Lectin Free Sourdough Baguette

Real 100% fermented sourdough baguettes with "wild yeast" starter, no commercial yeast, and no lectins, this French bread has crust, air, and crumb.

We P-doxers crave bread! I put this picture up on my Instagram and it broke the internet! Sure, there are good lectin free breads out there, but not like this. This is made from just lectin-free flours, water and salt, fermented the "Old World" way.

You don't need commercial yeast (more about yeast later), there are no eggs, and we don't add fibers that can trigger a weird bowel reaction. This bread has fiber and resistant starch naturally from the lectin-free flours. The dough rises, stretches and acts like real bread dough, because it is.

(For more lectin free sourdough recipes get my e-cookbook, Sourdough Rising!)

Not all sourdough is created equal, so it's important to know your sourdough. The more you educate yourself the better off you'll be. Some of the content out there has conflicting or ambiguous info about sourdough. Can you eat it or can't you? It depends how it's made. I do know for sure that the loaves of bread in the grocery bread aisle labeled "sourdough" are NOT real sourdough. Just read the ingredients. Commercial yeast! That right there means that it’s short-rise, non-fermented bread. And it is a lectin bomb. So, don't be fooled by the name.

On the other hand, some artisan bakeries leaven sourdough the old-world way with only wild yeast starter. Still, some artisan breads, like La Brea, still have commercial yeast to speed the process along. So, you lose the benefits of the long-ferment weakening the gluten chains. Avoid commercial yeast.

Wild yeast requires more time to rise, and the longer dough sits, the more time it has to ferment and kill lectins. We’re talking days, not hours. For many artisan sourdough breads, while the "leaven" is certainly fermented, often the dough is not, or isn't fermented long enough. So even some artisan sourdough breads still contain lectins.

Eating bakery artisan bread is a big gamble. The only way to be sure your sourdough bread is lectin free is to make it yourself, or find a bakery that shares its fermenting times and has had their breads' gluten/lectin parts per million (ppm) measured. Here is a chart that may help make sense of your sourdough options:

Lectin Free Gourmet Sourdough 101 Infographic

I can't tell you how excited I was to make a real sourdough baguette. I'm even more excited to share it all with you. So let's get "started" on the first step, the starter.

Step 1: Make the Starter

This is arguably the most important step in making great sourdough. Starter is the "sour" in sourdough. It's basically fermented flour and water. It takes about two weeks to get your starter ready. After two weeks it's still considered young, but it works. The bread above is from my two-week starter. Hopefully this will be the first and last starter you make. Starter dough is sort of like a baby. Once you have it, you have to keep feeding it to keep it alive.

Here's the thing about yeast. Wild yeast is all around us in our environment. It's in the air. Like local honey, you want to consume your local yeast. When you buy commercial yeast, it comes from somewhere else, so it's foreign. Making your own starter allows you to capture and harvest wild yeast that your body already accepts and likes.

When you need to use your starter, take only enough for the recipe. And always leave some behind so you can add to it. Okay, let's make starter!

PRO TIP: For the 1:1 ratio of tapioca and sorghum flours used in this recipe, make a big batch beforehand. For instance, add 454 grams of each flour to a large bowl, mix well and store in a large canister you can measure out of. When the flour blend gets low, make more.

Lectin Free Sourdough Starter

1/4 C Flour (I use a 1:1 ratio of Tapioca and Sorghum Flours

1/4 C Distilled Water

Instructions:

In a large, clean, glass jar with a lid, combine the flour and distilled water well so it feels like pancake batter. Cover, not too tight, and place on a room-temp, dark shelf. After 6 hours, give it a very good stir to incorporate some oxygen. Wait another 6 hours and stir it again. Next day, add 1 T each of tapioca and sorghum flours and 2 T distilled water. I like the combo of tapioca and sorghum flours for feeding because it has ample starch, which is what this living thing feeds on.

Stir well, cover loosely and place back on the shelf. Repeat every 24 hours, pouring off half of the starter before feeding. We pour off half every time hereafter to ensure enough "food" to go around. Also, you'll begin to notice bubbles and growth. Pouring off gives it room to expand.

After a few days, you should start to smell something that resembles bread or Champagne. When I got my first whiff, I felt excited and hopeful for my future with lectin free bread. Keep going!

You may notice a purplish liquid settled on top before feeding. This is pretty much moonshine. I wouldn't recommend drinking it, unless you're in prison. It tastes terrible (okay I drank some). Just pour it off when you pour off half the starter before feeding.

In about a week (sometimes longer) your starter should be ready to use. If you see lots of bread-like holes and your starter doubles in size after feeding, it's ready to use. Use it when it's most active. It's all those air holes! The top may be bubbly and cracked like wrinkly skin.

This is what ready starter looks like. Once your starter is ready, you can use it to make sourdough baguettes or store it in the fridge. If you cold store it, you only need to feed it once weekly. But always feed it before you use it to make sure you have enough for the bread you're making.

Step 2: Make the Leaven

This step is exciting because it means we're making bread! Leaven is the step between making starter and making dough. During the leaven step, we will basically be multiplying the starter. A good long fermentation is key to a good Lectin Free Gourmet sourdough. This next step is crucial to a successful loaf.

First, be sure your starter is very bubbly and active. Try to capture it a few hours after feeding at its peak bubbliness. If you've been storing starter in the fridge, you need to wake it up. So, take it out and let it sit on the counter a few hours. Pour off the liquid and stir. Feed it and stir well. Let it sit for a few hours. If your starter is not refrigerated, just make sure it looks very bubbly and alive

When your starter is most lively, mix your leaven.

Leaven Recipe

1/2 C Distilled Water

1/4 C Starter

1/4 C Flour (1:1 tapioca and sorghum blend)

A bit about the flour combinations. Let's face it, the reason most bread is made from wheat flour is because it's a great flour as far as baking goes. Wheat flour has protein, starch and fiber. There really isn't a perfect lectin free flour on its own. So, we need to combine flours to get all the qualities of wheat flour. It's chemistry! Sorghum flour has a good amount of fiber and protein, and tapioca has the starchiness lactobacilli (the good bacteria in sourdough) loves to eat.

Now, to make the leaven, in large mixing bowl, whisk the starter in the distilled water until dissolved. It's important to use non-chlorinated water for all steps so as not to kill good bacteria we are brewing. Next, whisk in flour with vigor to incorporate lots of air. Cover it with a plate and let it sit for 12 - 24 hours. You'll know when it's ready when it looks really bubbly.

Note: be sure to leave some starter in your jar and feed it again now, so you have more for step 3 and for future use. This is as much about enjoying bread as it is nurturing a healthy starter for life. Some of the best starters are decades old.

Step 3: Make the Sourdough

Finally, we're getting somewhere! Once your leaven has reached the ready stage, you can use it to make the sourdough.

I have studied the traditional French sourdough method of Dave Snyder and his San Joaquin Sourdough, which won the prize for the best baguette in Paris in 2008. I have adjusted the recipe quite a bit for lectin free ingredients. This step in particular is drastically different because we add more starter. Traditional sourdough methods use starter only in the leaven.

So, here we go. Sourdough making is all about percentages that add up to a lot more than 100%. That's because we have so many steps. For LFG sourdough, it's about 337.5% water, 100% leaven, 56.25% starter, 337.5% LFG flour, 337.5% Sorghum four, 25% Arrowroot starch, 25% xanthan gum, and 10% salt for about 1,229% of ingredients. The San Joaquin recipe has a total of 960%.

Mind blown? Ignore all those percentages here and just go with these measurements.

Lectin Free Gourmet Sourdough Recipe

1 1/2 C Distilled Water

1 Psyllium husk "egg" (2 tbsp whole psyllium husk and 1/2 cup distilled water

All the LFG Leaven from Step 2

1/4 C More Starter

3 1/4 C Flour (1:1 tapioca and sorghum flours)

1 T Arrowroot Starch

1 T Xanthan Gum

1 t Salt

To save your wrist and arm, you'll want a stand mixer for this part. I love my Cuisinart stand mixer. Here's the one I have available on Amazon. Click here to buy the Cuisinart Stand Mixer.

Attach the dough blade to your stand mixer and set aside.

In a separate bowl, whisk 2 tablespoons psyllium husk in 1/2 cup water. Let it sit for about one minute to thicken.

In the stand mixer bowl, dissolve all the leaven, psyllium husk egg, and additional starter in 1 1/2 cups distilled water by giving it a few whirls in the mixer with the dough blade. Add the rest of ingredients and mix on low for about one minute until the dough forms a ball and appears "shaggy" like the picture. Dough is very wet and sticks to your finger when you touch it and leaves "peaks" behind.

Next, very lightly oil a large glass bowl. I like EVOO here. But you can also use butter or ghee. Lift the shaggy mass out of the stand mixer bowl and transfer to the lightly oiled glass bowl. Cover with a dough cloth. Every 30 minutes for a total of three hours, you need to "stretch and fold" the dough. I do a total of five stretch and folds each time, covering with the cloth between rounds.

"Stretch" means pulling the dough like taffy as far as it will go without breaking, and fold means to bring the ends back together. Stretch and fold, stretch and fold, stretch and fold, stretch and fold, stretch and fold (5 times each time). For ease, I do the stretch and folds inside the bowl. With the bowl in front of you, grab the dough from the back of the bowl with both hands, pull it straight up and fold it on top of the rest of the dough. Turn the bowl one-quarter to the right. Repeat the stretch and fold process until you've done four. After which, your dough will look smoother, and less shaggy. Then cover and do it again in 30 minutes. Repeat until you've done a total of five stretch and folds.

Next, ditch the cloth and cover the glass bowl with plastic wrap and place in the refrigerator for 24 hours. This is where the dough will rise and grow twice its size.

Step 4: Shape, Proof and Bake Dough

After your dough has risen in the refrigerator for 24 hours, you can make your bread. Ready dough has thousands of holes and has doubled in size. On parchment dusted with sorghum flour, shape your dough into one large baguette (or two demis) and sprinkle it in sorghum flour. You could also make a large round loaf, dinner rolls, hoagies, or whatever you want. For my first round, I kept it simple and made a baguette. When I was comfortable, I experimented with different shapes.

Once you have your shape, you can score it. For a baguette, I find that staggering three long diagonal scores down the length of the loaf. Once you've shaped and scored the dough, let it "PROOF" for one hour. Do this by leaving the dough where it is and covering the baguette with a dough towel. Dough will continue to rise during this stage, and you'll see the scores you made open up a little bit.

Preheat the oven to 500 degrees. Prepare a steam pan. I use a bread pan filled with water on the bottom rack. Put it in the oven five minutes before you bake the bread.

After one hour of proofing, transfer your baguette to your baking pan. If you have a special baguette pan, you will get a nicer, rounder bottom. I bought one from Amazon that I love. I can bake up to four baguettes at a time and they always turn our beautiful. Baguette pans have a round bottom and little holes for optimum shape and air flow. Buy Kristine's baguette pan on Amazon for gorgeous looking bread. The pan holds up to four baguettes. Click here to buy the baguette pan.

Next, place the bread in the oven. Be careful! Hot steam can burn your face. Immediately turn oven down to 480 degrees. After ten minutes, turn down again to 455 degrees for the rest of the time. I live at high altitude and find that times vary. I bake my bread for a total of 25 minutes until it's crusty and brown. You will just have to experiment to see what works in your area and your oven. THE HOUSE SMELLS LIKE BREAD!

Let bread cool for about 10 minutes. I like to eat a few slices hot with a dipping plate of oil and balsamic vinegar, black pepper and herbs. You will notice this LFG sourdough bread is crusty and chewy on the outside, and airy on the inside. Just like sourdough bread should be.

Enjoy!