Can you write the Easy Guide to Sourdough and Networks?
This week while pondering the possibility that the Simpsons Writers are actually double agents after watching an episode predicting the corona virus, I ended on a Colbert (yea Co-Bear my a$$) skit. He made a remark about staying home and making our own sour dough bread. Yup I am doing that too.
As I got the last edits back on the Easy Guide to Internet and Network Stuff, I started thinking. Could i make an Easy Guide to Sourdough? I had joined the fray some time ago and had a lot of issues with sticky dough, frisbee shaped bread and even mold. I realized that I had a lot to learn about bread. Beer brewing was much easier.
The short story is a little different for me though. I stopped eating all grains a couple of years ago during a diet competition. When I started again I broke out all over and incorrectly diagnosed it as a gluten allergy. As long as I avoided all breads and wheat based foods I was fine. I even tried to find a great gluten free pizza dough since I had already purchased a pizza oven. Then I toured Europe and learned it is only American wheat. The only thing I can figure is glyphosate. Even organic wheat does it. Unless that is, I use a long rise process with wild yeast. You might call it sourdough.
At first I really did have a hard time baking in. My friends were super polite, trying to swallow undercooked pizza, and rock hard sourdough wasn’t easy I am sure. My wife put the hammer down and said “No more guests eating this until you figure it out”.
I found Bake with Jack online. He is a pretty good bread maker that should have changed his name to Jake. I think Bake with Jake from a marketing perspective sounds better. Anyway, he had a video that solved sticky dough. Another that solved loaves going flat and looking like Frisbee’s. I blame the 20 pound I gained on experimenting with sourdough. The truth is beer might have something to do with it. I do find it easier to drink good beer when making bread.
After going through several of Jacks videos and a dozen other less helpful ones, I think I broke the code. I got making sourdough bread, baguettes and pizza down to a two sided one page guide. That is about the easiest Easy Guide I have ever written. Instead of charging for it, I decided to just post it here as a free download. The one thing to keep in mind is that the water amount changes based on how dry the air is where you bake and raise the bread. I live at the beach so I use about 10 grams less water. My friends in Palm Springs say they need about 5 grams more water.
Otherwise, this is about as easy as it gets. Enjoy!
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