Vanessa Kimbell's sourdough starter

Serves Cakes, Bread and Pastries

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Method

Sourdough starter

Day 1: 8am
Mix 100g flour and 110g/ml warm (28C) water in a clean jar and stir until well combined. Cover with a loose-fitting lid and leave somewhere warm for 24 hours.

Day 2: 8am
Put 50g flour and 60g/ml warm water in a new, clean jar. Add 100g of the original starter (which by now should be starting to bubble) into this new jar and stir well. Discard the remaining starter from the previous jar and wash out the jar, ready to refresh your starter again the next day. You should now have 210g of new starter. Cover loosely and leave somewhere warm for 12 hours, then repeat the refreshment process, as above.

Day 3 onwards
Continue to repeat this refreshment process twice a day for a further 3–6 days until your starter is bubbly and lively and doubles in size within around 5 hours of being refreshed. It is now ready to use. If you aren’t baking every day, you will need to build your starter before you bake. This is a two-stage process, known as a double refreshment, which will leave you with a second-build starter (below).

Second-build starter

Day 1: 8pm (first build)
Put your 30g starter in a clean jar with the water and whisk together well to oxygenate the water. Add the flour and stir vigorously to combine the ingredients. Cover the jar loosely with a lid, so that the gases produced during fermentation can escape. Leave the jar on the kitchen worktop at an ambient temperature of 20–22C.

Day 2: 8am (second build)
Take 30g of your starter and refresh it again following the instructions for the first build. Leave the jar for a further 12 hours before baking.

The bassinage technique

This is how you add water to dough over a period of time. First, wet your hands in a jug of lukewarm water and shake off any excess – your hands should be just wet enough to stop the dough sticking as you mix it. Put your hands in the dough with firm, open fingers, and gently close your fingers while twisting the dough anti-clockwise, drawing the dough through your fingers as you do so. This action mimics a dough hook. The dough should not stick if it has been rested long enough. Every couple of movements, wet your hands once more, again shaking off any excess, and turn the bowl. It should take less than 1 minute to mix in the water. Cover and leave the dough for another 30 minutes.

This recipe was taken from the October 2021 issue of Food and Travel. To subscribe, click here.