Because the smell of bread baking
soothes rage and I have made the mistake
of reading the news from Charlottesville,
or Pittsburgh, or Washington
before beginning the morning’s writing,
I mix water, rye, and starter
Thus begins one page of a long poem by Ava Winter wherein she mixes not just water, rye, and sourdough starter, but history too. Ava, who is the author of the poetry book Transgenesis and also a dear friend, gifted us our gluten free sourdough starter when we were living in Lincoln. I’ve never used the starter to make one of those instagram-worthy sourdough boules–as Winter goes on to describe later in the poem, without gluten to rely upon, the structure of a bread dough is almost impossibly fragile. While the rye flour of Winter’s poem-recipe is lower in gluten than conventional wheat flour, it’s still not celiac safe, and so I haven’t been able to bake the bread she describes either. But I have used the starter to add flavor, depth, and yes, also height to other gluten free recipes. While it will never achieve the leavening power of a glutenous sourdough starter, it still bubbles up after I feed it (1 part buckwheat flour, 1 part rice flour, 2 parts water), and adds that signature tang, which is all the more important given that most gluten free flour blends taste a bit flat and dull if your palate is used to wheat.
A sourdough starter is an ingredient, but it’s also a routine. It requires tending (though not as much as I feared it might: ours has been fine, if a little starved, at the back of the fridge for more than a month when the semester gets busy). It requires use. To feed a sourdough starter, you have to reduce it by half, and feed it with fresh ingredients, which the bacteria in it will consume. To avoid throwing away that half portion of sourdough “discard,” there are all kinds of recipes on the internet to make use of it. The one we make most is this cracker recipe.
These gluten free crackers are far better than any store-bought gf option we’ve found, and better than most store-bought glutenous crackers too. They keep for weeks in an air-tight container, and would probably freeze well too, though their shelf life is so good I’ve never tried. The original source of this recipe is King Arthur, and if you don’t need to be gluten free, you should try their version. Ours is adapted for our sourdough starter, and our gluten free pantry. I’ve given the ingredients by weight, which works much more consistently when swapping out gluten free flours.
Gluten Free Sourdough Crackers
Ingredients:
- 227g gf sourdough discard (ours is fed with equal parts rice and buckwheat flours)
- 113g gf flour blend (we use Bob’s 1 to 1)
- 4 Tbsp butter at room temperature
- ¼ tsp salt
- Mixed herbs, dried or fresh & chopped (e.g. sage, rosemary, thyme)
- Olive oil & coarse salt
Method:
- Use your hands to mix flour, salt, sourdough discard, and butter into a smooth (not sticky) dough. When the dough is coming together, knead in the herbs too. Be generous with the herbs–I like to add enough so that they’ll be clearly visible in every cracker.
- Divide the dough into two parts, and shape each into a small rectangular slab (a bench knife works well here). Cover in plastic wrap and refrigerate for 30 minutes or up to a few hours.
- Preheat the oven to 350. Roll out the chilled dough on parchment, one piece at a time, lightly flouring surfaces with more Bob’s 1 to 1 as needed to prevent sticking. You’re aiming for about ⅛” thickness, or even thinner. Don’t worry about ragged edges, they’re proof that the crackers are homemade!
- Slide parchment and rolled dough onto a baking sheet. Brush with olive oil, sprinkle with course salt, and then cut into 1-2” crackers (I use that bench knife again). Prick each square with a fork.
- Bake 20-25 minutes, rotating pan halfway through, until crackers are browning around the edges. Cool on a rack–at this stage, if some of your crackers are still joined, you can break them apart. Store in an airtight container.
Other GF Sourdough Recipes
I grew up on sourdough waffles (Syrup Sundays!), so I was thrilled to find that this King Arthur sourdough waffles recipe works perfectly with the same gf replacements as the recipe above: Bob’s 1 to 1 measured by weight, and our rice/buckwheat sourdough starter. If you don’t have buttermilk, substitute milk curdled with white vinegar (1 Tbsp per cup milk). The same batter also makes great gf pancakes.