Fast rising German style sourdough bread
This is one of the tastiest loaves I have made so far. It is a pure sourdough loaf but takes less time than most breads relying on the powers of wild yeast. The rye meal soaker is combined with a small amount of sourdough, yielding quite a powerful starter.
Fast rising German style sourdough bread
Sourdough build
- 220g coarse rye meal
- 300g boiling water
- 1 tbs mature rye sourdough culture
Pour the boiling water into a bowl that holds the corse rye meal. Mix thoroughly, cover and let stand for about 20 minutes until it cools down to hand warm. Mix in the sourduogh culture, cover and let rest for about 15 hours at room temperature.
Seed soaker (optional)
- 30g linseeds
- 30g sunflower seeds
- 100g warm water
Mix the ingredients for the soaker, cover and let stand for about 3 hours. You can make this the same time that you prepare the sourdough build and let it stand for 15 hours as well.
Dough
- 330g whole-wheat flour (replace 100g with fine rye flour to get a bread with a stronger rye flavor)
- 11g sea salt
- Enough water to make a soft and sticky dough
- Sourdough build
- Seed soaker (optional)
The dough will rise rapidly for reasons not entirely clear to me. Maybe it is just the high amount of sourdough combined with the fact that it’s summer. I don’t recall making a sourdough loaf fermenting this quickly.
Bulk fermentation: 45 – 60 minutes at room temperature of 22°C.
Shape into a log and place into a place into an oiled bread tin.
Final fermentation: 30 – 45 minutes.
Baking: Bake at 230°C for 20 minutes, reduce heat to 210°C and bake for further 40 – 50 minutes. Let cool completely, preferably let stand for 24 hours before cutting into it.
Source: Own recipe
Hi Nils,
Thanks for this recipe. I found it really slow to rise for some reason. Maybe it’s the climate here in England at the moment. It’s wet, grey and cold and seems to have been like this for months.
Is the amount of rye start right (1 tbs) in your recipe? It doesn’t seem very much and you also refer to the high amount of sourdough in the recipe, so am wondering if something is missing from the recipe. Also what is the purpose of adding the boiling water to the coarse rye meal? How does this help the fermentation? It did rise a bit in the tin, but is quite a dense crumb. My bread is cooling at the moment, so am looking forward to testing it.
Kind regards,
John
John
11 August 2008 at 01:02
Hi, John,
I have used very coarse rye meal, closer to cracked rye than anything else. By mixing with boiling water I wanted to soften it. I guess, you could just use warm water, I have seen bakers boiling their meal for hours though.
The rye-water-mixture becomes the sourdough starter by adding 1tsp sourdough to it and letting it stand overnight. After this time, did you check if some souring had occured? The total amount of flours/meal being 550g, the amount of sourdough (~550g) is around 100% relative to this total, which is quite high.
Regards,
Nils
theinversecook
11 August 2008 at 01:33
Hi Nils,
Thanks for coming back. I cut the loaf when it had cooled and tried a slice. It is quite sour, but nice and nutty.
Two things I’ve learnt is that I didn’t bake if for long enough, so it is a little underdone and sticky still. I baked for 50 mins at 200 C in a fan oven, so perhaps i should have given it an hour. Secondly, I think I should have used ripe rye leaven. in hindsight, it wasn’t ripe enough to use, but I just took some because I wanted to get on with it!
I’ve become quite interested in the German-style breads recently, after years of baking the French-style sourdoughs. They seem healthier. Are you going to be doing any more of this type of bread? I would be interested in the recipes you use.
Kind regards,
John
John
11 August 2008 at 10:38
Hi John,
it may also help to let the finished bread rest for about 48 hours, which I believe has something to do with the starch gelatinization of rye, which is that rye gets all sticky when mixed with water and exposed to high temperatures above 70°C. For baking times, 50 minutes at 200°C could be enough, depending on the shape of the loaf / pan, I think.
I am tempted to use this as a base recipe for more German bread baking. Maybe throw in couple of handfuls soaked rye grains too, leave out the seeds and increase rye. Will come back to this reipce.
I realize that the notion “fast rising” is perhaps misleading and should be taken with a pinch of salt. If the bread is not rising fast, then the resting times should be extended keeping in mind that a dough has to go through its own life cycle, which is the only determining factor (not my little recipe). Making this a not so fast rising loaf for some.
Regards,
Nils
theinversecook
11 August 2008 at 12:21
[...] @ 9:51 pm The formula for this bread is similar to the preceeding fast rising sourdough bread (link ti blog entry), however it was baked as free standing loaf and the seeds were left out. I also used a thick [...]
Fast rising sourdough bread - Take 2 « Ye olde bread blogge
15 August 2008 at 21:53
Hi Nils, just made this and letting the dough cool and rest! I like it because initially I let the sour rise a bit longer than 15 since it’s rather cool here and wet. But once mixed the time is really quick, also I used the 2nd version of this breads percentages of flour in the final dough, Can’t wait to try it, maybe I will use some beer in it next time?
Jeremy
28 September 2008 at 18:16
Wasting the beloved liquid and put it into bread dough? Sounds like the right thing to do with that stuff. My taste in beer stops right after mixing it with lemonade – tastes much better that way
Hope your loaf will be good.
theinversecook
28 September 2008 at 20:35