It seems that baking bread is the thing to do during this current “shelter in place” caused by the Corona virus.
Funny thing is, I started baking bread a couple of years ago simply out of curiosity and I’ve been baking two or three loaves a week ever since.
Also, I got tired of buying yeast for baking bread so I developed my own sourdough starter. He’s affectionately known as Floyd in my home.
The thing is, baking bread really is quite simple.
I scoop 4 cups of unbleached flour into my mixing bowl, add a tablespoon of kosher salt, about a half cup of sourdough starter, and a cup and a half of room temperature water.
All I do then is use a rubber scraper (also called a spatula) to mix it all together. Once it looks like a ball of dough, then I leave it to sit overnight on my bread table.
In the morning I put my cast iron Dutch oven in the oven and start to preheat the oven to 450 degrees. Push down the dough, transfer it onto a piece of parchment paper, and then let it rest while the oven warms up.
Once the oven is up to temperature I put the dough into the smoking hot Dutch oven and then back into the oven for 30 minutes.
At the 30 minute mark I lower the temperature to 400 degrees and reset the timer for another 30 minutes.
And after that, the bread is ready. That’s it. Bread. Homemade, home baked bread.