Acorn wants YOU to bake your own bread- sourdough bread to be exact and yes- it is just that easy. Think of it as a science experiment! No yeast is needed- just flour, water, salt and your sourdough starter. Here is Chef Roland’s recipe for catching your own wild sourdough starter, well-loved and stained from Acorn’s archives:
“After the starter is made, Chef’s flour and water proportions for making sourdough bread are similar to mine, but I use a wet hand to mix the dough, not a mixer, and his sourdough bread recipe calls for the addition of yeast, mine does not. I also bake the loaves in preheated Dutch ovens with the lids on at first. It is how the Acorn do.”
Want to pick up a nice, homey, French cookbook for your collection? You can contact/message Chef and Elaine through this link: https://www.facebook.com/La-Galette-Berrichonne-271761916263568/
Making a dough, working it into loaves, and baking the bread is truly a rewarding, multi-sensory experience. Whatever you do, do NOT cut into a loaf before it has cooled. If you understand the science of why grilled/roasted meat needs to rest for 20-30 minutes after cooking, then you will understand why bread must completely cool first before cutting. Moisture needs to slowly even out through the cooling bread, under the protection of the crust. Cutting into the hot bread releases too much moisture, changing the texture. Blehhh.
starter/leaven bubblin’ and ready to go! 
200 grams of the starter/leaven 
700 grams of water 
starter and water, mixed well in bucket 
1000 grams of flour, all purpose and mix of whole wheat 
sticky, shaggy dough 
after 20 minutes, add the salt in an ounce of water 
after a few turns in the bucket (every 30 minutes) the dough becomes stretchy and smooth 
divided and resting 
ready for final rise 
all poofed 
into the preheated baking pot 
lids on 20 min 
lids off 20 min 
tah daaaah!
And what to do with the leftover starter/leaven you made the night before? Mix in a beaten egg and add another 100 grams of flour of your choice (all purpose, whole wheat, spelt or buckwheat) and a splash of milk. It’s Waffle Time!
starter, egg, milk and more flour 
high-tech waffle iron 
om nom nom nom
Cookies you ask? Yes- BY ALL MEANS make the cookies dough but who says you have to bake it all at once? Save 2/3 or more back and freeze the dough!
chocolate chip cookie dough 
a few for now, but more in the freezer for baking later
Now that the bread is baked and cool, put some honey on a slice . As you enjoy the treat, think back at all the bee effort that goes into making that honey:
hives #1, #2, #3 and #4 
nice brood in #3 
brood and honey from #4 
capped honey, ready for extraction 
extraction set up 
Acorn cutting off wax caps 
half gallon jars of honey from hive #1
