Desert Sourdough

About my Pizza dough balls

Note: The Yeast dough freezes great even long term, but needs to be done at shaping after 1st rise. Then thaw 24 hours in the fridge before using. I like it best to put in the fridge after first rise and then make the pizza the next day after allowing to come up to temp for about an hour and rise a little. The Sourdough freezes ok, but should to be used within a week or two for it to rise right. It can be difficult to stretch without tearing if you have not done if much.
Note 2: The sourdough gets a little olive oil, but if doing for a high heat pellet oven, it is better without.

About my Bread

My Sourdough bread is different than the typical "Artisan" loaves you see everywhere now. My process is different in that they do a no knead method that rises awhile and gets shaped, then it goes in the fridge for 12-24 hours or more before being baked, This method is what develops that really tough crust. I started my starter in 2018 for one reason, because I wanted to make sourdough bread bowls for my home made clam chowder and the only sourdough I knew at the time was what I remembered from San Francisco nearly 40 years ago. That was really just bread bowls to me but I do remember an extra sour French loaf... that I did not really care for at the time.
At the time, I really did not look into what I should be doing too much, I had been making bread for quite awhile at this point and since I did not know better, my French bread is made like most other bread with 8 minutes of kneading and 2 rises over about 8 hours depending on kitchen temps, except I used sourdough starter instead of commercial yeast. I figured instead of San Francisco style, since mine originated in Phoenix, I would call it Desert Sourdough, I did not even have a recipe, I thought sourdough was just flour, salt and water right? I just made some bread and tweaked it until I liked it. Then when I decided to try to sell it, I wanted to make consistent loaves so I wrote down the recipe as I made it and here we are. My bread has a tighter crumb (not huge holes in it) and is a much softer crust. Part of that is because I put it in a plastic bag as soon as it is cooled. It can be more crusty if it just goes into a paper bag and left exposed to the air, but not nearly as tough as hard as the Artisan loaves are. I have that as an option if that is how you like your bread.