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Pumpkin sourdough

Ingredients

For sourdough starter

100g Shipton mill Dark Rye flour

100g water

about 25g active sourdough cuture

For the dough

150g pumpkin

Sourdough starter

425g flour*

260g water

10g salt

40g pumpkin seeds

7g caraway seeds

5g freshly ground nutmeg

*you can use your favourite mix of flours for bread. I used 50g Three Malts and Sunflower Brown, 75g Stoneground Wholemeal, 50g light rye, 250g French Type 55. All from Shipton mill.

Method

Mix ingredients for Sourdough starter and leave in room tempreature for 12-14 hours. The volume should double and bubbles are visible. In warm enviroment it might take around 10 hours.

Then prepare your pumpkin. You can use any variety you like - i love hokkaido -for its beautiful colour, delicious taste and also because you don't have to peel it unlike other pumkins. Remove seeds and pulp from the middle and chop it into chunks. Lightly cover with olive oil and Salt+pepper to taste. You can also add fresh or dried herbs to your likings. Bake in the oven on 200°C until soft and golden brown - about 15-20 min depending on the size you chopped your pumpkin. You can prepare it in advance and refridgerate or freeze it. Roasted pumpkin is an amazing side dish for any meat or simply with rice and youghurt+tahini dressing for light vegetarian meal. Pulse roasted pumpkin in food processor or simply mash with fork if you like chunks of pumpkin in your bread.

Toast pumpkin seeeds on a pan until they pop and then cover with cold water.

Once sourdough starter is ready (remember to remove a little bit for your next bread) mix in flour and water and leave to rest for about an hour. Then add all other ingredients apart from pumpkin seeds and mix in a mixer for 6-8 minutets until smooth dough. Add strained pumpkin seeds and mix to incorporate.

Leave to rise for two hours with folding every 40 minutes. Then shape your bread and put seam side up to a banneton (or a bowl lined with floured linen) floured with rice flour. Proof for another about two hours (depending on the ambiente) or overnight in the fridge.

If you want the bread to have shape like a pumpkin, prepare 4 butchers twine strings. Once your oven is pre-heted lay them in a star shape on top of the bread, put baking parchment and another tray without edges (you will use the tray to transfer the bread to a pizza stone in your oven) and turn it upside down. Then lift bread basket/bowl and gently brush off excess flour. Then tie each of the strings around the bread so it is just around or little looser but the string should not cut into the bread much. (please not my picture is not the best example as I tied the string too tight). You can add a cinnamon stick as a stalk.

Score if desired and put the bread to the oven pre-heated on 250°C and steam the oven by pouring a cup of water into another tray at the bottom of the oven. After 15 minutes (18 min if bread is from the fridge) remove the tray with water and decrease the temp to 190-200°C. Bake for annother 30-35 minutes.

Once bread sounds hollow when knocked on its bottom it's cooked. Remove the strings shortly after taking him out of the oven and leave to cool completly on a rack (if you manage to wait that long).

Well done you made it and enjoy!

P.s. it goes reallly well with butter; as a cheese toastie or with pumpkin soup for double pumpkin experience.