Sour Dough Bread

Last July when I went to San Francisco for Blogher’08 I stopped in a tourist shop and picked up some San Francisco Sour Dough Starter. I gave my mother a package and another to a friend.

I kept a package for myself and began following directions. It said to put the starter in a warm dark place for several hours. So, I figured the oven would be great.

My husband preheated the oven for some wings. Plastic bowl melted all in my Sour Dough Starter and my foray into fancy breadmaking was foiled.

Now, it’s probably not that complicated for Marye Audet who writes Baking Delights.

But, for me it’s proven to be quite a challenge.

My good friends made wonderful bread every single day like clockwork. They gave me another starter.

I decided to get creative and added garlic and parmesan cheese to my “sponge” and pretty much killed it. Don’t add that to starter – add that to dough.

I have ruined 3 sets of starters, mainly because I did not understand the steps that involve “the sponge” and “the starter.”

Maybe this has happened to you before – where you read the directions over and over and over and every time you draw a blank. Huh?

I logged onto

All Holiday Cafe to see if Katelyn Thomas could teach me how to use the starter to make more starter and a sponge, but no. She did have a lot to say about Making Gingerbread Houses, but the kids and I already did that.

They say the 4th Starter is the Charm.

No one says that, but, practice makes perfect, right?

When my friend gave me the last starter and announced there could be no more because he was moving to Alabama I Googled Sour Dough Bread and found these great instructions by S. John Ross.

And now I’ve been giving bread away all season. It’s so easy to make two snakes and braid them into a holiday wreath or a candy cane. This would, actually make my friend Jen from Jlogged.com very proud. I even took it as a white elephant gift for my Toastmaster’s party and my Vow counselors loved it.

Making dough has also been keeping my 2 year old Zack out of trouble. He likes to roll and pound and squish and smack it.