Sourdough Jack
Posted Wed Dec 14, 2005 in
Stories
Sourdough Jack Mabee wrote a couple of books about using sourdough to make bread. He also has a lot of western recipes in his books. My copy is copyrighted 1970. I have no idea where we got it, or when. I just know that it contains some excellent cooking wisdom and some damned-fine stories to boot.
Last night, while talking to Daughter, the subject of sourdough bread came up. She made beef stew, on the stove not in the crockpot, and bought a loaf of sourdough to complement the meal. Our conversation reminded me of Jack’s book, so I carried the phone with me, walked into the kitchen, and pulled it from the shelf.
We laughed about how I used to make sourdough from scratch each week. That would have been in 1983 or 1984. I made a starter and baked once each week, usually starting out on Friday evenings. I’d get the starter out of the fridge, make my sponge, and set the large stainless-steel bowl on top of the fridge to age overnight.
On Saturday morning I would split my sponge, set aside enough for two or three loaves of bread, and then use the remainder to make sourdough hotcakes. It was a thin batter and I made dollar-sized cakes. The griddle had to be HOT and it only took a few seconds for the batter to rise and brown. It was a fast operation to make the cakes.
The kids gobbled them down as fast as they came from the griddle. I always sampled a few, right from the griddle, without butter or syrup — cook’s prerogative. Their melty-tart taste had enough flavor without anything extra.
After breakfast, I made my dough and then set it back up on top of the fridge to rise. After a couple of hours, I’d punch it back down and knead it gently, then let it re-rise.
The rest of the afternoon was marvelous, with smells of baking sourdough bread and the promise of fresh bread from the oven. On cool days we’d have a fire in the stove, adding its bit of smoky smell to the mix. We usually ate about a whole loaf right from the oven, barely letting it cool enough to cut, sometimes just pulling chunks off to eat with a little butter or just plain.
I used to love baking bread. There isn’t much of anything better than fresh-baked bread, especially sourdough bread.
Wow, that brings back a lot. My dad used to do nearly the exact same thing, right down to the sourdough pancakes. (I of course was the kid gobbling them up as they came off the griddle.) I can still taste it. Thanks for the trip!
— Alan 14 December 2005, 08:45 #Why’d ya quit?
PS. I think this one might go through! YAY!
— Lee 14 December 2005, 13:14 #I have tried to make a few memories for my kids. I know I remember certain things from my childhood with great fondness—Sunday afternoon soup and football with Dad, biscuits-and-gravy on Saturday mornings, big pots of pinto beans with ham, fried ‘taters, and hot bread with real butter. There were a few things like that.
I wanted my kids to have a few of those. You’ll have to ask them what they are, because I don’t know, at least I don’t know all of them.
Why’d I quit? Well, life has a way of impressing itself on us and things change. Toward the end of my graduate work, I started to focus on the completion of that work. That was about all I did for a year. That’s probably when the bread-making stopped.
— ruminator 14 December 2005, 19:46 #Thanks dad, for this memory! I loved those little pancakes, but mostly it was the fact that you made them for us! I have alot of those little memories. :)
— Becca (Daughter) 19 December 2005, 13:40 #