Comments on: Soft Semolina Sourdough

By: Joanne

Joanne — Fri, 04 Jan 2013 18:35:18 +0000

hello, i am from the UK so not sure what semolina is, i have semolina flour that i use to make bread sometimes is that ok or should it be coarse like corn meal – forgive the ignorance, thank you !

By: bripponippo

bripponippo — Thu, 18 Aug 2011 19:33:59 +0000

this is the best bread i’ve ever baked since i use sourdough.
I baked 8 small loaves, half with no seeds and half with cumin, and I used only 30 g of extra virgin olive oil and it’s amazing! I really mean it!

By: Claire

Claire — Sun, 07 Aug 2011 00:32:24 +0000

It’s been a few months since I baked with my poor neglected (i.e. pushed to the back of the fridge and not fed for weeks on end) starter, but decided to have a major baking session today since I’m on holiday. I’ve had my eye on this recipe for a while and since I’d just picked up a huge bag of semolina for less than £1, it seemed to be the right time to make it. Unfortunately, I chose to bake on a day when the temperature plummeted and the loaves proved really slowly. It’s August and I had to resort to putting them in the microwave with a bowl of hot water just so that they would be baked before midnight! I wouldn’t be able to shape a batard if my life depended on it, so I went for boules and covered them in cumin seeds rather than your tasty combo. Sadly, I didn’t do a good job flouring my bowls and my boules had to be scraped out rather more than I would have liked and ended up as somewhat degassed and twisted lumps of dough. Then my slashes were disasters, but I went ahead and baked (because the aforementioned midnight was fast approaching)! So now I have two of the ugliest loaves that I have ever seen in my life (along with two only slightly misshapen loaves of your soft sandwich sourdough – can’t go too far wrong when it’s in a tin, right?). They are shaped like UFOs (with a pointy “rim” halfway up the side) and the slashes are, well, not very slash-like. However, I have just had a slice and the texture and flavour are absolutely incredible. Thank you so much for sharing this wonderful recipe, and for your wonderful blog in general. And if I may be so bold as to make a suggestion to a master baker? Cumin is definitely a fantastic addition to this bread – I thoroughly recommend it if you choose to make this recipe again!

By: Susan

Susan — Mon, 21 Mar 2011 21:11:55 +0000

John — the oil serves as a tenderizer to keep the crust soft.

By: John

John — Mon, 21 Mar 2011 19:37:24 +0000

Could you shed some light as to what makes the crust softer. Is it the oil? The semolina? The baking time? The steaming time?

I’m just starting to learn how to bake a sourdough bread, and am interested in which parts of the equation are responsible for thick hard crust or softer thinner crust.