The other day, my fridge went on the fritz, and I had to remove all the perishable stuff and put it in a cooler. What didn’t make it was my starter. But that didn’t bother me because I literally hadn’t used it for months, and I was planning to throw it out and start anew…

But looking at my starter, I got a little sentimental and decided to feed it. And in that moment, I remember a recent conversation that I had with a friend who mentioned that she missed my sourdough. Yikes! So, I dumped out the hooch, then mixed in some flour and water, then let it sit overnight. By morning, it was clear that it had peaked and declined, so I dumped out half and re-fed it. Damn! It doubled in just three hours!

Normally, with that kind of doubling rate, I’d set out to make dough. But I wanted to be sure it was ready, so I re-fed it after 4 hours’ time as I had to cook dinner. I couldn’t believe that it tripled in an hour-and-a-half! It was ready.

Since I feel a little rusty, I went to a tried-and-true formula that I’ve used for years. Here it is:

Formula

Flour	100.00%
Water	75.00%
Salt	1.80%
Total %	176.80%

Final Dough

High-Extraction Bread Flour	571g
100% Certified Organic AP Flour	400g
Water	686g
Salt	21g
Starter (levain)	343g
Total Yield	2020g 2 X 1000g loaves + 1% for processing

Quick Process

This is a riff on the Tartine Country Loaf. It’s about as straight-forward as can be. I do a 30-minute fermentolyse to hydrate the flour, then I only do two folding sessions separated by 45 minutes as opposed to the six folds at 30-minute intervals that Chad Robertson does. This is because the flour I use develops gluten FAST. It’s also a reason I use about 35% AP Flour. It helps lighten the dough and produces a lighter and loftier crumb. As for total bulk fermentation, I’m expecting it to last about 3-4 hours at most, especially with how active my starter is.

For folding, I used to do stretches and folds directly in my 6L Cambro container. But before I had to curtail my baking, I started folding my dough on my workspace. I feel that I could more effectively stretch it that way and not de-gas the dough as much.

Once bulk fermentation has completed, I’ll shape batards and place them in my 14″ batard baskets. I love these baskets as the finished product always creates a nice oval shape. Plus, because the dough isn’t as constrained in

As I sit here writing, I’m incredibly excited to be baking sourdough again. I forgot how much I love the process.