So, after my initial, not very impressive starter, I have wrapped my sourdough equipment and left it in the pantry for a few months. Having chatted with Steve Jaye lately, about food, what else, he suggested he’d send me some of his excellent, 8 month old starter and that I should try again. It took 2 weeks for Royal Mail and Poste Italiane to deliver the parcel, but it got here last week. Amazingly.

I have immediately fed Steve’s starter with 150 g of strong flour and 150 ml of water and left in room temperature for a day. The next day it has more than doubled, I had to take a break from painting the garderoba and get on with baking.

The following is Steve’s method, which has worked in my kitchen twice so far.

500g of strong flour, plus 2 tsps of salt and 2 tsps of brown sugar, combined, plus 300 g of the starter, which has been mixed prior to use, 250ml of warm water. All this into the bowl of kitchen aid and then mixed on very slow speed for 2 minutes, then left to autolyse for an hour, covered. After an hour it needs to be folded and beaten for about 5 minutes, kneaded in kitchen aid for a few more, until smooth with well developed gluten. Then bulk proved for 6-10 hours in room temperature, covered.

Once doubled in size, its formed into a nice ball, handled carefully, so as not to lose any of the rise, placed into a round banneton and it goes to the fridge overnight to develop a flavour.

In the morning the oven gets preheated to 230 degrees with a deep ceramic dish with a lid in my case, or a Dutch oven in Steve’s, or a posh cloche in Ken’s kitchen. I will be treating myself to expensive toys once I get a bit more confident in this field. The ball of dough from the fridge goes onto the floured ring of baking paper, into the preheated dish and into the oven, covered, for 20 minutes. After 20 minutes the lid comes off and a beautiful view like this happens

2 small details not to be forgotten: the loaf needs to be slashed before baking and it needs to be sprayed with water to help form the crust. Also, a tray with boiling water underneath the bread will help.

After 40 minutes there is a beautiful, homemade sourdough. What Florek called- the best homemade bread here yet. This loaf made Florek and Steve talk for the first time in weeks, after business differences kept them quiet recently.

The starter is back in the fridge, I have the taste for much, much more!