A Spent Sourdough Rye and Whole Wheat Loaf

A Spent Sourdough Rye and Whole Wheat Loaf

It was inevitable that I would try this. I have been monkeying around with the no-knead rye and no-knead whole wheat breads from my motherstarter discards. Why not put them together in a single loaf?

 Spent Motherstarters, ww and rye flours, yeast, salt, water, bread spice, flax seed

This was very old sourdough motherstarter (MS) discard. It had been in the fridge, since I refreshed my MS, not last time, or even the time before that. But refrigerating it didn't guarantee that it was any good any more: this MS was truly ancient. I had dipped into it occasionally for other breads, but I knew it should really have been tossed. It wasn't just boozy. It was smelling a bit like acetone. But I just can't bring myself to waste anything.

Consider this stuff 'Preferment'. Okay, it was probably 'Postferment'. It was still grains, and it still had lots of flavour. Maybe it wasn't good flavour any more, but it was flavour. It had reached the stage, though, that I said to myself, "I better use this up, or get rid of it." I decided to use it, with no expectations that I would get anything useful out of it.

I just weighed them together and called that 'the starter' in this baker's recipe that I have been using recently for a no-knead rye:

• Starter 92.7%
• Flour 100%
• ID Yeast 1%
• Salt 1.5%
• Water 85.4%
• Bread Spice: 1 1/2 tsp

My amounts:

• Starter 726 (381g Whole wheat, 345g Rye MS; ie what I had, aprox. half ww, half rye)
• Flour 783g (half ww, half rye)
• ID Yeast 8g
• Salt 12g
• Water 669g
• Bread Spice: didn't measure it.
• I also tossed in a handful of flax seeds, didn't measure it.
• Sesame seeds, for the top, didn't measure it.

I used half whole wheat, and half rye flour for this loaf. The rye flour I used was the light rye that has been sitting around here far too long.


Method

Think of how much fun it was to make mud pies as a kid

I mixed it up with wet hands -- this is extremely wet dough! -- and stuck it in that long thin tin I have for ryes. I sprinkled some sesame seeds on top.

Then I went to bed.

Spread it out in a tin, sprinkle some sesame seeds on top, let it rise, spread yogurt on top

Are you getting the picture?  I am working nights this weekend, I don't have a lot of time to fool around with Reinhart-style timings and preferments, and kneading for x amount of time, resting for y amount of time, etc.  I just wanted some dough and ingredients to bake something, and I wanted to fall asleep.  This thing is was literally thrown together before a daytime sleep after working all night.

Five hours later, I awoke and turned on the oven to preheat. The dough had risen a bit, but it wasn't overflowing the tin or anything. I glopped some yogurt on top and spread it around, and baked the loaf for about 55 minutes at 450 degrees, with a tray of water for steam.

I forgot to dock it with a fork. I had wanted to do that. Oh well. Have to leave something to experiment with next time.

Finished loaf sits 5-10 minutes in the pan cooling before I attempt to take it out

Voila.  Go back to bed you still have a couple of hours before you have to get up.

The loaf baked nicely, and all the booziness of the old MS had burned away in the oven, I hope.

I left it on the table overnight while I was working, and in the morning I sliced a bit of it before falling asleep.  It does have a bit of acetone scent to it, between the whiff of bread spice you get.  Furthermore, although the crust is well cooked, the center could have been baked a bit longer.  The knife comes out clean, but it could stand to be a bit more baked.  Despite the off smell, the taste is not off-putting.  It tastes okay, but is not something I'd rave about.

This is one heavy loaf.  It must be greater than 2 kg even after baking, because it sets my tiny scale to read E for Error.

Notes to Myself

• Next time dock it with a fork before baking.
• Try this without a yogurt topping to see what it looks like.  Try an egg wash topping too.
• Try sprinkling the top with sesame seeds after it rises.
• For heaven's sake, use some new motherstarter, don't always use this extremely old stuff.  Why do you keep that stuff, anyway?