Freshly baked bread from your own ovenis usually a treat. If you bake yourself, you know the ingredients of the bread, you can implement individual wishes and really make the bread the way you like it best. It is not only the ingredients that are crucial, but also the type of bread and the method of preparation.

Traditionally, sourdough breads are eaten in Germany. Some have a rather thick, hard crust, are soft and moist inside and are characterized by extraordinary wholesomeness. Sourdough breads are not mass-produced, a good loaf takes several days to ripen, ferment and really become a bread. The dough blank is usually quite soft and unstable, which is why a fermentation basket ensures that the bread keeps its shape before baking.

Traditional breads according to old recipe

Sourdoughs stick strongly. They develop their typical sourish aroma, which smells a bit like beer and a bit nutty, in a longer fermentation process, during which lactic acid bacteria and yeasts multiply in the not yet baked dough. This forms gases that are trapped in the bread dough and ensure the baking of the moist lightness and looseness of the bread, even if heavy flours are used. To allow these bacteria and fungi to do their job, the dough blank should rest between 12 and 72 hours before being baked. He does this traditionally in a Gärkörbchen. The basket is usually round, made of air-permeable materials such as wood, straw or wicker and usually size-standardized. There are fermenting baskets for breads of about 500 g, 750 g, 1,000 g and 1,500 g. Before the dough blank is put into the fermentation basket, the basket should be sprinkled inside with flour. This prevents the dough from sticking. Often there are also different ones grainsand seeds to be baked in the crust of the bread are scattered in the basket. Since the fermenting basket is never smooth, but has a corrugated surface, the grains as well as the flour remain hanging and can be evenly distributed. These ribs in the basket also give the bread its characteristic surface after baking.

Fermenting baskets are not heat resistant!

The Gärkörbchen is really only there to keep the bread during the fermentation process in the form. Before baking, the dough blank must be placed on a baking sheetor a furnace pusher are to be overthrown, because fermenting baskets may under no circumstances mitgebacken. The baskets are not heat resistant and would go up in flames at high temperatures in the bread oven.

What does the fermentation basket have to do with the crust?

The crust forms during baking where the dough blank was placed in the basket during the fermentation process. Although the dough was well mixed, heavier ingredients settle here and the basket protects against dehydration. The part that is on top during baking (ie after falling out of the fermenting basket), was down during the fermentation all the time, is very humid. This can form a good crust when baking. It creates roasted aromas that give the crust its very special, nutty taste.

Fermenting baskets in different forms

Traditionally, breads are round or oblong oval. This has to do with the shape of the fermentation baskets – which are usually round or oblong oval. And that has not changed until today. The material from which the baskets are made has changed very much. Previously, fermentation baskets were primarily woven from straw. This type of baskets is very rare to buy. Most are fermenting baskets made of wood, braided from wicker or made of silicone. If you like to bake often, you should think about whether a fermenting basket made of natural materials pays off in the purchase. Because bread lovers swear that bread made of plastic molds tastes different and does not develop the typical taste in the crust.