In today's episode, we continue the conversation with Beesham the Baker!
In this episode, the conversation covers freshly milled grains, sourdough hydration percentages, and some of Beesham's favorite equipment.
"Why are we baking sourdough bread? Because we want the health benefit of it. Of course, it's a lot of flavor... but if the fermentation goes slowly, then it's easier for us to digest... It said the minimum time for fermentation should be around 15 hours. Then you can't digest the bread and your body can absorb all the minerals, the nutrition, the vitamins and everything..."
Want to make your own sourdough at home? It's seriously way easier than you think. Cultures For Health offers DIY kits and a variety of starter cultures to make at-home baking and fermentation super simple. Best of all, we are offering 25% off when you use the code CFHPODCAST.
Cara:
Welcome to part two of our conversation with Beesh. Today we are going to tackle even more info on sourdough and wild yeast cultures, cultures for Health has everything you need to get your own sourdough started going at home, use the Code CFH podcast to get off.
Cara:
One of the things that I noticed on your website is that you use a lot of, like, heritage grains. And I think you talk a lot about local grains to you in Sweden. Can you talk a little bit about that, how you chose the grains that you choose every day and what that looks like, if you like to mill your own grains freshness, if that makes a difference to you, what you're really looking for and maybe like advice to people and how they can also find grains local to them, because I don't think people really realize how easy it is to.
Beesham:
Yeah, how easy outside where I live on a farm here. So I have been involved in a project, like, for three years ago. It was a big project here in Sweden where it was responsible by the government itself here. So the project was that to encourage people, many people involved, to get your bread on the table. You start from the farmers, the Millers, the bakers and the consumers also. So we try to bring back with the heritage grains. I use a lot of the heritage grant myself in all my baking. And I think it's very important, first of all, because it's very important to go back those grains like spares. And we have a special week called Orland Suite. You have kamut, you have encouraged, you have Emmer. There's so many different all grains there's. Many of them, actually, in this project I was involved here, we used to do a lot of tests growing every summer in the farm here with like maybe from 400 to 600 different kinds of grains to test growing them in a small square like this square foot to see which one will grow, which one will adapt to the weather here and harvest how big the grains will come. You know, we have this researcher called. His name is Hans Larson. He's the one behind he's been doing this for 40 years. He worked at Farm University here in the south of Sweden. So I was very happy to be involved in this project and to do when they will harvest the grains, we will fresh meal it, will fresh meal it, and then I will Bake with it. So what I see a lot of people today is getting the new mock meal from home Mealing and all this. Actually, I have been doing it almost for 19 years, milling my own grains 19 years ago. So because we had a lot of Rye here, a lot of Rye on the farm. So I would like to meal my own Rye to get a nice bread from fresh meal bread. This is also very important, a freshmeal flour will give you a more flavorful nutrition and everything that you need for your bread instead of going to get a package of flour which has been on the supermarket sell for one year. For over one year. Right. Of course it will make a difference. I see a lot of people is going into whole grains today. So the best is to just meal your own grains. Yeah.
Cara:
So do you think that milling your own grains also makes a difference in things like hydration? Like, one thing I've noticed is that the fresher the flour sometimes can really affect one way or another the amount of hydration that you need to add to your dough in order to get it to whatever the desired consistency is for you. Do you find that milling your own grains has different effects on your bread in that way, too?
Beesham:
Yeah, it depends. What kind of everything depends on the flour. That's why I said earlier recipe is just a recipe. I've been traveling the whole world. I've been baking from the very weak flour to the very best flower when I was in USA. So I was in Maine. And then you have very good flowers. The flower I think we used from there was for main grains because I was on the east part in Maine. You can see that the recipe I had with me, let's say it will take 72% of hydration, but that flower was taking almost 78% of hydration. So that's why you see it's different. So, of course, when you grind your flour, you have freshmeal flour, and it depends what kind of grains it is and how much you're putting off the fresh whole grains in your dough to make your dough, it will absorb more hydration. It will affect the formula of the recipes. Sometimes it goes over 120% hydration.
Cara
Oh, my gosh. Yeah, I've seen that. That's crazy.
Beesham:
It's very difficult to understand. So everybody just needs to try and do tests. As I said, we always want to try a couple of times till we get the right results that we want.
Cara:
Right. When you use whole grains and you're milling your own flour, do you kind of have a percentage, like earlier you said inclusions probably don't go above 40%, 25% maybe is a good minimum. Do you have like a percentage that you use whole heritage grains in your doses, or do you do 100% in some of your doughs, like 100%, like local Rye? What's kind of like the rule of thumb there for you?
Beesham:
Actually, there's no rules. Okay. Actually, there's no rules if you want to call a bread whole grains bread, so it has to be over 50%. Okay. Got you. But like, for me, when I do a spelled bread, I keep it 100% spelled even I would make the leave and also spell because here we have a lot of different flowers actually we have a local meal not far from here, like 30 km from where I live. The meal only heritage grains and fine flower. Also for bakeries to give to bakeries, to small artisan bakeries to Bake with. So for me it's not difficult to get white sifted, white spell, I can buy that. So let's say I would use 70% of that and then I will mix my 30% of the whole spell myself. So I will have a country love of spell 70%. But there's no rules. It depends what people want. Some people want lighter bread, heavy bread. So it depends on what people want.
Cara:
Yeah, you got to cater to your needs and what's locally available.
Beesham:
Yeah, to your needs. Because there's no rules. Because some people want 100% whole grains, some want 70 30, some 80 20, just like 60 40. So it's very different from what you want. Yeah, of course. Then the fermentation, the fermentation and the hydration, all this will affect. It will change when you change the ratio.
Cara:
Do you find that maybe it's not that dramatic of effect, but do you find that when you use different grains, they kind of have different yeast strains on them, almost like different grains have different environmental introductions into your starter and they kind of have different effects on the outcome of your starter. Do you see that a lot?
Beesham:
I normally put a lot of when I do a living, let's say I do a living if I meal some of my fresh grains and put it in. When you meal it, it has a lot of enzymes, the activities of the flour. It's fresh meal, it's warm, you put it in the leaven, you mix it and I think it will give you a very nice, fluffy and active living. I think it makes a big difference by using a flower which has been on the shelf for six months, eight months, twelve months, I don't know. So it will give him more character, will give more flavor. For me, it's very important to create flavor, to create the flavor. I never baked same day sourdough baking. So what's the use of baking? I see a lot of people posting same day sourdough baking. So what's the use of baking? Sourdough if you have to Bake it the same day, you don't understand why you are baking sourdough because you're not getting the benefits of the sourdough. First of all, we want this fermentation to go as slow as possible so that when we make it, when we eat it, we feel very satisfied. It's a bread with a lot of flavor and then it's easy for us to digest it because we don't need to eat a lot of bread. So we just need to eat just a little bread to get satisfied. Also buy the industry bread, even you eat a whole lot and then you're hungry again after 1 hour and hours.
Cara:
right.
Beesham:
So this is what people need to understand. It's so important to understand this. Why are we baking sourdough bread? Because we want the health benefit of it also. Of course, it's a lot of flavor because the fermentation goes slowly and then it's about easy for us to digestion it's only then. Actually, there's been two studies. Actually. One is done in USA. I don't know which University. And we have one in Sweden. It has been done. It said the minimum hours of fermentation actually should be around 15 hours only. Then you can't digest the bread and your body can take all the minerals, the nutrition, the vitamins and everything. Only the benefits.
Cara:
Yeah. Absorb all the nutrients. Yeah. Wow.
Beesham:
So that's why sometimes when I travel, I will stay in the hotel and then I will eat I have to eat something. And then they will come with a roll. They have made a rolls with a lot of yeast in it. And then really, you feel bad about it after I've been eating sourdough bread for over 20 years to use the bread because the fermentation is not there. You see, I also did it 25 years ago. Yeah. So, you know, the process from start to finish, sometimes it takes to 1 hour, one and a half hour because it puts a lot of yeast in it. And then imagine that bread is going to grow in your stomach because the fermentation with the water you have been drinking and then will expand. Actually, it's not good. That's why people need to understand why it's so important to eat sourdogh bread. First of all, you don't need to eat a lot of bread. It gives you more flavor, and then you can get all the nutrition that your body needs. And it's not a problem to eat bread. Bread is not a problem. People is avoiding bread. Why? Bread has been there for thousands of years in all the cultures.
Cara:
Right.
Beesham:
So it's very important to understand this.
Cara:
Yeah. It's crazy to me to see the level that people avoid bread without really understanding what's in it. I saw an interview one time where someone was running around, like chasing people who wouldn't eat pasta. And they were like, well, why don't you eat pasta? And they were like, oh, it's the wheat. And they're like, what about the wheat? And no one really knew. They were just blindly following these diets without really understanding what is in bread to avoid. And if there is something to avoid. But I think you have a really good point that bread is more than just something that's filler. It's something that can be incredibly nutrient dense and has been used for thousands of years to drive societies when they were starving, that's what they had was bread. And they may do what they had and they use local grains like you do. So it's refreshing to hear that people are still focusing on those qualities of bread. And like, what I think of bread is like a very strong driving force in helping us.
Beesham:
Yeah. It's very important because it doesn't matter which culture you go. You have bread everywhere. Exactly. It's bread everywhere. And bread should not be luxurious things. Bread should be affordable for everybody, right?
Cara:
Absolutely.
Beesham:
One story I normally go to my friend in Greece and help them with a bakery. He has a very huge production of bakery and with seven to eight shops. And he told me for him was very important that everybody, even that person who cannot afford because in his bakery he will have bread that will cost probably, I don't know, five, six Euro, seven Euro. One bread and other bread will cost only €1 because he will tell the people that can afford the bread to cover the cost so that the person who has no money can come to the shop and buy a bread that he can have also. So in this way, I think it's really nice bread should be for everybody. So everybody should be able to afford the bread.
Cara:
Yeah. And good bread too, right. Not the commercial stuff that we're seeing, but like good sour, right?
Beesham:
Yeah.
Cara:
I definitely agree with you. So I guess changing directions a little bit. I wanted to talk a little bit about equipment I saw in a few of your videos on your Instagram. I think probably in a bakery setting. I saw some really nice ovens that I recognize that I've used in the past in culinary school and stuff like that. I wanted to hear your opinion and hear you talk a little bit about commercial baking versus like home baking. And you talked earlier that all your master classes were based on home baking and not like commercial equipment. What is your thoughts and advice around baking at home and making do with what you have? How do you translate what you know in the industry to what you're teaching everybody who's working from home?
Beesham:
Yeah. You see, there's two different things here. When you Bake in a professional way, you need those equipment because first of all, you need space and then you need to be big quantity and it has to be practical for you because time is money. Okay. So you have to do a lot definitely. You have to do a lot of production in a very short time. So you need to have space if you have to Bake 1000 bread a day. So different bread. So you need space and oven and facilities. But at home, how many bread can we Bake, Max? Maybe five, six bread at a time, some oven. I don't know. In the US, I've seen home oven quite large. You can Bake two or three breads. I don't know. It depends. We have the stove or you it all depends on what you have. Actually, I have proven it before I made this online course. I never baked at home for years. I never used my own at home because it was not a need for me. Because if I need a bread, I take a breath from my work and I bring it home. But after I did this workshop, after we filmed this workshop, I got so inspired. So I tried to Bake at least once a week in my oven. I'll make a door and bring it home and I just want to because I see amazing results one can get. I see my students, we have just a special group, a private group from all my students that has bought the course on Facebook where they can share the knowledge. Because, you see, I have almost 1300 students. I cannot answer everybody. I get a lot of message on Instagram and all this. So we try to gather everyone in one place. Even I cannot answer all the questions. But for my other student, which has been going through the same problem, they will be able to answer. So actually, if you're going to Bake at home, it's not a problem. You can make amazing rent at home from whatever you have. You don't need fancy equipment, you don't need fancy. An example I'll give you, you can take a kitchen cloth and put four baggage for proofing on a tray and a kitchen cloth. So it's so simple with a plastic bag on top, put it in the fridge and then heat up your oven and you Bake. It's very important to have either you Bake on a steel in your oven or stone, or you have the Dutch oven. So whatever you can afford, you can buy very cheap stone or you can go to a place where they catch stone to get a Grande. I had a granite for a sick Grande like this for so many years. So it's worked very fine. It depends what people can't afford very expensive oven. One can make really good bread from whatever you have at home. You don't need an expensive Benator. You can just take a bowl, put a cloth in it because you're making two breads, right? Absolutely. This is how my course is built on. You use what you have at home. So everybody has the basic things. Basic at home. Yeah. And it's approachable for everyone at home too. Yeah. They can go and buy the fancy and expensive thing, but it's whatever you have, it's not necessary.
Cara:
Yeah. I think the biggest thing is people see Instagrams and they see stuff like the Challenger bread pan, which is a pretty popular Dutch of style pan. And they think they need to spend $$150 to $100 on a Dutch oven when they don't need to. And so I think some people get discouraged because they see price Tags on things that they think they need and they don't need it.
Beesham:
Of course, it depends. Probably you get a better result when you have a thick cast iron cover. Then all this will create a better result. But in the end you're baking because you want to eat a good bread and give a good bread to your family, then still you can do it from whatever you have at home, even if it will be fine. This is what I will encourage people to do. One can really nice bread at home.
Cara:
Absolutely. I've definitely done it. Obviously, you've done it through your master class for everyone listening. Definitely achievable. Just keep at it. Right. That's the biggest thing. Just keep trying, keep doing, keep learning. What is the number one question you get about sourdough? Like, if all the questions you said you had 13,000 students, you don't have time to answer them. Of all the questions, what do you think is either the number one question that you get asked or the number one most important question you get asked?
Beesham:
I think the most important question is how to make a starter.
Cara:
Right. Got to start somewhere.
Beesham:
Yeah. So I think because sometimes I put a small video clip with my stock is very active. It's a really active start. It doesn't matter. Wherever I go in the world, I always travel like 200 grams, 300 grams. If I will stay one week in a bakery. When I leave this bakery, I bake 500 kilowatt hours and gone from there with this 300 gram. Okay. So I think people want to see that. And of course, I've been taking nicely care of it now for 21 years. And now I'm really happy to see the lab result of it. Exactly. You can go on my Instagram and read about it. Okay.
Cara:
Yeah, I saw it. It was really cool.
Beesham:
Yeah. So I'm really happy to get this lab test took almost three months. They have to do different procedures and all this. So I'm really happy to get the result now. And I'm really happy that it is saved for the future generations to come in the South Library in Belgium. So most of the first question, if people want to Bake sourdough bread, one can go read a lot of books and watch a lot of YouTube. You can take a lot of courses. But if you don't have the main ingredients, the stock, which will make your door rise and give you a good result, then nothing will help you. So first of all, you need to make a good start. So that's the first question I'll get. And of course, I'll get a lot of questions also.
Cara:
Yeah. Not so good for sandwiches, but they look pretty. Yeah, it depends if nice.
Beesham:
That's why it's very important to understand all the bread have different characters. Like, I have my signature bread, the big bread, which has very big holes in it. I call it perch. So this bread, you can just break it and dip it in good olive oil and garlic or whatever and just eat it in the soup and eat it. You understand each bread has its own characters. Because you have a heavy Rye bread and a dense bread. You have a whole wheat bread. Every bread has the way you have to know how to eat it.
Cara:
Yeah. I think that's maybe like another misconception that people have about bread is all bread is going to come out as this big nice, had this huge rise, had all these big holes in them. I think a lot of people perceive bread in general as that. And it's not necessarily that. Right. We have our rye loaves, which are really dense. We have stolen, which is like whole, nother world of sweetness. Right. We have all of these different kind of breads, a panel of which is just like really simple, classic, delicious, perfect. Chibata, Chibata is definitely one of my favorites. Fakasha is one of my favorites, delicious of sourdough. So I definitely think people need to understand the different styles and really what style they're looking for. Right. Like, there's traditional, classic country style. And then you have your really Holies and you're really dense and all that and understanding that and understanding how your flowers working on it, too, because I think sometimes people see like a whole wheat or they see a spell and they think it's going to look exactly the same as just like 100%, like basic white flour. I think understanding that difference is really important.
Beesham:
That's why I tried to make a big varieties of bread. You see, I tried to show people different breads from dense bread. Actually, one of my favorite you had this question, what is my favorite bread? Actually, for me, my favorite bread is a good dry bread. I have this bread, I call it the Viking bread, 100% Rye, with a lot of ingredients, a lot of seeds in it. And sometimes we have whole ballet porridge in it also. So it's a very heavy bread. But this bread can last you for one month in the fridge, and it still is so tasty. And you just need two small slices, like in the Nordic country here. So people without this kind of bread, they will not get satisfied. Like the days the neighbor goes to Sweden. And if they don't get the Rye bread every day, they're not going to get satisfied. You can give them a lot of but in France, but they need the packets every day, right. In Italy, they need the chevatas and the light bread. So I think every culture has their own ways of eating what is important for them. So I think people just need to try. And so that's why I am so broad. I like to share. I know a lot of bread for me, so that's why I show it to people also. So that's why I try to show people a lot of different kinds of bread. So I think people need to understand different culture, different ways of eating like in French, if the French man, the French people, they don't get the baguettes, then probably their day is not completed because you see the bakery in France, they're baking all day. They don't Bake it in the morning and sell it all day. The baguette is baked every hour. You see, it's a culture.
Cara:
Yeah. And I think that's a good place for people to start, too, is to look at their culture, look at their family and their heritage. And I think in terms of types of bread in the world, it can be pretty daunting. There's a lot out there and there's a lot to learn. And I think you can attest to that. And I can attest to that. Like we're forever learning. There's always different loves and different styles to learn. But I think always just going back to your heritage is like a great way to start and connect with your family in a way that maybe you haven't in the past is like that's what I love about fermentation. And that's what I love about food in specific is just like the connection it allows you to have to the people around you. And your favorite might be Rye, but my favorite might not be Rye.
Beesham:
And that's okay,
Cara:
right. Exactly. And learning how that fits you and trying different recipes that fit your wants, like you've been saying, I think is definitely really cool about sourdough almost in the sense that it's a universal thing, but we can all make it our own at the same time. I don't know. I love that about it. So let's shift again for a second. I want to talk about wild yeast starters. So I've seen on your page, I've seen a few maybe started off apples or like different kinds of fruits or vegetables, like these wild yeast starters. What do you do with them? Do you use them as sourdough starters? Have you been successful with it? What made you think to do that, all of that kind of like what can you tell us about, like, wild yeast and why you would use it or why you might want to use it? Benefits, flavors, all that kind of thing.
Beesham:
Yeah. So wild yeast, actually, we have yeast everywhere and all the fruits and all the vegetables. Actually, you can just ferment anything. Yeah, actually, I've been doing it for many years, for almost 18 years. Like I said, I will go through the season in the autumn. You have a lot of Apple. In the summer, you have grapes. And so to make a wild, you just take one pot of fruits can be fresh fruit or dry fruits and four pots of water and sometimes a little honey or raw sugar. Let it ferment for up to twelve days in a bottle. That's it from it. And then you use that water to make a leave in it's only one time. Using it's only one time. It's not like sourdough. You refresh it and then this will give you a bread. It will give you a nice bread flavorful. Bread just depends what fruit you're using because you have the honey and then you have the fruit. Sometimes you have some sugar and also the dough will be more sweet there and then you get a very nice character of the bread. But the problem is here. The problem is here because we have done when I was 2015, I was in Belgium, actually, I have a video on YouTube if somebody will search on wild yeast. I was in Belgium and explaining about the different wild yeast because we made a lot of different wild yeast with different fruits and to see herbs and dry fruits to see what's the character. And some will have a nice fermentation. Some will not have a nice fermentation because of the acidity in the fruit. Like if you have the lemon, let's say you use some tangerine or lemon or so the fermentation will not be there, right. So it will break the structure, the gluten from the dough. But while this is nice to make, but normally the water, you will keep it up for two months and will last you for two months in the fridge. In the end, you have a flavorful bread and ice. But the benefit, I don't know. But one problem can be very dangerous with it, you can get a very bad bacteria coming into the wireless water,
Cara:
right? Be careful.
Beesham:
One disadvantage if it gets a cross contamination, of course, in the end you don't have any benefits of it. It's just about the flavor, the structure. It will not have the sourdough benefits. So I do it time to time just to try something new and to show people that you can just use natural yeast to make your bread, to Bake, to rice.
Cara:
What are your thoughts on all of the different trends? So I've been seeing people make sourdough starter with all different types of things, like yogurt, kombucha, fruit flies. I've seen uptick in people trying to make starters with fruit flies, which to me would be like a cross contamination concern because it's pest, bringing in bad bacteria. Have you seen those trends? Have you seen other types of trends of using other fertilizers to start a sourdough starter? What are your thoughts on that? Have you ever tried it?
Beesham:
Yeah, I've tried different. The thing is, one thing here is very important to understand, okay. Our mother the starter that I have always I keep it clean all the time. Then if I want to go to make a leaving, if I'm going to make a leaving, then if I'm going to make a living, how do you say I can use yogurt or milk or kombucha. Because you want to keep your mother's salt clean, but the leaves that you want the flavor to be in your bread that you can make with different tastes. So never make your original mother start to put all the ingredients in it. Keep that clean, but make different kinds of live and with different ingredients. Yeah. People can experiment and do whatever and see, actually, I have made bread only with kombucha. Take the kombucha water and make it even with it and Bake. Very nice bread I have made with water, kefir, grains. Water, kefir.
Cara:
Oh, cool.
Beesham:
Yeah. Very good. Yeah. Take the water and then make a leave in and then you make a bread with it. Right. So probably you will not have the same benefit of the probiotic of the kombucha if you have ferment it and Bake it. I don't know.
Cara:
Hard to tell, right. The science isn't there yet. That's really cool. Yeah. That's really good advice. Always keep your mother's starter clean and keep her happy and healthy. And then whatever you want to do outside of that, you should do outside of that to make sure you always have a healthy, happy pace. That's a really good idea. Okay. I think I'm about out of questions for you. Do you have any last words of advice, stories you want to tell, things you want to say, favorite loves you want to share?
Beesham:
Things are some advice I get from people, a lot of my students and one really need to have patience. Baking sour bread. Give it time. Definitely. And let the fermentation take time. Some places it all depends from places, different places to places. If I go to Asia, it's very hot, there's very humidity and the fermentation will go very fast. One story I can tell you, I was in Israel some years ago to do a workshop there. And then I remember it was almost 48 deg. 48 deg. Wow, that's hot. So it was really hot. Yeah. Even we use almost ice and water, half ice, water, ice, pieces of ice. Put water in it and use it. And the dough, I tell you, the dough will double in 2 hours. That is very important. It's very important how much inoculation you're using in your dough. So that's why sourdough baking is very important to plan. It depends where you live and how much inoculation means how much starter you're going to have in your dough. To make your dough fermenting. So one can use one 5%. Let's say you have one kilo flour. Use 5 grams 5 grams of salt if you live in a very hot country, if you live in cold countries and probably use 30%, so in the end, the same effect will so you're controlling the fermentation in this way. So it's very important. Concentrate. Don't concentrate too much on recipes because it's good to have a formula that you need to use. One kilo flour 700 G water 2200 grams of salt 2% of salt 20 grams of salt like this to have it. But in the end it's the best way you are. Your flower can react differently. Your flower can take more water or less water or your fermentation can go faster or slower. That's why it's very important to try and experience. Your temperature is very important in your kitchen is very important your oven for the finished result people ask why I don't get an ear on my bread probably your dough is not been scoring nicely or your oven is not hot enough or you don't have the steam. All these things matters so one just need to try a couple of times and see where the mistake has been done so everybody can do it. It's not difficult just have patience and practice and practice and practice
Cara
and it's all going to taste good. Even the denser flavor. Yeah, perfect. Well, thank you so much for coming on and talking us. Thank you so much.
Beesham:
It was really nice to share some of my ideas so people want to check my website beyond the baker.com and say what do they check my Instagram? Don't forget I'm a funny guy. I always put some funny stuff yesterday. We have a fat Tuesday in Sweden. We just see if you go on my Instagram you will see we have like a cardamom buns rich band with almond cream and then whipped cream on top with a hat on it. So I think people eat millions millions. All the bakery do really good business on it so I made for the schools made a couple of hundred yesterday.
Cara:
Yeah, that's awesome.
Beesham:
Yes. Thank you so much for talking to us. Yes thank you so much for having me and it's a pleasure.
Cara:
I hope you enjoyed listening to all the wonderful, wonderful knowledge Bishom had to offer and remember to check out his Instagram thanks for joining us and use the Code CFH podcast to get 25% off and help you and sell with your internet.
