so easy a caveman could do it

by Stacy

My day needs to start with some fuel in the form of starch, protein, and coffee. My husband knows to stay out of my way until I have had breakfast, or at least my first cup of coffee. I have even witnessed him trying to sneak a bowl of cereal but fleeing the kitchen when the coffeepot beeped to avoid being in between me and my morning coffee.

My starch and protein of choice has been eggs and toast for quite a while now. The whole wheat bread I’ve been making weekly has been my toast of choice, but after my first success using a sourdough starter, I thought I would try something new.

I checked Wild Yeast and the Fresh Loaf, but every starter-based recipe that sounded good called for rye or buckwheat flour that I don’t have. How hard could it be to find a straightforward sourdough starter bread recipe?

Then I decided not to care. Back in the dark ages before teh internetz — heck, even before then! — people made bread with starters all the time. They didn’t have digital scales or proofing ovens or commercial yeast in the fridge, they had a starter, flour, water, and salt. If they could make bread, so could I.

mostly whole wheat sourdough loaf

And I did.

Is it the best bread ever? Nope. I mixed some starter and a touch of salt with more flour and water until it seemed like a good consistency for a hydrated dough. I folded it several times then let it proof on a pizza peel. I scored it (poorly, it seems) and put it in a hot oven with a steam pan and baked it until it sounded done. How much flour and water I used, I don’t know.

The crust is crisp, the crumb is tender and a little chewy. It made a nice sandwich for lunch, and it’s made good toast with my breakfast for the last few days, too.

part of this balanced breakfast

Morning coffee? Check.

coffee and cream

Love the Straus Creamery packaging.

coffee and cream

Instead of recycling their stylish glass bottles you return them to the store where the creamery picks them up so they can be sterilized and re-used.

Did I mention how cute they are?

Mmm, breakfast. Delicious, even without a recipe.

{ 3 comments… read them below or add one }

Justin February 12, 2010 at 4:14 pm

I digging whatever filtering you did to your photos today.

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stacy February 16, 2010 at 10:51 pm

Thanks, dude. It’s called “vintage look” (plus a little tweaking) and is a script for GIMP. I’m trying to learn to edit my photos better, along with taking better ones to start.

Reply

Mimi February 15, 2010 at 12:08 am

Great looking bread! Sometimes the best bread is improvised. If you still need recipes, come visit me on my blog. I have a bunch of ’em!

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