DURUM HERB CHEESE SOURDOUGH BREAD

Steps:

• Sauté the herbs, garlic, and pepper in olive oil and set aside to cool. If you want impressive garlic power, use all four cloves (or more) and just warm the minced garlic in the oil. If you want muted garlic flavor, you can reduce the quantity of garlic and/or heat to the point of softness.
• Measure and prepare in a bowl the dry ingredients of the dough, including the cheese.
• Add the water, starter and sautéed ingredients to the dry ingredients and mix.
• Cover the dough and set it aside at room temp for one hour.
• After one hour, stretch and fold the dough four times as per the first video here. To summarize the video instructions: scrape the dough loose from the bowl with a wet scraper, lift it out with two hands, fold it in thirds. Then do the same from the opposite sides of the dough.
• Put the dough back in the bowl, cover and set a timer for twenty minutes.
• Repeat this three more times. This is four stretch and folds over the course of the second hour since mixing (1:00, 1:20, 1:40 and 2:00 hours). You should notice a big difference in the pliability of the dough over the course of the stretching and folding.
• Let dough ferment for an additional 6-12 hours depending on room temp (that is 8-14 hours total since mixing up the dough).
• Scrape the dough out of its bowl onto a well-floured counter. Gently spread the dough into a rectangle. Fold the dough in thirds and then in half. See this Breadtopia video for more details on folding and shaping.
• Let the dough rest for 15 minutes while you wash the dough bowl and prep your proofing basket. I sprinkled flour directly into an oval coiled rattan basket.
• Flour your hands and the dough, flip the dough, tuck under the edges while rotating it to create a batard shape.
• Lay your dough in the basket, seam side down and cover.
• Put the basket in the refrigerator for about 10 hours (up to 20) OR leave the basket at room temperature for about 1 hour.
• Preheat the oven and your baking vessel to 500 F for thirty minutes before the proofing time is up.
• Flour your hand and flip the dough out of the basket, and place it into the hot baking vessel. Score it with a razor or allow the existing seams to open up.
• Bake until the internal temp is around 205 F.
• 30 minutes at 500 degrees, lid on.
• 10 minutes at 450 degrees, lid off.
• Variations
• Eliminate the stretching and folding. The loaf may be a bit flatter, but the crumb will still be open and the taste delicious.
• Reserve the herb-garlic sauté until after the bulk fermentation, and then spread it onto the dough when you fold it in thirds. This works best if you strain or squeeze out the oil from the sauté. The crumb will have a swirly pattern of herbs.
• Use mozzarella cheese cut in chunks instead of provolone. The crumb will be open from the melting chunks and the cheese flavor is milder. Consider adding an additional 1/2 tsp of salt.
• Use provolone in slices that you add after the bulk fermentation and while folding in thirds. This creates a strange crumb with long open layers.
• (Pictures of these variations are below the photographic instructions.)