freshly milled flour

White Chocolate-Cranberry Sourdough Loaf

February 19, 2024 by bakerhillfarm

Hey friends! Ya’ll know I like to keep it short and sweet, but I have a few things I think you need to read before scrolling to the recipe!

The first being, this recipe has a large amount of sourdough starter. That is not a typo. Using a higher ratio of starter to dough gives us a faster rise! This is a one day shape and bake. What this means is, the day you start your stretch and fold process is the day you bake. You can do the entire recipe on one day, but I prefer to start the autolyse process the night before. What is that, you ask?

The night before I want to bake and eat my loaf, I feed my starter. While I am doing that, I go ahead and start to soak part of my flour in the water needed for the recipe. This gives the final product a much better crumb that holds together and doesn’t fall apart or crumble everywhere. This is so easy and if you watch the video below, I share the entire process! Sometimes it’s easier to see something done than to read it!

White Chocolate-Cranberry Sourdough Loaf

Delicious sourdough loaf, that tastes like dessert! A wonderful breakfast or show stopping addition to any meal.

Ingredients

300 grams of hard white wheat
400 grams of fed sourdough starter
170 grams filtered water
7-10 grams of salt
1/4 cup of sugar
1/2 cup of dried cranberries
1/2 cup of white chocolate chips

Instructions

The night before you want to bake your loaf, mill your 300 grams of hard white wheat in a medium sized mixing bowl. Remove 1/2 cup of the milled flour and place it in the freezer.
With the remaining flour in your mixing bowl, add 170 grams of filtered water. Combine well until there is no remaining flour. Cover and let sit overnight on the counter.
Pull out your sourdough starter and feed it so that you have 400 grams of levain. I add 100 grams of starter to a bowl and feed 150 grams of hard white wheat and 150 grams of filtered water. Cover And leave on the counter overnight. Make sure you have some sourdough starter reserved for future bakes.
The next morning, add your 400 grams of fed starter, dough from your mixing bowl, remaining flour from the freezer, salt, and sugar to a mixing bowl. Knead for about 5 minutes until your dough is thoroughly combined. Cover. Let this sit in a warm place for 1 hour.
After the hour is up, uncover and do four stretch and folds on each side of the dough. Use water on your hands to keep the dough from sticking to you. See video for method used. Cover and let sit for 1 hour in a warm place.
After the second hour is up, repeat step 5.
After the third hour is up, you’re ready for your third stretch and fold. Before you stretch and fold, sprinkle the dried cranberries and white chocolate over the top of your dough. Now stretch and fold the additions in. Cover and leave for 1 hour.
After the hour is up, you’re ready for your final stretch and fold. Stretch and fold the dough, keeping the additions in as best you can. Cover.
Now prepare your baking vessel. Sprinkle a bit of flour on a piece of parchment paper. Take your dough and coil fold it a bit tightly WITHOUT pushing the air out of the loaf. Put on your parchment paper and sprinkle with flour. Place the paper in the Dutch oven and cover. Let sit in a warm place 1-1.5 hours.
Remove lid and score loaf once it has risen some. Place lid back on the Dutch oven. Place in a cold oven. Set the temperature to 485 degrees F and bake for 35 minutes. After 35 minutes, remove Dutch oven and turn your temperature down to 400 degrees. Take the loaf out of the baking vessel and parchment paper and place directly on the oven rack. Bake for 20 minutes.
Remove and let cool for 2 hours. ENJOY!

Sourdough Sandwich Bread with Freshly Milled Flour

December 25, 2023 by bakerhillfarm

This is my favorite family bread recipe. It makes the sourdough lovers happy, and the white bread lovers happy. It is healthy and absolutely delicious!

Please read watch the video or read the recipe thoroughly (including the notes) before making. This recipe is not hard or complicated, but it does involve some extra steps you may not take with the other sandwich bread you make.

The overnight autolyse period is essential. You could swing it with a 3 hour rest period, but if you’re baking same day it would have you up pretty late. I truly believe 8 hour autolyse does wonders to this bread!

I use a Pullman 2 pound loaf pan for this recipe. I absolutely love this pan as it gives me a very uniform loaf that looks like picture perfect sandwich bread.

Yield: 2 pound loaf

Sourdough Sandwich Bread with Freshly Milled Flour

Perfect sourdough with freshly milled flour! Soft, pliable, and so yummy!

Cook Time 40 minutes

Total Time 40 minutes

Ingredients

4 cups of hard wheat grain (this will make about 6 cups of bread flour; use hard white or hard red)
2 cups of filtered water
1 tsp of salt, divided
1/2 cup of sugar
1/2 cup of oil (I use olive oil)
1 cup of fed sourdough starter

Instructions

The night before you want to bake your loaf, mill your grain. Remove roughly a cup of the flour and put it in the freezer to use tomorrow.
Add your 2 cups of water and 1/2 teaspoon of salt to the remaining flour. Mix until there is no dry flour remaining. Cover and let sit on your counter until the morning. Be sure to feed your sourdough starter as well so it is ready to use tomorrow. Feed 1:1:1 ratio.
In the morning, put your rested dough in your stand mixer. Add the remaining ingredients (don’t forget the 1/2 teaspoon of salt) to your mixer, as well as the reserved flour in the freezer.
Put your dough hook attachment on and let it knead 10 minutes. It will see dry at first and then very wet. Once your 10 minutes is up, put it in a mixing bowl to start your fermentation. Cover it and set in a warm place or proofing box. See video to see what I use for a cheap proofing box. Set timer for 1 hour.
After 1 hour, WET the area you will work your dough. Do not add flour. Wet your hands as well. Place your dough on the surface and stretch it out until you can’t anymore without it ripping. Fold it up like a blanket. Place back into your mixing bowl and cover. Set the timer for 1 hour and repeat once more.**
after the second hour it is time to do your third fold. Pick the dough up on either side and lift into the air until it detaches from the bowl. Set it back in the bowl. Turn your bowl and do the same with the remaining sides you haven’t down. Cover and let rest again. Set your timer for one hour and repeat once more.
At this point, your dough has been fermenting 4 hours. Place it into a greased or parchment lined 2 pound Pullman loaf pan or divide in half to fill 2 one pound loaf pans (8x4 inch-NOT 9X5).
Let it rise in your pan in a warm place about 1.5 hours. For a quicker ferment, see note below ***.
Bake at 400 degrees F for 40 minutes or until the internal temperature reaches 190-200 degrees.

Notes

**this step involves lamination folds. If you do not want to do them, just fold your dough in some manner that will pull the dough apart and then bring it back together.

*** sometimes I do not have an hour and a half to let this rise again in my bread pan. If that is the case, I let it rest at least thirty minutes. Then I put it in a cold oven and set the temperature to 400 degrees. I let it cook 40 minutes. Remove, cover the top and put it back in for another 10 minutes.

Soft Whole Grain Sandwich Bread

June 12, 2023 by bakerhillfarm

This recipe is for soft whole grain sandwich bread! Milled with 100% whole grain hard wheat, it is a delicious & nutritious bread!

This recipe calls for hard white wheat due to preference. I have also had great results with hard red wheat. The key is using a hard wheat as this is a yeast bread.

The two keys, in my opinion, to soft whole grain bread are kneading long enough and using an egg. It is difficult to overknead whole grain bread. I knead one loaf in my KitchenAid about 12-14 minutes on low.

The egg used provides a natural form of lecithin. Lecithin improved gluten structure, helped bread stay together but also rise higher. It is a must!

Soft Whole Grain Sandwich Bread

Soft sandwich bread made with 100% whole grains!

Ingredients

392 grams of hard white wheat berries (2 1/4 cups of grain)
1 1/4 cups of warm water (not too hot it will kill yeast)
2 1/4 tsp yeast
1/4 cup honey
1/4 cup oil
1 egg
1 tsp salt
1 1/2 TBSP vital wheat gluten (optional)

Instructions

Mill your grain. Add wheat gluten if using and mix. Remove about 1/4 of the flour and set aside.
Add yeast to warm water. Let your yeast bloom. Once it has bloomed, add it the the 3/4 flour to your mixing bowl as well as water and yeast. Combine and cover. Let it rest 20-30 minutes.
In a separate bowl combine oil, honey, salt, and egg. Mix well.
When your dough is done resting, add oil mixture as well as the rest of the flour. Add dough hook and let it knead 8 minutes and check it. Time needed depends on your mixer. In my KitchenAid, I knead anywhere from 10-20 minutes. You should be able to pinch a bit of dough and pull and it stretch about 2 inches before breaking off. The dough will be wet. Avoid the desire to add more flour!
Once you have a good stretch, scrape the sides down and cover. Let it double in size. This may take 35 minutes to an hour depending on the warmth of your kitchen. You may also let it rise overnight in the refrigerator. This produces a favorable texture as well.
Once doubled, transfer to a greased or lined 9x5 bread pan. Let it rise 35-45 minutes. You want it to rise above the pan, but not spill over the sides.
Bake at 375° F for 24-28 minutes. Check it at 24. Let cool and slice.