As we travel we want to share our favourite recipes with hosts. One of my (Aaron) weekly standards is dough. This is used for focaccia, loaves of bread, and pizza. It takes about 8 hours of rest time so we start it either early in the morning or the night before.
We are fortunate that we have a wheat grinder. This recipe could be done with store bought whole wheat flour but we love the freshly ground flour. Half of the flour we use is freshly ground and the other half is white that we get from Costco.
Weekly Bread Recipe
The recipe is simple enough. Combine the following dry ingredients:
- 6 cups whole wheat flour
- 6 cups white flour
- Four teaspoons salt
- One teaspoon yeast
I mix the dry then add in 1/3-1/2 cup sourdough starter and water. I’m pretty good at over adding the water and creating a dough that is too wet. I just add more white flour by the tablespoon when I do that.
The hardest part is the first stir. Scraping the sides and bottom to make sure there is no flour left out of the dough ball is important. I’ll scoop from the bottom and fold over making sure that no dry spots are hiding. Set a timer for eight minutes.
Then you repeat the following the 3 times:
- Stir it, making sure to fold it over the top scraping the bottom. This usually takes me a couple of minutes
- Set an 8 minute timer.
Now leave it until your ready to bake. The bake times vary for each and you should be sure to check that it is baked.
- Focaccia and pizza- 450° for 12 -15 minutes
- Bread- 350° for 45 minutes
This yields five loaves or two focaccias and three loaves of bread. I’m hoping to spread this recipe to many hosts as we travel. I would hate to leave this versatile dough at home.
Ball Family Travel 