Sekowa Special Baking Ferment

We have got a great Sekowa (pronounced “Sek-o-va”) introduction and recipe on our Sekowa produce page.

But I wanted to extend on this for beginner’s top tips. I am very new to bread making, so I am yet to learn how your dough should look to be successful. It’s taking a bit of trial and error to get the perfect loaf. But here are a few pointers that I would have found useful at the beginning of using Sekowa as my raising agent. 

Once your starter is made, you keep it in the fridge until you are ready to make a loaf. It will happily last up to two months in the fridge without needing to be fed. When it has all been used or a couple of months have passed, you simply make a fresh batch with your Sekowa granules.

The Sekowa will give you a great lively starter, and once added to make your ‘sponge’ (a step between the starter and making the full dough) you will continue to see plenty of bubbles and life.

From the BakeryBits recipe on the Sekowa page you will be instructed to keep it warm – this is key to keep it happy and bubbling. On a sunny day it should be OK in the sun, but in winter I would say a proofing oven at 28˚C was well worth it (this is what I did). Or the airing cupboard can make for a great warm place too! If it’s cold in your kitchen, it may take longer to bubble and proof. 

When adding your flour to the ‘sponge’:  If you are also new to bread making, the wet mess of dough is a little worrying, when it is so sticky, gloopy and kind of shredded in the bowl. Bear with it, trust the recipe for a bit, once you have added the water and given it a good mix with a dough whisk (I didn’t have a machine but you can use one) it will start to bond together. Something happens and it starts coming together. If it doesn’t come together, it may need a splash more water but add a little at a time giving it a good chance of mixing between water addition.

You still proof the dough twice when using Sekowa, once in the bowl and once in a proofing basket or tin. I think the proofing time is a little quicker with Sekowa than a generic sourdough starter (but this will depend on your temperatures). In my case, the first proof was 3 hours and the second was 1.5 hours.

During each proof the dough should double in size, or in my case, reach the top of the proofing basket. I used two 500g bannetons to proof the dough from the BakeryBits product page recipe.

If you don’t have a baking cloche – that’s OK! I didn’t have one either, instead I used a pizza stone which was preheated along with the oven. Then once the oven was up to temperature, I would take the stone back out to place the dough on and score with a lame. (Another bread making utensil - it’s a very fine sharp blade, used to cut a slit in the top of the dough to allow it to expand neatly when baking. I believe it is pronounced “larm”!)

Once the dough is in the oven I added a tray of water to make it a little steamy in there.

The best thing about the Sekowa is there is no hassle or time restraint to when you can bake with it due to no forward planning to feed it. It also has a sour taste and allows you to make a crispy crust similar to that of a sourdough. It’s a great aid for a beginner or a helpful tool for a seasoned baker.