levain

recipe adapted from Flour, Salt, Water, Yeast by Ken Forkish
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Finished bread!

If you're interested in baking bread, I highly recommend buying Forkish's book! It's very detailed and provides excellent explanations about the chemical processes that create great bread which are really useful for troubleshooting. I've scaled down this recipe to reduce waste and make it suitable for baking bread every 2-3 weeks. I usually double the recipe, baking two loaves at once (which requires two Dutch ovens) then slicing and freezing almost all of it.

Ingredients

1. 2-4kg all purpose flour
2. 2-4kg wheat flour

Instructions

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Levain after fermenting for four days

1. 1. This spreadsheet has a guide for starting, maintaining and reconstituting a levain. Each day, save the amount of levain listed in the "reserve" column, add flour and warm water, leave uncovered for 1-2 hours and then cover and rest at room temperature. I recommend using a six quart tub with a lid and writing the empty tub's weight on it to make it easier
2. 2.