Frida's sourdough bread
Frida and her girls have made sourdough bread for the entire household on the Viking farm. It's a lot of work to first grind the flour and cultivate wild yeast. The dough needs to rest overnight, and it takes most of the day to heat up the clay oven. That's why Frida only makes bread once a month. It's a day that everyone looks forward to. A slice of freshly baked sourdough bread with butter or cream cheese is quite delicious.
A good sourdough bread may take a while to make, but you end up with an irresistible loaf with character. So do try this recipe.
For this bread we use the most common Viking Age cereals: barley and rye. We do not use wheat as the fine, white wheat loaf was for feasting.
Day 1: Starter dough
150 ml lukewarm water
100 g rye flour
1 tablespoon rye sourdough starter or 25 g fresh yeast
Mix the ingredients to make a soft dough with the consistency of a thick porridge. Cover and leave to rest overnight.
Day 2: Bread dough
Starter dough
500 g rye flour
ca. 100 g barley flour
ca. 400 ml water
1-2 tablespoons salt
Optional: a handful of oats, linseed, thyme or cumin.
Add the rye flour, barley flour, water, salt and the optional ingredient to the starter dough and mix. Knead well to form a smooth and elastic dough. It will be quite sticky, so you may want to knead it on an oiled surface. Be careful not to add too much extra flour during kneading as it will make the finished bread turn out hard and dry.
Leave the dough to rest for at least 3 hours.
Form 2 loaves and let them rest for another 2 hours.
Bake the breads on a baking tray or baking stone in the oven or on the grill at 230c for 10 minutes and then at 200c for 30 minutes.
Enjoy!