Leilas Levain bread

Now I have baked my first sourdough bread in a while, and eaten it. I know I say it every time I talk about sourdough bread, but it's such a big difference! This bread was eaten in just a few days, although the loaf was gigantic!

This Levain can probably be considered a faux version of many, more experienced bread maker than me. In some books, a Levain is prepared for several days, but I was too eager to try my sourdough so I took a faster version.

Leilas Levain bread

Ingredients

10 g yeast

240 g of lukewarm water

840 g strong bread flour

400 g sourdough

about 25 g salt

How to:

1. Crumble the yeast into a bowl and let it dissolve in the water. Add half of the flour and knead in a machine for about 10 minutes.

2. Add the sourdough, salt and the remaining flour. Knead the dough on low speed in a machine for 20 minutes.

3. Prover the dough in the bowl under a tea towel until doubled in size, in about two hours.

4. Preheat the oven to 250 degrees C.

5. Pour the dough on a floured surface of wood and fold the dough gently into a loaf. Do not work the dough, handle it with care so that no air bubbles lets out. Flour the bread and let it rise under a tea towel until doubled in size in about 1 ½ hours.

6. Turn out the bread on a baking sheet and set it in the oven. Throw in 1 cup of water on the oven floor to get a nice crust on the bread. Reduce heat to 200 degrees C and bake for 40-50 minutes.