Have you ever made a sourdough starter? If you have, how long did you keep it going? Is is still alive? Do you feed it regularly?
I'm just judging if you are a better person than me. If you answered "yes" to any of those questions, it's likely that you are.
I love the taste of sourdough. I love making my own bread. I think it's pretty cool that starters can been passed along to different people and develop flavor based on age and origin. I'm just not patient enough to keep one going.
In fact, the only experience I've had with a sourdough starter in my house was when my roommate moved in with one, put it in a tall cupboard we never used, and forgot about it. A few months later as I was fumigating everything in the apartment trying to figure out what that horrendous smell was (apparantly I was the only one who could smell it.) I found the starter again. Let's just say it didn't die a pretty death.
This recipe is for people like me that like the tangy taste of sourdough but don't have a sourdough starter. It uses yogurt as a cheater method to get some of that same great tanginess into a regular yeast bread. It is fast (excluding the rising times) and makes a nice, chewy bread with a light sourdough-like flavor. The recipe suggests spritzing the loaf with water throughout baking to encourage a nice, crispy crust, but if you were lucky enough to have received a large cast iron pan for your wedding from a good friend, feel free to use that to cook your loaf. Directions for both methods are written in the recipe.
If you like sourdough, I highly encourage you to make this bread. It's one of my favorite things to come out of my kitchen for a long time. My husband ate it for lunch and dinner the first time I gave it a try. (Of course, that also might show you how bread-deprived the poor guy is.) And if you do make it, feel free to lie and tell people that it is real sourdough.
Unless, of course, you are a better person than me.
Mock Sourdough Bread
Ingredients
- 2 cups plain yogurt (I've never tried Greek yogurt in this recipe. If you do, you will likely have to add more water or reduce the amount of flour you use.)
- 1 T yeast
- 1/4 cup warm water
- 1 T honey
- 2 tsp salt
- 1 T oil
- 4 - 5 cups flour, divided
Directions
- Heat yogurt just to lukewarm. Dissolve yeast in warm water. Stir in yogurt, honey, salt, oil and 2 cups of flour. Beat until smooth. Gradually remaining flour just to make a smooth dough.
- Turn dough onto a floured surface and knead until smooth and elastic. (If using a heavy duty mixer, let dough knead for 7 minutes.)
- Place dough in a greased bowl; turn once and leave greased side up. Cover and let rise until double, about 1.5 hours. Punch down. Divide the dough into 8 equal portions or form one large round loaf on a greased baking sheet. Let rise, covered, for 30 minutes. (If using a cast iron pot to cook your loaf, place dough to rise on a greased sheet of parchment paper set in a pie pan. Cover lightly with plastic wrap and let rise for 40 minutes. Meanwhile, heat oven to 450 with cast iron pan inside.)
- For non-cast iron method: Heat oven to 375. Brush loaf (or loaves) with cold water and bake until it sounds hollow when tapped, about 30-35 minutes for small loaves or 45-50 minutes for one large loaf. Brush or mist with water every 10 minutes to get a crisp crust. Cool on a wire rack.
- For cast iron method: Once cast iron pot has heated for 40 minutes in the hot oven and the loaf has risen, carefully remove the pot from the oven (using pot holders!) and gently place the dough inside using the parchment paper as a sling. Cover the pot and place in the oven for 20 minutes. Remove the lid and let the loaf cook another 10-15 minutes or until browned. Remove pot from oven, carefully removed bread and allow it to cool on a wire rack.
Prep Time: 15 min Cook Time: 50 min Ready in: 3 hours Yield: 1 large loaf
Recipe Source: 101 Things to Do With Yogurt
