Bread gets a bad rap. It is full of carbohydrates, simple ones at that. In addition, most bread is made from wheat which contains gluten. Most people do not know why gluten is bad, but with so many gluten-free items on menus, there must be something wrong with it. Besides those reasons, store-bought bread contain many other ingredients added to it, many of which you cannot pronounce. These issues have put pressure on bread in the American diet, along with new substitutes like pitas, wraps, bowls, and burritos.
I stopped buying bread almost 2 years ago and switched mainly to salads, instead of sandwiches. My switch was fueled by a desire to eat more whole foods and decrease reliance on processed foods, especially simple carbohydrates. This is where bread came into play. The bread you buy in the store is highly processed with significant additives. Those two factors drove bread out of the diet I was targeting.
Unfortunately, the bread manufacturing process has changed significantly over the past century. As bakeries became commercialized, changes were made to move faster and increase production. The changes eliminated the natural, longer-acting yeasts and leavening agents out of the process. Natural, wild yeast, like the kind used in sourdough bread, has been replaced by fast-acting yeasts and artificial stimulants to make the dough rise faster. The outcome? The bread you buy has many or all of the following ingredients added: sugar, extra gluten, conditioners, soy, mono- and diglycerides, colorings, preservatives, and bleaching agents, to name a few. These ingredients are not healthy for your body to digest and absorb.
To Eat, or Not To Eat
The match is so poor, in fact, that store-bought bread can easily lead to digestion issues with some people and total disaster for others. It goes far beyond gluten. The yeasts and chemicals added during commercialization creates bread that disrupts the digestion process and interrupts the absorption of beneficial minerals. Forcing bread dough to rise faster is not not natural and many bakeries actually add more gluten to make it happen. The traditional or artisan manner of baking bread using natural yeast and fermentation creates a much more wholesome and gentler match for our digestive system.
How is Sourdough Different?
My experimentation with yeast through fermenting vegetables, vinegar, and kombucha has highlighted the beneficial relationship between organisms around us and those within our bodies. It may sound crazy, but we are all one huge bio-organism. If we intend to thrive, getting in sync with these organisms is critical and that is where fermentation comes into play.
Fermentation incorporates naturally-occurring bacteria and yeasts into your diet. These organisms transform food to be in tune with your digestive system. These cultures break down the components of food into more digestible sources. Some of these components feed the bacteria in your gut (prebiotic) while others support the growth of good bacteria (probiotic). Consuming these fermented foods makes things easier to digest and absorb and that is a good thing.
If you don’t believe me, I can provide a testimonial from my own digestive tract. I cannot eat several foods due to the way I feel after I have consumed them. One of those foods is cucumbers. If I eat raw cucumbers, I will be sick for several hours. However, I can eat pickles and fermented cucumbers like crazy, if I want. No problems whatsoever. The same goes for cabbage and milk. Both are tough for me to digest but I can eat kraut and yogurt (not together) with relative impunity.
Then, one day, it all came together. If fermentation can make other foods easier to digest, what about bread? It just so happens that fermented bread does exist and it is called sourdough. I have had sourdough before but it was just when I was in San Francisco or a restaurant happened to use it on a sandwich. As it turns out, many of the healthier stores make it or stock it in their bakeries, so I decided to buy a loaf and give it a try.
The Sourdough Experience
When I brought the loaf of sourdough home, I gave it a try as a snack and as part of a sandwich. It was just like I remembered from San Francisco. The bread is crusty and soft in the same bite. The flavor carries a delightful yet subtle taste
Over the next couple of months, my wife and I added sourdough to our regular shopping list. It was nice to have bread back in the house again, but sometimes it was difficult to find at the store. Loaves were often out of stock or near the end of its shelf life. Sourdough bread is typically expensive and often fetches up to $7 per loaf. This situation called for a different answer.
The answer I decided upon was to make it myself. I have never baked bread, but I do know people that have baked bread. They seem to enjoy doing it. Besides, they do not seem to have mad skills like Buddy Valastro or Duff Goldman. They are ordinary people working on a craft. I had taken the first steps to making my own sourdough bread.
Creating a Starter
The first step to making sourdough bread is creating a starter. If you have read my kombucha articles, you know the fermentation process is triggered by a SCOBY aka Symbiotic Culture of Bacteria and Yeast. The same thing happens with a sourdough starter. The starter is created from flour, pure water, and then is fermented with the yeast and bacteria from the air around us. This is how bread has been made for centuries.
For my starter, I combined the flour with water and added home brewed kombucha with its own yeast to kick-start the process. Over a process of days, the starter is fed with fresh flour and water to develop the yeast cultures. After 7 to 8 days, the starter is ready to use.
Creating and maintaining a starter takes a couple of minutes per day or per week, depending on how much you plan to use. If you want to use it occasionally, you can store it in the refrigerator and feed it weekly. If you plan to use it every couple of days, leaving it on the counter and feeding it daily may be your best bet. I located a video from Katie Shaw @ heartscontentfarmhouse.com to feed just once per day that I have adopted.
Output
So far, I have baked bread, made rich, fluffy pancakes, and a crunchy & delicious french toast casserole. My first loaf of bread was a bit dense, so I turned it into that casserole linked above. It worked perfectly. I will take another shot at a loaf of bread this week. More to come on that endeavor.
I strongly encourage you to look at fermentation in your food and to read this article about the links between weight, your immune system, and a healthy amount of organisms in your gut biome. A large, growing amount of evidence is linking mental and physical health to a flourishing digestive system and there is no better way to feed and maintain that system than by adding fermented foods to your diet. Sourdough, along with kombucha, vinegar, yogurt, kimchi, sauerkraut, and other fermented products will really spur your body and mind to be in the best condition possible.
To Ferment or Not To Ferment…That’s Digestion!