Sourdough Without Fail by Kate Downham

Thank you Kate - I just got my book from the delivery guy !! Looks great !!

I was lucky enough to get this book as a gift from a wonderful friend.  

Couldn't have come at a better time - after about eleven months of questions, investigations, tests, discussions with Dietitians, talking to friends with similar problems, and struggling to eat well, it seems to be the case that I've lost part of my gut microbiome that 'gracefully' digests fructans for me.

Whilst I try to re-introduce the right friendly micro-organisms to my gut, sourdough to the rescue!  It seems that many (most? all?) sourdough cultures, if allowed to work for a full 24 hours, do a rather good job of 'pre-digesting' the fructans in wheat for me.

So I'm learning to make lots of sourdough baked goods, after following your instructions in this book as to how to create my own starter.

I've also now got myself a lovely new gluten-free sourdough starter, which is only about 10 days old.  Already, I've managed to create a gluten-free and vegan-friendly sourdough bread which rises and is good to eat.  

So grateful!  Thank you so much, wonderful author and wonderful friend too!

Hi Kate:

Am I able to use these recipes with fresh milled flour as well?

Thanks,
Linda

I give this book 9 out of 10 acorns.

I love Kate's combination of detailed background information and simple recipes She takes you step by step through what is going on with the dough and how different factors - flour, temperature, time, handling, moisture, baking shapes and so on - will effect the finished result. I was lucky enough to be able to take part in the recipe testing. Despite being a sourdough novice with a cold kitchen (and a struggling woodstove oven) I went from raw ingredients to live starter to successful bread loaves.

my hot cross buns

The book covers baking with different grains, including how to make a gluten free starter and loaves, and also simple tables enabling the recipes to be scaled up or down according to your family or appetite. There is an amazing variety of different bread styles (I never knew some of these existed!) so something to suit all bread occasions.
I really love the 'discard' recipes and to be honest, even if you don't bake bread (I rarely do) having a sourdough starter is worth it for these recipes alone!

my vegetable pancakes from starter recipe

The best thing of all is how Kate explains how to adjust the recipes to fit in around your real life. You don't need to adjust your life to fit around the baking, but can adjust the baking to fit around how you actually live.

Because I had so much fun with the sourdough testing, as well as buying my own copy of the book, I bought one for each of my sisters too!

extra books as presents

Thank you!  I agree!  

I would add, I made a very good gluten-free sourdough starter using the most popular gluten-free strong bread flour mix on sale where I live, following the regular method not the gluten-free suggested work-around.  Allowing for the fact that I don't have a gluten-free kitchen myself,  this worked without any direct contact between the gluten-free flour & the gluten-containing starter.  

So I'm cautiously optimistic this might be possible for a fully gluten-free & coeliac-suitable kitchen too.

10 out of 10 acorns!  This book is an education in sourdough baking.  Plenty of recipes.  Plenty of adjustments for various conditions and what to do if something seems not to be working.

Plenty of people say their friend’s book is awesome, probably some bogus chatbots are saying that too.  I have never met the author but she could be my friend.  We’re on different continents.  This is Kate’s third book I have had the good fortune to test recipes for.  Kate puts in a lot of work creating and having testers follow to the letter, so she can see how well her directions communicate what to do.

If you have been wanting to bake with sourdough, give this book a try.