Sourdough Sandwitch bread

The day before prepare the wet ingredients. Simply combine them in a large measuring cup (about 4 c.), mix together (keep things non-warm about room temp is right). Let sit overnight and it will start to get bubbly. Keep letting it sit upto 2 days (I usually use 24 hours or so). THe mixture will actually start rising if its working well.

Once the starter is done (called a spounge), the next day in your favourite bread maker shoot for the following cycle:

25 minute mix
1-1.5 hour rise
1.5 hour baking time

Put the wet in the ‘bottom’ of the bread maker. Put the ‘dry’ in the top, making sure NOT to put the yeast in yet. Make a well in the dry ingredients, and put yeast in that. Start mixer as noted above, checking about 5 minutes into it. The dough should look like a quick bread, if its too thick it will never rise, but too thin and it will cave in near the center. I usually do it by eye, checking to see that the dough is moist enough to be sticky, but not so moist as to be cake batter like. Think of it as very stiff quick bread dough, but not as thick as a normal ‘wheat’ loaf. Its kind of hard to explain, but if its too thick it will be lead, and too thin and it will cave. You need the middle of this. If its too dry just add some starter (I sometimes have to double the amount of starter depending on how dry the day is!). I also sometimes stop the bread machine, and test the dough with my fingers, It should be creamy rather than stringy or dry. Once the dough is properly mixed, I just let the machine make the bread. Sometimes the machine will not properly cook the bread, so I put it in my toaster oven on ‘convection’ to harden up the crust. This is optional.