The most important ingredient in my sourdough baking and all my baking and cooking:
*Thanking the Lord for His provision and His gifting me to bake bread. I pray the Bread of Life helps me to prepare His provision with His Hand. As I speak His Life into my kitchen, I pray for whoever and whatever He brings with Him to my heart and kitchen. And I praise.
*Oh, I praise and sing to Him! Just think, when we praise and worship Him, our cells open and fill with His Life. This is true for the ‘cells in your baking.’ This is true in all things, where we speak His Life.
*How does this relate to sourdough? God created us in His image, a beautiful, fine-tuned machine. And He gave us everything we need to maintain this beautiful body to live in fullness and abundance.
God provided the seed (wheat berry) that is ground into fine flour and mixed with water. Once mixed, the amazing happens. It ferments, grows health-giving bacteria, then becomes a delightful and satisfying food when additional God-designed ingredients are added. Fresh milled flour has 40 of the 44 essential vitamins and minerals needed by our bodies. It only lacks vitamins A, C, and D and the amino acid lysine. Compared to commercial processed whole wheat flour, fresh milled hard red wheat flour has twice the amount of calcium and phosphorous, twice the amount of crucial vitamin B vitamins, niacin, thiamine, and nearly twice the riboflavin. It also has three times the iron and four times the potassium. That said, consider what processing does. It removes all of the essential, vital for life nutrients, bleaches, processes and then ‘enriches’ the processed flour with ‘fake’ replicas of God’s nutrients.
Let’s talk a little more about fermentation.
With sourdough bread making, there is a process called Bulk Fermentation. This is dough’s first rise, right after mixing dough, initially, not yet shaped. This produces gases, organic acids, and good bacteria populations. Think about the old Pac-Man video game. That would be the enzyme, or fermentation process, eating all the bad bacteria and producing gas and ferment, good bacteria. This process strengthens the dough, generates flavor and a good rise, leading to a textured and tasty loaf.
Cold Fermentation or Cold Proofing is where the dough is put into the refrigerator for 5- 48 hours to slow down fermentation, increase flavor, give you more time to do other things, and the loaves score better. This is done after shaping. All you have to do is, remove from refrigerator when you’re ready to bake. Having your oven and baking vessel pre-heated, score the loaf and bake.
I encourage you to go and explore YouTube, Pinterest, and try different recipes and tweak them to be your own. This is what I always do. You will experience and grow as you journey.
You never fail because your heart fills with joy and peace in the presence of Jesus baking with you, as you praise and pray, and your house fills with the aroma of fresh baked bread.
Not only will you enjoy your mistakes and flatter loaves, with all the love put into them, but your family will be blessed, spiritually and physically. Also, all you have prayed for will be blessed.
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