I was reasonably happy with this bread. The flavour was good, but the dough was a little too dry. The hydration is relatively low because the olives add quite a bit of moisture. The recipe author warns against amending the dough before the olives go in because it will become dramatically looser once they do. While this is true, I still found the dough very tight. I don't know if this was down to the flour being very dry (after a long, dry winter) or my olives not being as wet as expect or the author preferring drier dough or what. In any case, I've adjusted the recipe here to begin with a slightly higher hydration starter. If you live in a very humid climate or find your dough has a tendency to come out on the looser side, you may want to omit a few Tbsp. of the water.

Rosemary-Olive Sourdough

Slightly adapted from Sourdough.com

Ingredients

Preferment

• 2g (100% hydration) fed/active/ripe starter¹
• 579mL water
• 304g hard (strong/high grade/bread) whole wheat flour

Dough

• 515g hard (strong/high grade/bread) whole wheat flour
• 15g coarse sea salt
• 129g pitted kalamata olives, chopped
• 2g dried rosemary (or 3g fresh)

Directions

Preferment

1. Combine the starter with the water and mix well, being sure to break up the starter as much as possible.
2. Add the flour and mix well to thoroughly wet the flour.
3. Cover and set aside at room temperature for ~24 hours. You may need more or less time depending on the temperature of your room.

Dough

1. Add the salt to the flour and mix to combine.
2. Make a well in the centre of the flour and pour in the preferment.
3. Gradually incorporate the flour, working from the centre outward.
4. Once the flour is mostly incorporated, cover and set aside for 10-20 minutes.
5. Meanwhile, prep the olives and the rosemary.
6. Add the olives and rosemary to the dough and finish mixing it.
7. Turn the dough out and knead for 5-10 minutes.
8. After a few minutes of kneading, adjust the hydration as necessary, adding more flour or water as needed. Don't add too much of either at once!
9. Let the dough rest, covered, for another 10-20 minutes, then knead for another few minutes.
10. Cover and set aside at room temperature for an hour or so, then stretch and fold the dough.
11. Repeat the stretching and folding at one-hour intervals until the dough seems light and lively.
12. Divide the dough into two equal portions and round each one. Cover and set aside for 20 minutes.
13. Shape each portion into a loaf and place, seam side up, into a floured banneton.
14. Cover and place in the fridge for 8-12 hours.
15. Preheat the oven to 230°C (450°F), grease a large baking sheet, and sprinkle it with cornmeal.
16. While the oven is preheating, boil some water and remove the dough from the fridge to warm up a little bit.
17. Turn the loaves out onto the prepared pan and slash the tops as desired.
18. Once the oven is preheated, pour a few cups of boiling water into a large pan and place it on the bottom rack of the oven.
19. Place the bread on the middle rack. Try to be quick about opening and closing the oven to keep as much steam inside as possible.
20. Steam the bread until the crust has some good colour on it (10-20 minutes).
21. Reduce oven temperature to 180°C (350°F) and remove the water pan from the oven.
22. Bake for another 20-30 minutes. Bread is done when it sounds hollow and not wet inside.
23. Turn off oven and let bread rest in warm oven for 5-10 minutes.
24. Remove from oven and transfer to wire rack to cool.

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¹ The original recipe calls for using your "storage starter". If you bake fairly frequently and your starter doesn't get too lethargic or sour, you don't necessarily need to feed it up before starting this recipe. (It won't hurt anything if you do, but you don't have to. However, if you're like me and tend to go for long stints without using it, it's best to refresh it with a 1:1:1 or 1:2:2 feeding before you being and then use 2g of the refreshed starter in the preferment. ^Back