Pumpkin Spice Sourdough Loaf
Equipment
- Large Mixing Bowl
- Kitchen scale
- Danish Dough Whisk
- Dutch Oven
- Bread Lame
- Banneton Basket
- Bench Scraper
Ingredients
- 100 grams sourdough starter active and bubbly
- 250 grams water
- 200 grams pumpkin puree (Libby's is my favorite)
- 500 grams bread flour
- 10 grams sea salt
- 25 grams brown sugar
- 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
- 1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg
- 1/2 teaspoon ground all spice
- 1/4 teaspoon ground cloves
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 75 grams chocolate chips or cinnamon chips optional
Instructions
Prepare your sourdough starter
- Feed your sourdough starter at a 1:1:1 ratio about 4 hours before you want to mix up your dough. Combine 40 grams starter, 40 grams water, and 40 grams flour. Stir until everything is well combined and there are no dry bits of flour stuck to the bottom.
- Feed your sourdough starter at a 1:5:5 ratio about 12 hours before you want to mix up your dough. Combine 10 grams of starter, 50 grams of water, and 50 grams of flour. Stir until everything is well combined and there are no dry bits of flour stuck to the bottom.
- Your starter should be bubbly, at least doubled (maybe even tripled) in size, have a sweet, yeasty smell and a flat top. For best results, mix your dough up when your starter is at it’s peak.
Day 1: Prepare your dough
- Combine your active sourdough starter, pumpkin puree, water, vanilla extract and brown sugar and mix until starter is dissolved. Add flour, salt, cinnamon, nutmeg, all spice and cloves and mix until a shaggy dough forms. Depending on how runny your pumpkin puree is, you may need to add additional flour or water to get your dough to the correct texture. This dough will be a little stickier than normal, but should still be easy to work with. Don’t be afraid to adjust the flour a bit to work for you.
- Stretch and Folds: Perform a series of “stretch and folds” throughout the next 2 hours. This is how you strengthen your dough since we don’t knead it. First, wet your hands, so the dough doesn’t stick to it. Reach to the bottom of the bowl, pull the dough up and over and place it on the top of the dough. Turn the bowl a quarter turn and repeat the stretching and folding motion 4-6 times. You’ll notice the dough changes through this process. Your first set will look a little bit shaggy, but by the end you should have a nice, smooth and elastic dough. Cover the bowl and wait about 30 minutes in between each set of stretch and folds.Stretch and fold #1: 30 minutes into bulk fermentationStretch and fold #2: 30 minutes later – this is when I like to add my chocolate chips or cinnamon chips.Stretch and fold #3: 30 minutes laterStretch and fold #4: Optional, if your dough is still sticky or isn’t starting to hold it’s shape in your bowl you can do a fourth set to continue adding strength to the dough.
- Finish bulk fermentation: Cover the dough and let rise for 1.5-2 more hours (longer in the winter when it’s cold). You’ll know the dough is ready to shape when the dough is puffed up, jiggles when you shake the bowl, has scattered bubbles visible on the sides and top. As a reference: my kitchen usually stays around 74F and my dough typically takes about 7 hours from mixing until it’s ready to shape.
- Pre-shape: Lightly flour your counter and place your dough on the floured counter. Gently pull your dough across your counter until you’ve got a round ball. Using a bench scraper can be helpful. The goal is to introduce some tension in your dough, but we’ll be back for the final shaping in a little bit.
- Bench Rest: Let the dough rest uncovered on the counter for about 30 minutes. The dough will probably flatten some during this time. This allows the gluten in the dough to relax and prepares the dough for the final shaping.
- Shaping: Prepare your banneton basket. Place a kitchen towel in the bowl and flour as needed. Sprinkle a little flour on top of the dough. Using a bench scraper, lift the dough up off the counter and place it back on the countertop – floured side down. This ensures that the flour is staying mainly on the outside of the dough.For a boule (round loaf): Going around in a circle, pull the dough sideways towards you and then fold up to the top of the round. Turn 90 degrees and repeat the same process pulling the dough sideways and then folding up to the top. As you continue this process around the dough, increase the tension as you pull. Gather the bread into a circle and place into your prepared bowl. Place into your prepared banneton basket.For a batard (oval loaf): stretch your dough into a chubby rectangle. Fold into thirds – like you would fold a letter for an envelope. Then roll the dough up and pinch the sides together. Gently pull the dough back across the counter to build tension. Place into your prepared banneton basket.
- Let rest 5-10 minutes and then carefully tuck any chocolate chips on the bottom of the loaf inside and then stitch the dough up to keep the tension tight.
- Cold Fermentation: Cover the dough and refrigerate overnight or up to 36 hours. If you want to bake the same day, you can let the dough rise for about 3-4 hours in the banneton basket until it’s puffed up and risen. Then bake according to recipe directions.
Day 2: Baking
- Preheat your oven and Dutch oven to 450 °F for 45 minutes.
- Once preheated, pull the loaf out of the refrigerator and remove the covering. Place a piece of parchment paper on top of the dough. Flip the dough over so it is now sitting on the parchment paper.
- Scoring: Use a bread lame score the dough. You can use a decorative score, or just a simple expansion score.
- Baking: Carefully remove the Dutch oven from the oven. Take the lid off and place your bread into the Dutch oven (including parchment paper – this helps with the transfer). Put the lid on and put back in the oven. Bake for 25 minutes, then remove the lid of the Dutch oven and continue baking for 20 minutes until the bread is a crackly deep brown and reaches an internal temperature of 200-210 °F. If the loaf starts to get too dark before it’s fully cooked, you can cover it with foil. This will help keep the outside from burning while the center finishes baking.
- Remove the Dutch oven and place on a wire cooling rack.
- Cooling. I know it’s hard, but try to let your loaf cool for at least one hour before you slice into it.
Notes
If you notice the bottom of your loaf burns a little bit, try adding a little bit of dry rice or cornmeal to the bottom of your Dutch oven and then place the parchment paper and dough in to bake. This will create a barrier and keep the bottom of your loaf a little softer.
Homemade bread doesn’t have any preservatives in it, so it will dry out much faster than bread at the store. I recommend slicing your loaf and freezing everything you don’t eat the first day or two.
