More sourdough bread

Educated by three prior attempts at sourdough bread which all failed or succeeded to different degrees I was ready yesterday to give it another try. To recall: All of the prior attempts were too dense in their crumb. They all had a crust that was way too hard and dry. And the salt was unevenly distributed in the last loaf. The first two times I did not allow the dough enough rise time. In the last attempt the dough had risen plenty but I am speculating that the dough was too dry when I formed the loafs. So I needed more water in the dough. So this time around I was following this modified procedure:

1. I mixed my starter culture with a cup of flour and half a cup of water and let it sit in a plastic wrapped bowl until the entire mixture was all bubbly. This took less than 12 hours.
2. I added another two cups of flour,  one cup of water, and two teaspoons of salt and once again mixed it all up. Again, I let it sit in the wrapped bowl until bubbly.
3. I added yet another cup of flour (but no water) and kneaded it all down. When it was still way too sticky to work and form loafs with I slowly added some more flour, maybe another quarter cup total. I sprayed my hands with oil while kneading or otherwise the dough would have stuck all over my hands.
4. When I decided it was enough kneading the dough was still trying to sticky, both to my hands and the working surface. And it was definitely too wet that I would have trusted it to retain the shape of a loaf in the oven.
5. To enforce some shape onto the loafs I used three 2 pound baking pans. I oiled them down with cooking spray. I divided the dough into three mini loafs and put in in each of the pans. I covered the pans with a towel and then let them rest at room temperature, for three hours.
6. I baked the loafs at 400°F for 35 minutes, spraying the top with my water mister repeatedly. I removed the loafs from the pans almost immediately, then allowed the loafs to cool over night.

The result were three good looking  14 ounce loafs, except for a cracked crust along the length of the bread; in real on the kitchen counter these loafs were looking better than in the picture. And the cracks should be readily fixed by scoring them next time before putting them into the oven (and that should make them look even nicer, too).

The crumb is still dense but given that I am working with pure sourdough I am not sure the crumb could ever be much lighter than this. Too salty? Definitely not, if anything than it is missing some salt. Or rather not. Most eating tables come with salt shakers these days. So it is easy enough to sprinkle salt on the bread if so desired, and I declare myself satisfied with my crumb.

The crust, the worst of all my prior breads, was the best part of this batch, to the point even that I ended up slicing the crust off the bread as a special treat. If anything, it was not chewy enough this time. Which once again seems very fixable the next time, by simply leaving the bread in the oven for a few minutes longer.

While I am very pleased pleased with the outcome of this latest sourdough experiment there are some tweaks of course that I would like to try. These are:

• It seems as if steps 1 and 2 from the above listing could be combined. There is a risk adding the salt earlier may negatively affect the yeast. If so it would prolong the rise time (at best) or  keep the dough from fully developing (at worst). But I think the risk is low, and I want to try at least once.
• The bread pans had still plenty of head space when I took then out of the oven. I should therefore use a total of four cups of flour ans two cups of water  for the dough. That's 33% more bread for pretty much the same effort.
• Score the loafs before baking. Hopefully that will keep them from cracking lengthwise.
• Bake the bread an extra five or ten minutes for extra crust. The extra dough may affect baking time as well so an extra five minutes may not do. But hey, that's why I spend my time near the kitchen so I can keep an eye on these things.