Puglia style Sourdough Bread
Pane di Altamura is a traditional bread from the Puglia region of Italy. This bread is an good sandwich bread, or when serving soups and stews and used as a dipper. This recipe in the style but not true to the designation because we use ingredients available in North American, and use home oven not wood fired. True pane di Altamura has a special designation, Denominazione di Origine Protetta (DOP), meaning the ingredients come from a particular region and the bread has to meet specifications of taste, texture, and aroma. This includes a crust that is 3mm thick, a pale yellow crumb with a homogenous aveoli distribution, and a mildly sweet, not particularly acidic flavor.
Ingredients
Stiff Levain
- 55 g sourdough starter
- 65 g whole grain durum flour OR semolina rimacinata flour
- 40 g water
Durum Version
- 240 g fresh-milled durum wheat berries OR whole grain durum flour 1 3/4 cups + 1 Tbsp flour
- 160 g bread flour 1 1/4 cups
- 330 g water 1 1/3 cups + 1 Tbsp
- 160 g stiff levain all that was built above, ~1 cup compressed
- 9 g salt 1 1/2 tsp
Semolina Version
- 400 g semolina rimacinata flour 3 cups + 1 Tbsp flour
- 300 g water 1 1/4 cups
- 160 g stiff levain all that was built above, ~1 cup compressed
- 9 g salt 1 1/2 tsp
Instructions
- Build the stiff levain and let it double-to-triple in size.
- Mix all of the dough ingredients, including the ripe stiff levain, until they’re incorporated.
- Scrape the dough out onto a clean surface, and slap and fold the dough for about 7 minutes to develop the gluten.
- Transfer the dough to a clean container, cover, and let it double in size over the next 4-6 hours. You can continue to develop the gluten with coil folding or a lamination if you wish.
- Scrape out the dough onto a floured surface and preshape it into a ball. Cover and let it rest and have a final proof for about 1 hour.
- Thirty minutes before the end of the final proof, begin preheating your oven to 500F with a round baking vessel inside. You can also bake the bread on a stone with a steam system or an upside-down roaster pan as a lid.
- Shape your dough in the high form
- Load the dough into your baking vessel and drop the temperature to 480F.
- Bake 25 minutes at 480F covered and another 10-15 minutes at 450F uncovered.
- The internal temperature of the bread should be over 205F when finished baking.
Nutrition Disclaimer
Paulson Pursuits is not a dietician or nutritionist, and any nutritional information shared is an estimate. If calorie count and other nutritional values are important to you, we recommend running the ingredients through whichever online nutritional calculator you prefer. Calories can vary quite a bit depending on which brands were used.
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