Brisbane Sourdough | Sourdough Brisbane - Genuine Sourdough is difficult to find in Brisbane

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Brisbane Sourdough | Sourdough Brisbane - Genuine Sourdough is difficult to find in Brisbane

Genuine sourdough bread is difficult to find in Brisbane, Australia. Many bakers in Brisbane are calling yeasted breads with sourdough flavors added true sourdough bread and since there is no government regulation for Brisbane, or indeed across Australia, a bakery can call any type of bread a sourdough bread. Brisbane sourdough bread is hard to find.

This process of adding flavors and yeast is performed due to speed of production, the ease of mechanical manufacture and the lack of understanding of the true process involved in making sourdough bread.

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Worldwide Sourdoughs from Your Bread Machine (Nitty Gritty Cookbooks)

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What is Sourdough Bread? 

A genuine sourdough is bread made with a pre-fermented leaven where natural yeast and bacteria are used to raise, or proof a bread rather than the use of commercial yeasts, improvers and other additives.

Sourdough bread has longer keeping qualities due to its slightly acidic nature as well as its higher density. It ferments over a long period of time which helps to release the nutrition inherent in the grain, thereby giving making the choice for the health conscious bread lover.

It imparts a more complex flavor, due to the artisan methods employed in its production, and the all important time of fermentation. The fermentation releases vitamins and minerals trapped in the flour, resulting in its health conscious qualities.

Today the word sourdough is used to describe fermented doughs, however originally it was specific to rye bread and has become a modern name to describe any naturally leavened bread product. It is known in France as levain bread, in Italy as biga natural and is often associated with organic breads.

You can know a sourdough bread by its distinctive slightly sour smell and taste, a milky colored and opened crumb, meaning that the air bubbles in the bread are not uniform but rather different sizes and shapes. The crust should be slightly chewy and slightly shaded, not a uniform color.

Tips for Baking Sourdough Bread 

The processes involved in making sourdough bread begin with the selection of flour. Organic flour is best as there are no chemicals to interfere with the seeding of natural yeasts and bacteria into the leaven. The next step is ensuring a pure supply of water. This is best achieved by using a filter for removing chlorine and the impurities of tap water, or using spring water.

With these two ingredients we can create a leaven. The leaven is the raising agent of a bread and is created by mixing flower and water to encourage natural yest and bacterias already present in tiny quantities in the flour to flourish. This is done by adding the flower and water together, allowing it to stand overnight, then adding more flower and water over several proceeding days in order to encourage fermentation. This becomes the leaven which will latter seed your bread.

The next step is mixing. It is important that a sourdough is mixed gently and not too much as over mixing can destroy the caretenoids by forcing oxygen into the dough and bleaching it. It should be mixed with a relatively high proportion of water. A sourdough dough should be quite wet. One way to decrease mixing time is to use a method known as autolyse. This is the mixing of the flour and water without the leaven, salt and other ingredients for approximately 20 minutes to start the development of the gluten.

The next step is bulk fermentation. This is where the yeast and bacteria begin to multiply in the bread dough. Complex flavors are developed in this stage and the gluten continues to develop also.

The next step is cutting and molding where by the dough is cut into its desired size and slightly degassed. This is followed by an intermediate proof for approximately 45 minutes and then shaped into the desired shape, for example baguette or Vienna.

This is followed by the final proofing until the dough gets to its desired size. This can be determined by a lack of spring back indicating it is time to go into the oven.

The final stage is baking, best done on a stone or sole oven where the bread is placed directly onto a hot stone which enables rapid expansion in the first stage of the bake. It should be baked to a dark golden color for the best flavor.

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