich worthy any longer (and possibly never was!). So i got up early to buy  fresh rolls for our lunches. While i was there, mesmerised by the smell of freshly baked bread, i bought a loaf, too. What can i say? I have no willpower! And i also have very little time over the next few days … and sourdough baking takes a little bit of that.

But i haven’t let myself off scott free. I need to get on top of this dodgy old oven lark, so my mission this week is to buy an oven thermometer in order to be better prepared for the next bake-off (which is suspect won’t happen now until the weekend).

February 11 – 11am

I’ve been reading a sourdough tutorial by Celia at Fig Jam and Lime Cordial (she introduced me to this baking game in the first place), and feeling really guilty about buying bread this morning. I know that i’m procrastinating on the home baking front, because the first loaf was just okay and not out of this world. I’m also not looking forward to another  battle with the oven. If i have a thermometer i’ll feel more confident.

But guilt sent me into the kitchen to feed Priscilla — the sourdough starter gifted to me by Celia. She (the starter) was looking a little watery on top, but from the photos in Celia’s tutorial this seems to be okay. I’ve added ¼ cup of bakers’ flour and a ¼ of a cup of water, as per instructions. I stirred it in (not sure if i’m supposed to), then gave her a little loving tap on her container lid. I hope she’ll forgive me my delay, and be kind to me on her next outing.

February 11 – 11.3oam

I’ve just had a slice of toast made from the remainder of my first sourdough loaf. Sliced thinly it toasted fine, unlike those first few days when the toast was gluggy (due to too much moisture that an additional 10minutes in the oven would have sorted out). It was best eaten fresh in those first few days, and staleness has made it a better toasting bread. Message to self: don’t give up — get to know your bread.