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making bread
sensei muramoto says that the three ingredients to make bread are flour, water, and good attitutde.
the starter needs a little bit of white flour and water - why? - in whole grain flour you find fiber, and fiber doesn't ferment easily. rather, it putrifies . . .
before using your starter, see if there are bubbles in it. it should be bubbly.
you've covered the top of a small dish into which you've put your flour paste with a paper towel. this is to remove the excess moisture. you've left it for two days outside in a non-drafty and warm area - just a little bit of water and flour paste.
it's good to have a strawberry or grape or some other ripe unwaxed organic fruit nearby, so as to enliven the air with living molecules. another bright idea - though we've not yet tried it - is to rinse the fruit and to use the rinse water for the starter.
the air around the starter needs to be reasonably dry and warm.
the kitchen needs to be chemical-free and not antiseptically clean.
in all of this, you can think of "pampering" the starter.
at the beginning of your bread-baking career, you can anticipate the bread to rise very little, since you are not using a one hundred year starter. the aiharas, who are our teachers, used their first breads as door stoppers. if you have a good signature,
you can sell them as authentic souvenirs!
in the meantime, you can remember that whole wheat flour has a tendency to be difficult in its rising , even with regular yeast, because of the heaviness of grain, so your finished output may be more squat in appearance than your eye is used to.
also, your bread's overall beauty will depend alot on the quality of your kneading. kneading is done vertically. the well-worked dough has the elasticity of your earlobe - that's easy! spelt flour or other less glutinous coarse whole grain flour will not have as much elasticity.
(in the case that you've got difficulty with making your own starter, you can contact GOLDRUSH PRODUCTS 408-288-4090 for a package of theirs.)
(and by far the best mb bread is to be found at pacific bakery, san diego.)
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