Bread the staff of life, Sourdough is the oldest form of leavened bread and was used at least as early as ancient Egypt. It was probably discovered by accident when bread dough was left out and good microorganisms wild yeast drifted into the mix. The resulting bread had a lighter texture and better taste.
Sourdough bread is made by the fermentation of dough using naturally occurring lactobacilli and yeast. It uses biological leavening rather than using cultivated baker’s yeast. The lactic acid produced by the lactobacilli gives it a more sour taste and improved keeping qualities.
Sourdough Bread
The secret is a good starter, you can buy starters online. I am in the process of making jars of starter from mine to sell. You can of course make your own after all it is just flour and water, which like all living things you have to feed, I shall do a post on making and looking after a starter shortly.
So below is how I make my bread.
INGREDIENTS
50 – 100 g (1⁄4 – 1/2 cup) bubbly, active starter.
375 g (1 1/2 cups plus 1 tbsp) warm water
500 g (4 cups plus 2 tbsp) bread flour
9 to 11 g (1.5 – 2 teaspoons) fine sea salt
INSTRUCTIONS
Make the dough: In the evening, whisk the starter and water together in a large bowl with a fork or spatula. Add the flour and salt. Mix to combine, finishing by hand if necessary to form a rough dough. Cover with a damp towel and let rest for 30 minutes.
Stretch and fold. After half an hour, take a corner of the dough and pull it up and into the centre. Turn the bowl a quarter turn, repeat until you’ve performed this series of folds 4 to 5 times with the dough. Let dough rest for another 30 minutes and repeat the stretching and folding action. If you have the time: do this twice more for a total of 4 times in 2 hours.
Bulk Fermentation (first rise): Cover the bowl with a towel and let rise overnight at room temperature, about 8 to 10 hours. The dough is ready when it has doubled in size, has a few bubbles on the surface, and jiggles when you move the bowl from side to side.
Shaping: In the morning, coax the dough onto a lightly floured surface. Gently shape it into a round fold the top down to the centre, turn the dough, fold the top down to the centre, turn the dough; repeat until you’ve come full circle. If you have a bench scraper, use it to push and pull the dough to create tension.
Resting: Let the dough rest seam side up rest for 30 minutes. Meanwhile, line an 8-inch (20-cm) bowl or proofing basket with a towel and dust with flour (preferably rice flour, which doesn’t burn or stick the way bread or plain flour does). Using a bench scraper or your hands, shape it again as described in step 4. Place the round into your lined bowl, seam side up.
Proof (second rise): Cover the dough and refrigerate for 1 hour or for as long as 48 hours.
Place a cast-iron dutch oven in your oven, and preheat your oven to 290°C or as hot as your oven will go. Cut a piece of parchment to fit the size of your baking pot.
Score: Place the parchment over the dough and invert the bowl to release. Using the tip of a small knife or a razor blade, I use a Stanley knife blade, score your dough however you wish — a simple “X” is nice. Use the parchment to carefully transfer the dough into the preheated baking pot.
Cook: Carefully cover the pot, close the oven, and reduce the heat to 230°C. Cook the dough for 30 minutes, covered. Remove the lid, lower the temperature to 200ºC and continue to bake for 10 – 15 minutes more. If necessary, lift the loaf out of the pot, and bake directly on the oven rack for the last 5 to 10 minutes. Cool on a wire rack for 1 hour before slicing.
Sourdough Bread
So there we have the basics of making sourdough bread, I am going to do videos to show the shaping process, the lift and fold etc as well as making your own starter.
There are about 4,000 varieties of chilli in the world. This is my four chillies chilli, the chillies I use in this recipe are cascabel, chipotle, ancho and jalapeno. I have used this recipe for a number of years it was the chilli sauce I used when I did chilli dogs at food festivals. I use it in the smoker doing a low and slow with flank and shin that has an amazing depth of flavour from the low slow-smoked cooking. Does great nachos as well, a dish that used to go down really well when I did pop-ups. Although it has four chillies in it is not a fiery blow your head off chilli but more depth of flavour with that nice heat kick to it.
Ingredients:
800g minced beef
1 tbsp olive oil
2 onions
2 cascabel chilli
4 jalapenos
2 ancho chilli
2 chipotle chilli
1 tbsp smoked paprika (I like piquant)
Half a bulb of smoked garlic
1 tbsp oregano or mixed herbs
8 squares dark chocolate (85 %)
400g tin chopped tomatoes
400g tin kidney beans
300ml beer (your choice stout works well as does an IPA)
Beef stock cube or stock pot
Salt & pepper
Method:
Place the dried chillies, ancho, cascabel, chipotle in a bowl and cover with hot water to rehydrate. While they are rehydrating dice the onion and finely chop the garlic. Saute the onion and once it has taken on some colour add the garlic. In a blender add the tomatoes, herbs and the now rehydrated chillies. Saute off the minced beef until browned add the beer and the sauce mix. Bring to a simmer and then add the drained kidney beans and the broken up dark chocolate. Season with salt and pepper to taste. If you were using a stewing steak, flank, shin or brisket you would make the sauce add the meat then slow cook for 3-4 hours, of course, you could do it in your slow cooker.
I am not one for sour cream and all the other stuff you see served with it but I do like to add extra candied jalapenos to garnish, that and I may be slightly addicted to them as well, I get mine from a good friend at The Preservation Society
Served with just a plain boiled basmati rice. So there you have my chilli recipe or rather my four chillies chilli.
I have never been a fast-food fan as such but I did enjoy fried chicken until I discovered the source of the chicken used. Now there are only two places I eat fried chicken and that is from my kitchen or my friend’s food truck Dirty Bird fried chicken
There are two secrets to having the perfect fried chicken, brine the bird and marinate in buttermilk. The choice of your seasoning in your flour dredge is up to you, I doubt mine are ever the same, sometimes spicy other times herby depending on my mood. The recipe for this one is below.
Recipe:
600g boneless chicken thighs
Spice mix
2 tbsp smoked paprika
1 tsp onion granules
2 tbsp mixed herbs ( oregano, thyme, parsley)
1 tsp garlic granules
1 tsp chilli powder
salt and pepper (sea salt fresh cracked black pepper)
Marinate:
5% brine ( for a litre of water 50g of salt dissolved) you can add to the brine with things like bay, pickling spices, citrus peel etc
300 ml buttermilk (if you can’t get buttermilk you can use whole milk and add cider vinegar for 300ml of milk add about a tablespoon of cider vinegar)
Dredge:
100g self raising flour
100g cornflour
You can use rice flour or even get some cornflakes and crush to a flour like consistency.
Method:
Make your brine by dissolving the salt in water, place the chicken thighs in the cooled brine for 4-6 hours. Remove from brine and pat dry with kitchen paper. Place the chicken in a container cover with the buttermilk and refrigerate overnight or for about 8 hours. The slightly acidic buttermilk helps tenderise the chicken by breaking down some of the proteins in the meat.
Mix the flours and most of the spice mix together, keep some of the spice mix back to mix with sea salt to season the chicken after cooking. Put the flour and spice mix in a bag this is the easiest and least messy way to dredge the chicken.
Frying:
Heat your oil to 170c personally I use beef dripping for my frying as I do not use highly processed vegetable oils. If I were to use a vegetable oil it would be a UK cold-pressed rapeseed oil. Cook the chicken in batches of about three pieces depending on the size of your fryer or pan. Deep fry for 8 minutes as with all my meat cooking I use a meat probe and cook to an internal temperature of 74c. As each batch is cooked I put on a rack and put in the oven at about 50c to keep warm but not continue cooking.
Crispy fried chicken
With this one, I did a spiced slaw using candied jalapenos from my good friend Rag who owns The Preservation Society. To say they are the best cowboy candies ever is an understatement and I truly am addicted to them. Chunky potato wedges seasoned with my chilli spice mix salt and pepper and roasted. Along with that was a side of my sauerkraut, I eat this with almost every meal I have.
So there you have my take on fried chicken hope you enjoy making it, get the kids involved and have fun.
