It is national sourdough day, fools

I was just informed that it is National Sourdough Day, no fooling.

I baked more sourdough this weekend. I wanted to see if my starter would come back to the reliable cycle I am used to if I treated it nice for a few days. This no-knead loaf rose very nicely for about 20 hrs.

I folded the dough and put it into a linen lined banneton. I wanted to see if this would make my bread any different. For years I have been using floured banneton and getting really rustic, crusty, artisnal looking loaves. Cutting into one sends out an explosion of crumbs. I thought the linen liner might 'smooth things out.' Ha. Ha.

The linen liner would, later in the weekend, nearly prove my undoing.

I floured the linen pretty heavily and the loaf came out quite easily. As I would later deliver this bread into the eager hands of my daughter, spending the weekend at her moms house, I scored it with an "A" for Anarchy.

The exterior looks beautiful, and the crumb was perfect for the sandwiches my child ate for dinner. The linen liner works wonders to develop a thin, even crispy and wonderful crust. You can cut this bread without leaving a small avalanche of crust behind.

Later in the weekend, baking bread for a soon to arrive dinner guest I under floured the linen and had a fairly sticky loaf of bread. The loaf stuck to the liner and tore a little as I transferred from banneton to parchement paper for scoring. Read the rest