I dived into the third attempt almost immediately after throwing away The #2 💩. Somehow, the quest for the perfect (or even just acceptable) bread had lit a fire in my belly and I was determined to find a recipe that worked for me.

I needed to bring together my favourite parts of both recipes: the tight, silky dough from The Virgin Loaf, and the open crumb from The #2 (supposedly, I never got to the baking part...).

A stumbled upon this recipe by Trevor Wilson - a sourdough that promised an open crumb with a stiff dough. There was a video tutorial to make sure you were doing everything right, and step by step photos.... Looked good. Poor Bernie had to work overtime, being refreshed a few times in a short span of time, to get him strong and bubbly for making bread. I can't imagine he was too pleased, it was like being called into work on a Sunday, but nonetheless he grew big and fluffy and was ready for action.

• 436g bread flour
• 24g wholewheat flour
• 10g salt
• 290g water
• 50g starter at 100% hydration

Obviously I'm oddly rebellious in following a recipe exactly, and I didn't have wholewheat flour, so I made one with only white flour, and one with a mix of white and rye. 

There's a certain magic with this recipe, where you give the bread small amounts of attention over a long period of time. The first step is creating and overnight autolyse - you mix all the ingredients except the starter, pop it in the fridge for a few hours, then leave it out on the counter overnight. Because I was unexpectedly refreshing my starter, I left it out to autolyse until lunchtime and it was all fine. The dough went from a rough sticky ball to a smooth and silky one, and then it was time to add the starter.



This went fairly well, although the feel of it was somewhat disgusting. There was a balance between making sure the starter was well worked in, and being gentle to the dough that had strengthened overnight.



Once that was all mixed in, it was time for bulk fermentation and stretch-and-fold. You leave the dough in the bowl for two hours, then gently do a round of stretch-and-fold. This both strengthens the bread and locks in a few additional air pockets for good measure. You repeat this twice more, which makes it three stretch-and-folds over six hours.



After the last stretch-and-fold, you turn out the dough and begin the preshape. That's just shaping it into a round-ish ball, and leaving it on the counter for an hour to rest a little. You could see the huge air pockets in the dough by now, so I was getting more and more excited to bake it.



After the hour passed, you shape into a boule and place into the bannetons. I'd picked up some rice flour by this point, so as to avoid any more sticking incidents. It worked like a charm! It proved in the fridge overnight, and next day I baked it in the afternoon.

It had a delicious crispy and chewy crust, and a soft, holey crumb within. I was very happy with this bread - until I learn to work with high hydration doughs, this provided me exactly what I was looking for.



I'm still missing a little bit of rise, but I think that's largely down to the flour I'm using (not quite enough gluten). Also, I'm trying hard to make a deep score into the bread, to encourage it to open up, but I'm only making little cuts, so we're only getting a little opening. I'm going to try to really slice it, so we get upwards growth and not a split on the underside.

I repeated this later in the week, and got the same delicious results. Until I learn to work with high hydration doughs, this is the perfect practice to get used to sourdough bread and to get experience with how the dough should feel, when it's ready to bake, etc.

Easy to follow recipe: ⚫⚫⚫⚫⚫
There was a video! Step by step instructions plus helpful visuals
Energy required: ⚫⚫◯◯◯
A little elbow grease to make the pre-mix for autolyse, but after that just stretch-and-fold
Dough difficulty: ⚫⚫◯◯◯
A stiffer dough that's easy to work with, but you have to be gentle not to knock out the air
Taste: ⚫⚫⚫⚫◯
It has that signature sourdough tang, and the amount of salt is perfect
Airiness: ⚫⚫⚫⚫◯
Not as much of an open crumb as a high hydration dough, but I'll totally take it! 
Crust: ⚫⚫⚫⚫⚫
Soooooo crispy
Adaptability: ⚫⚫⚫⚫⚫
I made it with half white, half rye, and it was great! With the stretch-and-fold technique it's also super easy to add other ingredients for extra flavour