It was a lot of work at first, because it required equipment and methods that were new to me, and it also required that I make my own sourdough starter from scratch.

But the method worked, the very first time.

And the next time. And the time after that.

By now, I’ve baked hundreds of boules and batards without a single failure. That’s not to say I haven’t made mistakes, but the Tartine method is exceptionally forgiving, so those mistakes have never led to failure. 

And the bread is great. The New York Times has described the bread that results from the Tartine method as ‘a wonder, the holy grail for the serious home baker.’

I recommend the book — it’s lovely, and it has lots of recipes. However, it’s not the best way to learn the process. It lacks clarity, it wanders, and it takes forever to get where it’s going. Before I tried baking my first bread under the book’s direction, I had to extract the instructions and rewrite them in useable form.

You could also try the New York Times recipe, but it goes to the other extreme. It’s brief and clear, but I think it assumes too much confidence and experience on the part of the baker. It’s definitely not for the beginner.

So I’m giving it my shot.

I’ve taught the method to multiple people. That includes a seven-year old who absolutely nailed it on her first try — and she really did it on her own; I taught her via Zoom from a thousand miles away.

HOW WE’LL DO THIS

I’m going to walk through this in four steps. 

The basics

First, I’m going to cover the basics. I’ll explain what sourdough bread is, I’ll briefly outline the Tartine method, and I’ll run through a list of equipment you should have before you get started. I’ll do part one right here in this article.

Creating a sourdough starter

Second, I’ll show you how to create your own sourdough starter from scratch. Yes, you can buy starter online, but there’s no real reason to do that. You can create your own, and it will be real, native, Southtown sourdough starter. You’ll find those instructions in a separate article, here: Part 2: Creating a starter

(By the way, if you have trouble making it work, let me know and I’ll give you a bit of mine. Just click the Contact button and send me a message.)

Mixing the dough

In the third part, I’ll show you how to mix your dough and shape your first boule of sourdough bread. You’ll find those instructions here: Part 3: Mixing dough

Baking the bread

Next, I'll show you how to bake the bread, using a cast iron combo cooker to simulate a commercial baker's oven. You'll find those instructions here: Part 4: Baking

Milling your own flour

And finally, if you want to go a step further, I'll describe how you can mill your own flour -- where to get the grain and what equipment you'll need. I've even included a recipe for a nice cranberry pecan bread that uses fresh-milled flour. That's all in Part 5: Upping your game

AN OVERVIEW OF THE METHOD

There are three ways that the Tartine bread-making method may differ from the methods you’re currently using.

First, of course, it’s a sourdough bread. It doesn’t use commercial yeast to get rise. It uses a live, bubbling sourdough starter.

Second, it’s a no-knead bread. Before I tried the Tartine method, I kneaded bread. It was hard, boring work. The Tartine method skips all the kneading. Instead, it relies on a natural process called autolysis which occurs when you allow your dough to ‘rest’ after mixing the flour and water, and it includes folding the dough now and then during its initial rise.

Third, it’s baked inside a cast iron dutch oven or combo cooker. That creates conditions for your bread that mimic those in a commercial baking oven. In commercial ovens, steam is injected at the start of the baking process. Home ovens don’t have that capability, but when you enclose your dough in the combo cooker, the dough itself produces steam, and the combo cooker captures it.

SUPPLIES

Bread is pretty simple. It has three ingredients:

• Flour

• Water

• Salt

Of course, you can complicate things a great deal as you get experienced and stretch yourself. You can add fruits and nuts and herbs and spices and milk and oil. You can choose alternative flours, like rye or einkorn or spelt. You can even mill your own flour from grain. But the basics are these: flour, water, and salt.

Flour

To get started, you’ll need two flours:

• Whole wheat flour (a five pound bag)

• Bread flour (a five pound bag)

Whole wheat flour is pretty basic -- it's wheat berries that have been milled.

Bread flour is also milled wheat berries, but it is sifted (‘bolted’) to remove bran, because bran interferes with your bread’s ability to rise. And -- unlike pastry flour or all purpose flour -- bread flour is made from high-protein wheats, which are better at producing gluten and holding the gases that help your bread rise.

For what it’s worth, when I started out, I used King Arthur brand flours, available at both H-E-B and Central Market, and I still recommend them for your first breads. (In a future article, I’ll talk about upping your game with some alternative flours).

Salt and Water

You can get as fancy as you like, but I use regular table salt and San Antonio tap water. They work fine.