Sourdough sandwich bread

These days, sourdough bread seems very popular, every bread baker love to create something by using this natural fermented yeast (naturel levain). Baking is a kind of hobby for me so I keep doing the same thing whenever I have a chance, I feel very happy when my creation not only looks good but also tastes heavenly, especially right from the oven!

Usually I bake traditional sourdough breads, sometimes with nutritional seeds, sometimes mixed with blue cheese…but today for the first time I do milk sandwich bread, in French – Pain de mie au lait with sourdough starter. Sourdough bread baking always requires a lot of time, so we need to prepare at least 2 days before baking!

Step 1  Preparation for the Poolish (the sponge) 

• Sourdough starter 85 gr.
• White bread flour 85 gr. (I do 60 gr. bread flour and 25 gr. whole wheat) 
• Filtered or bottled water 85 gr. 

Mix well all three together, at least 10 hours before bread-making or overnight at the room temperature. My kitchen is quite warm during the hot season so 7 hours to 8 hours is good enough for my poolish.

Step 2  Preparation for milk sandwich bread 

• Bread flour  500 gr (I use 400 gr bread flour and 100 gr, whole wheat flour)
• Poolish  255 gr. 
• Sugar  50 gr. 
• Salt  10 gr. 
• Egg  1pc 
• Butter  50 gr. 
• Milk  390 ml. 
• Dry yeast  2 gr.  (optional, if the poolish is strong but the proofing time could be a bit longer, without dry yeast) 

Put all ingredients together, you can add the semi-soft butter at the end and knead at first speed for 5 minutes then another 10 minutes at the second speed until the dough stops sticking to the side of the bowl.

The dough is sticky, so wet or oil our hands to handle it. Leave the dough in the box and in the fridge overnight! I put the box in the fridge at 7:00 PM and I took it out next day around noon, i.e more than 17 hours, we can leave it there longer, no problem!

Next day take the dough out of the fridge, don’t forget to dust the working surface with some flour, divide the dough into 4 equal pieces, put them in the mould (I use mould for sandwich : 40 cm L x 11 cm W x 10 cm H) Leave the dough for at least another 2 hours or  2 and 1/2 at the room temperature, for final proofing.

Bake for 40-45 minutes at 180ºC.

I’m happy that we could enjoy fresh sandwich right at home, I love the texture, it’s moist, fragrant, the sourdough really enhances the flavor of the bread! So I hope you could give it a try, I’m sure you will be happy with the result!