My first 50-50 WHEAT SOURDOUGH BREAD, or: COW PAT, as my husband called it...

A fantastic bread recipe from an expert baker, ruined in the hands of Eva... However, not everything that could have gone wrong did go wrong...

It's mid-March. Outside, the world is flying around, caught in a warm storm blowing from Africa. My laundry is drying in no time, as if in a tumble dryer, including the items on the clothes rack that the wind blew into the cactus bed... husband's pyjamas might be a bit prickly tonight... ;-)

The wind brought with it a lovely warmth - perhaps spring is finally arriving in Bella Calabria.

Meanwhile, I'm on a sourdough bread mission. I promised my husband to make a lighter sourdough bread suitable for daily breakfast.

I have been baking with sourdough for more than a decade, but the only thing I successfully manage is my version of Austrian Rye & Spelt Sourdough bread. The loaves turn out quite nice, if I may say so myself. They have the typical characteristics of rye bread, with a fairly dense crumb. Mine is also packed with spices, like cumin, caraway seeds, coriander, and fennel. It's very similar to the one at home, and my personal favourite. In Austria, and particularly in my family, it's our staple bread, and we enjoy it at any time of day.

However, it's a little too hearty for my Italian husband for breakfast, and I've been promising him a lighter sourdough wheat bread for a while.

Rye sourdough bread is super easy because it contains a small amount of gluten, meaning, the dough cannot trap a lot of air, resulting in its characteristic fine crumb. All you need to do is make a pre-dough, combine everything into a main dough the following day, rest, shape, and bake.

Wheat sourdough bread is another story and requires skill and knowledge. I've tried making it several times, but each attempt has been unsuccessful - needless to say, we did eat every bread to the last crumb.

Wheat contains a lot of gluten, which must be properly developed to create a gluten network capable of trapping air and carbon dioxide, allowing the bread to rise and create an open crumb, desired for wheat breads. Correct fermenting, timing, kneading, and temperature, as well as the type of flour, all have an effect on the final crumb and crust—the art is knowing how to get them right.

While searching for more information, I recently discovered a baker who has become my new bread hero. His name is Marcel Paa. He is a professional baker, bread sommelier, and pastry chef in Switzerland, and has a YouTube channel where he shares his professional knowledge, tips, and tricks. He is incredibly precise, explains everything in detail, and puts all the bread baking information that is flying around the internet back into perspective. His passion for bread is contagious.

Marcel makes bread baking look so easy in his videos, and based on the comments on his channel and blog, his recipes really work well, as everyone shares their success stories.

Well not quite everyone...

Armed with his advice, and full of good intentions, I tried to bake one of his breads today: Sauerteig Laib mit 50:50 Vollkorn und Weizenmehl, a sourdough bread made with 50% wheat and 50% whole-wheat flour. I was so full of confidence that this time I was going to get it right!

Yesterday, I refreshed my mother dough and a pre-sourdough. This morning, I prepared a cooked dough, allowed it to cool, and then combined and kneaded all the ingredients into a final dough that I left to bulk-ferment for three hours. Then I shaped it, left it to ferment for another hour, before baking.

Unfortunately, what was meant to be a beautifully raised loaf ended up resembling more of a flatbread.

It was all fine until I made the main dough. It was so wet, nearly unmanageable, not like the springy, beautiful ball that Marcel Paa created. The regular folding made a difference, but still nothing like I had seen in Marcel's video.

I noticed it already during kneading and was tempted to add more flour, but in the end, I stuck with the exact recipe to have a benchmark - me versus recipe.

Marcel suggests flattening the dough a bit before final fermentation... my dough was already like a frisbee... When it finally went in the oven, I thought all was lost, as it continued to spread out. As it baked, it began to look more promising, starting to rise in the middle. Finally, at least we'd have some surface area to put our honey on, but instead, all the dough's strength accumulated into a large center dome. The final bread is all dome in the center, and looking like a shoe on the side - am I do(o)med?

Anyway, here it is: my first wheat and wholewheat sourdough bread.

When I showed it to my husband, he said: 'Very nice!' Noticing my doubtful face, he eventually dared to say: 'But is it normal for it to be so flat?' I smiled, which encouraged him to dig deeper:

'It looks a bit like a cow pat! :-)

(Whatever I bake, we must eat, and I'm sure I also saw a sign of relief in his face: at least it looks edible...)

It's not that it's just flat. Properly baked bread is almost uniform in height from one side to the other. Mine has a rounded side, a large dome, and resembles a slipper on the other side.

I'm sitting here, typing with one hand, cheese in the other, waiting for it to cool so I can finally cut it and see the crumb. My expectations are small, but my hunger is big, so it'll be alright.

Now the journey begins: Today's bread is my benchmark. Spreadsheet ready with today's data, I will change one thing at a time to try and improve the bread.

First change: bake the bread inside a Dutch oven - this should at least stop it from spreading during baking.

While I've been typing, the bread has finally cooled, and we could cut it. It looks just as bad inside as it does outside, with large holes and tunnels. Unfortunately, I have no clue what went wrong or how to fix it - yet!

However: after eating our fourth slice, now with Philadelphia, I can honestly say, not all went wrong. The bread has a delightful, shattering crust, and a moist, creamy and flavourful crumb, and we are thoroughly enjoying it.

The house is filled with the wonderful aroma of freshly baked bread - so in the end, not all that could have gone wrong, did go wrong...

---

RECIPE:

As you can clearly see, I am not there yet with my recipe, but if you are interested, here is Marcel Paa's original: Sauerteig Laib mit 50:50 Vollkorn und Weizenmehl

Marcel's Youtube channel: Marcel Paa: Einfach Backen

I watch it in German, but many of his videos are available also in English or have English subtitles.