u/Hot_Dance_1299

Rebecca Gerritson recently posted on Instagram modifications to her basic white sourdough along with instructions for turning it into pretzel bread.

If you don't have her ebook, the recipe is quite similar to Aran's Country White Sourdogh, but slightly higher in starch%. It's also a smaller loaf.

Anyway, I used GF beer for part of the liquid just to see what happened. I was nervous because I thought the beer tasted awful 😂 but it's really delicious in the bread.

If you try this, don't make the mistake I made of using a bread sling to put the dough into the baking soda bath! Silicone + wet dough = slippery situation. 😂

This one was from Mary Thompson. It's a rosemary buckwheat loaf. She uses an interesting process for the fermentation that I am not sure is completely necessary as spelled out, but I followed it anyway and am really happy with the results.

The first difference in her process which I am likely to continue is using whole psyllium husk, and whisking in the preferment into the psyllium goop before it sets.

Her process called for half an hour to an hour room temp proof in a bowl, then into the fridge. The dough is pretty sticky, so the bowl and fridge proof both develop flavor and allow a long period for everything to hydrate well.

The next day calls for the dough to be kneaded, shaped, and proofed again in a banneton before baking. I didn't knead, I sort of just coaxed the dough into a batard shape. I don't see any reason outside of some difficulty shaping the sticky dough why it couldn't go straight into the banneton from the outset, but that's an experiment for another day!

I normally use ice in my Dutch oven, but didn't this time. I got a very soft crust, a lovely tender loaf that was not too large and very easy to slice.

I learned a few things from the ingredients, ratios, and methods in this book and will be incorporating them in my future bakes.