Sourdough bread – A Cheat Method to get the Taste

I love sourdough bread, does not matter if its white flour or rye or whole meal, I just love that sour taste. Every so often I look up the various recipes and think shall I make some. The time and effort it takes to make ‘mother’ the starter for it puts me off. I am not sure I have that dedication to make the starter over a period of I think couple of weeks (that was the shortest time I saw for this).

So I would yet another recipe and another and eventually I gave up the thought of homemade sourdough. I have learnt to make naan and one uses some yogurt in making the dough. This made me think, why can I not use that to make bread and see what it tastes like? I tend to use sour yogurt and so it should give sourness to the bread. And yes I was right and I have my cheat version of sourdough.

Ingredients

·       300 gm of wheat flour (roti atta will do or plain flour)
1 heaped teaspoon of yeast (I got live ones that I keep in fridge)
1 tablespoon of olive oil
1 to 1 and half table spoon of yogurt (sour if possible)
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon of sugar
Water should be warm – I generally make it just hot enough to be able to knead as that will get the yeast going.

Method

Put the dry ingredients together in a bowl.

Add the yogurt and then water to knead.

Just add water as you require (I do it by feel like how you do roti atta).

Knead it for a good 5 mins.

Once it is smooth and come together take a little oil in your hand and knead it so it covers the whole outer surface of the dough ball and at the same time it will line the bowl so when it rises it will not stick to the sides.

Cover it with a lid or Clingfilm so that it does not start drying out- I found that just using a tea cloth to cover tended to dry out the surface.

Leave it for a couple of hours and it will rise to double in size. The punch the air out and re-knead for a few mins.

Shape it up for the second rising. Now at this point you can put it in the baking tin and let it rise there. Just dust the tin with some flour so it does not stick.

Bake on high heat 250 C for about 30 mins. I would check after about 25 mins. But you should know your oven and the time it takes to bake your bread. Once done turn it out on a rack to cool as otherwise it will not cut properly.

You can have variations by adding garlic in when kneading the second time. I sometimes add poppy seeds. My point is once the bread is right you can add things you like.

Have it warm with butter or with olive oil and balsamic mix for dipping.