Sheepherder Bread

Submitted by Jellyqueen

• Ingredients: 6
• Serves: 18

ingredients

• 1 1⁄2 cups sourdough starter
• 4 cups unbleached flour
• 2 tablespoons sugar
• 2 tablespoons shortening, Melted
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1⁄4 teaspoon baking soda

directions

1. Into a large bowl, sift the dry ingredients, and dig a well in the center of the sourdough starter.
2. Blend the dry mix into the starter from the edges with enough flour to knead until smooth and shiny.
3. Place in greased bowl and let rise until almost double.
4. Shape into 2 loaves and place in greased bread pans.
5. Bake at 375 degrees F until done.

Reviews

[dogsandwoods]

05/12/10: After reading several of the (non-ABM) sourdough bread recipes on 'zaar, I decided to try this one. Just made the dough, but it did not even take 3 c of the flour. It barely rose in 11.5 hours, so I turned the oven on low, put the dough on a cooking stone (that had been dusted with cornmeal) and let it rise for another hour and a half. Nothing. Turned the oven up to 350F and baked it for 45 minutes. The bread came out sturdy and good. It was made using friendship bread starter that had been fed 12 hours earlier. Next time I'll wait until the starter starts producing gas from the feed before starting the bread. But I was pleasantly surprised by the flavor and texture. DH loved it and thought it would make a perfect shortcake for strawberry shortcake. 05/20/10 Update: Yesterday I made another batch with the starter that had been fed six days earlier. I let it rise all day in a bowl then transferred it to the loaf pan to let it rise in the oven on the lowest setting possible. It was in the oven all night and then it was baked this morning. (I'd now recommend just letting it rise in the loaf pan.) The bread came out sturdy and less sweet than the first loaf. Please note that this will take less than three cups of flour and will only make one loaf. But it is a good loaf! Thank you for posting!