Downham, Kate. Sourdough Without Fail: 100% Whole Grain Bread, Pizza and Pastries for Any Kitchen.
Reason read: as a member of LibraryThing’s Early Review program I get to read interesting books. I often learn something along the way. This is one such time.
Pros: I appreciated the option to chose your own adventure according to your skill level or experience baking. The photography is beautiful. The attention to detail is impeccable and the amount of information, impressive. I appreciate the thorough indexing and plethora of information.
Cons: the organization was a little wonky. I expected a primer on sourdough starter right up front, before anything else: where to obtain it, what you need to feed it, how to know when to feed before diving into a recipe, and so forth. Maybe there could be a more thorough glossary of terms upfront so I’m not asking what an oven spring is right out of the gate. However, the answer does come later in the book.
All in all I learned a great deal about sourdough baking. Since I am inexperienced, I was not expecting there to be so much math (figuring out the percentages of ingredients around flour, for instance), but I have heard said that baking is a science. My only experience is with pizza dough. I would like to rewrite this review once I have made something with a sourdough starter.
Author fact: Downham has written other books about food. Her cheese book looks interesting.
Book trivia: the book was funded through Kickstarter.
