Sourdough: From Sumer to the Klondikes

From the day the world went into lockdown, people became bakers overnight.

Flour was always-out-of-stock at the supermarkets and my feed was suddenly saturated with loaves of holey, soft, lacy interiors protected by crusty, golden-brown shells that were dusted with crazy ‘flour-al’ designs.

I didn’t jump onto the lock-down baking bandwagon because I’ve enjoyed living with a master-baker for years. Still, I wanted in on the action. So, I dropped in on the Sumerians.

Rulers of Mesopotamia, living and flourishing during the Early Bronze Ages and situated between the Tigris and the Euphrates (southern Iraq today) the Sumerian civilization was one of the first in the world - right there with the Ancient Egyptians, Ancient Chinese and the Indus Valley.

Most articles I came across would say that the discovery of Sourdough probably came about by accident. But the Sumerians were known for their creativity and fantastic inventions, which we still use today. From writing to the chariot, textile mills to maths, hydraulic engineering and the wheel. Among these wonderful contributions, (and perhaps most important given our topic) was the invention of the plow.

Suddenly there was a boom in agriculture and it’s thanks to that boom that two of the (arguably) best things on the planet were born: Beer + Bread.

In fact, they loved beer so much that they accredited its creation to the gods, used it as form of payment and drank it any chance they got. It wasn’t anything like the beer we know and love today but it was evidently just as good and gave them all the feels. Made from barley (which was baked twice then fermented) it had the consistency of porridge and was drunk through a straw to avoid the hulls that float to the surface - Sort of like how the Argentinians might enjoy a cup of maté.

When I shared this discovery with my mom, her response was, “Well, Iraqi beer really is excellent.” Not biased at all.

It’s impossible to say whether Sourdough bread (as we know it) existed back then, but it is safe to assume that with their knowledge of fermentation, some form of naturally-leavened bread would have been consumed at the time.

By the first century BC, everyone was doing it. The Romans sometimes used a starter made from grape juice and millet to accelerate fermentation; but it was the Greeks who first used it in powder form, making a type of sourdough that was combined with crushed grape juice.

Technically up until the end of the 19th century - when French chemist, microbiologist and silkworm savior Louis Pasteur (more on him below) discovered commercial yeast - all leavened bread was sourdough.

Photo: Neill Frank

“He who does not know beer, does not know good.”

Sumerian Proverb

From the royal tombs of Ur, mosaic made of lapis lazuli and shell, shows peacetime.
Photo: Alma E. Guinness / Alma E.

Today, when most people think of Sourdough, they think of Boudin’s Bakery in San Fransisco.

While legend has it that it was Columbus who first brought sourdough (as we know it today) to America; the truth of the matter is, it probably arrived with French bakers (Boudin being one of them) during the California Gold Rush in 1849 – cementing it in San Franciscan culture, to this day.

A few years later, in 1896, the Gold Rush in the Klondike region of the Yukon (N.W Canada) resulted in a mass-migration of hopefuls from as far as Seattle and, you guessed it, San Francisco. But to reach the gold at the end of this unforgiving rainbow, travelers had to cross Alaska, follow one of two pass trails to the Yukon River, and then sail down from there to where X-marked-the-spot.

According to one Pennsylvanian farmer who joined the mad-rush: All newcomers to the Klondike were referred to as Tenderfoot. But -

Someone with years of mining experience was known as a real Sourdough; this was because experienced miners kept little cans of fermented dough close to their bodies throughout the journey, and by a warm stove in their cabins, as a starter for making biscuits, pancakes and flapjacks (a staple of the rush).

Top Right Image: (Probably) A TENDERFOOT: C. 1850 / California Gold Rush.
Photo: BusyBeta

(Probably) A REAL SOURDOUGH: Klondike Gold Rush miner. Photo: Canadaehx

C. 1900 / Gentleman and prospectors standing at the White Pass & Yukon Railroad Station, Alaska. Photo: Wikimedia Commons

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: WHAT IT IS + WHERE TO START

When my at-home-master-baker (patiently) takes the time to explain the process of how he would make a loaf, his descriptions always included a bunch of numbers: grams, milliliters, percentages, tepid water, room temperature water, level of hydration. This eventually got upgraded to eye-ball-measurements and descriptions of feel and the texture of the dough. Then there was the type of flour you should or shouldn’t use to make a mild or more acidic loaf, not to mention all the time the dough is just sitting there “resting”, waiting for it to rise. It was all too much.

But when you reel all that back in, you’ll find that Sourdough bread is made up of about two main components and roughly three steps.

Component 1: THE MOTHER

Also goes by:
Starter / Chief / Chef / Head / Poolish / Levain

Whatever you call it, this is the pre-ferment mix from which every loaf
you make will come. All you’ll need to get started (pun totally intended)
is Flour, Water and Patience.

Like Gizmo from the Gremlins, the natural yeast and bacteria found in the flour
comes to life as soon as it comes into contact with water. Before you know it, you’re roomies with a bubbling, breathing jar of goodness that has a lot to say for itself.

Timeframe:
3-4 hours to come to life
5-6 days to develop a personality

Requirements:
Equal parts Flour + Water
A clean jar
A reminder to feed and water your starter every day for about 5-6 days.

How to do it:

• On the day of conception, set yourself up with a clean jar.

• Add equal parts of flour and water and mix well.

• Then, leave it alone for 12 hours (covered with a cloth), or 24 hours (in a sealed jar).

• Your mother will begin to ferment after her first feeding, and will continue to ferment between every meal hereafter.

• Repeat this for 5-6 days and you should find that at the end of this cycle, you have a healthy, active starter that is ready for work.

• It is at this stage, that your starter officially graduates to levain. Now, you can take some of this starter for your bread (recipe dependent) and whatever remains at the bottom of your jar will need to be fed and allowed to rest in the fridge for your next loaf.

component 2: The Bread

Also goes by:
Slices of heaven / the loaf

Now that your starter has been brought to life, it can get to work to produce
the one thing we’re all here for.

What you’re essentially doing is replacing the sad little packet of dried yeast
you’ve got stashed at the back of your fridge or freezer, with the wild yeast you’ve
spent the last 6 days caring for.

Timeframe:
Roughly 12 hours to overnight

Requirements:
A little bit of your starter
Your bread recipe
A proofing basket
A baking tray or oven-friendly pot
A good oven

How to do it:

• Take a little bit of your starter and add it to your bread recipe (as you would dry yeast) — Top up the leftover starter in the jar, place it in the fridge for your next bake.

• Mix your starter into your recipe well then leave your dough alone for 6-8 hours so she can rise.

• Once she has risen, place her into the proofing basket, cover her and into the fridge she goes for another 12 hours or so. After this, she will be ready for baking.

• Bake it for 40 minutes,

The end result will not only be healthy for you, but has a low-glycemic index - making it great for digestion, and diabetics.

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Start with: Some of your starter

Step 1: Mix it into your bread recipe

Step 2: Fold, rest & proof

Step 3: The end product

Bonus step: Slather with butter and gorge on every crumb

Although the method and ingredients to creating your starter remains (roughly) the same, every starter created will be unique to its environment. A starter in Canada, will be very different in its traits to the one that’s living in Dubai. According to one study*, even the microbes on your hands will mirror the microbes in your starter; adding to it’s individuality.

The more you feed it, the stronger and more active it gets and the longer it lives; the longer it lives, the more robust and flavourful it becomes — Your mother will even tell you when she’s hungry. For example, if left in the fridge too long without being fed, a thin layer of alcohol called the Hooch, will develop and sit on top of your starter. The longer you wait, the darker in colour the hooch becomes.

A popular slang for liquor, Hooch is cheap, illegally made or acquired alcohol of poor quality, and it is said to have originated from the Hoochinoo Indians of Alaska. The tribe had a reputation for intoxication and were the source of illegal liquor which they distilled themselves from ingredients like molasses.

Some people prefer to scoop this layer off; others just mix it right back in, before feeding their mother again. Neither method is good or bad, they’ll just give you slightly different results. If you choose the latter method, the acidity from the alcohol will help give you a tangier, slightly more sour starter. (This is one of many, many methods to achieve a more sour dough).

The good news is, once you’ve Dr. Frankensteined-it and established a healthy starter, a mature mother will be extremely difficult to kill.

She will also create an environment that is super hardy and resistant to any invading bacteria — if taken care of properly, she can and will outlive you. But! If you do see any mold, orange or pink tints or streaks on your starter, this means your mother hasn’t successfully created a hostile enough environment, and unwanted-bacteria have managed to get in. If this happens, mourn your loss and when ready, start over.

There are many factors to always keep in mind (feeding schedule, hydration, flour types, etc), but as daunting as the process might seem, once you get through that first week of creating and establishing your mother, it’s just a matter of experimenting and perfecting the recipe to your perfect loaf.

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: A LITTLE [MORE] HISTORY

I would be remiss to overlook the two people (other than the Sumerians) who helped us better understand the science and know-how behind the one thing that’s seemingly taken the COVID baking-world by storm: Antoine-Augustin Parmentier and Louis Pasteur.

Antoine Parmentier was an 18th century humanitarian, nutrition-fanatic and military pharmacist who served in the Seven Years' War against Prussia. He was captured early on in the war and as a p.o.w was fed a vegetable the French only fed their pigs; but one that is loved the world over today: the Potato.

He went on to be a solid advocate of the vegetable, promoting its nutrition and versatility; and he did this with some great guerilla marketing:

On one occasion he hired and placed armed guards around his potato patch during the day. At night, he would relieve the guards of their duty so that people in the area could steal his potatoes.

Parmentier’s main purpose in life revolved around agriculture, nutrition, and public health; studying the ways of preserving food (which included heat-sterilization as well as refrigeration). It comes as little surprise then, that in 1779, he was asked to teach at the Free School of Bakery, which was founded by the Parisian Head of Police ( the aim: stabilizing Paris’ food supply - Given the high cost of bread, its poor quality and the famine that swept across the country).

As a result, while making his way across France (for research), Parmentier learned that the poor quality of the loaves produced was due to faulty procedures and inappropriate methods in milling wheat. This eventually led him to consider other ways and sources for improvement. He tested different wheat varieties, corn and vegetables, especially the one he was relentlessly advocating: potatoes. He eventually discovered that you could use the potato’s dry stems to make flour, which will successfuly produce potato bread.

Although I couldn’t find the exact recipe, Antoine Parmentier was a prolific writer, documenting his life, learnings and successes, so it comes as no surprise that sources say he left detailed instructions on how to produce Sourdough bread using potato flour. Today there are many dishes named after Parmentier; and you can be certain that any dish with his name in it will contain potato in some form.

Some decades later…

Louis Pasteur was a French chemist who dedicated his life to research. A master of experimental research, Pasteur was described to be an extremely serious, humourless man, obsessed with his work. Known for his discoveries of the principles of vaccines, microbial fermentation and pasteurization; he was the father of commercial yeast. He also had his own newspaper.

In the 19th century, silk farmers in France were facing great losses due to two types of infections in their worms; which prevented the larvae from rolling their silk fibers to make their cocoons. Pasteur not only discovered this was hereditary, but he developed a technique that allowed the examination and removal of the contaminated eggs, preventing further infections. The silkworm community rejoiced, and their farmers thrived once again.

His focus on such diseases led him to study other fermented products like vinegar, wine and beer.

Pasteur’s focus on beer, however, was fueled primarily by his anger at the fact that France lost the Franco-Prussian war. As a result, he made it his goal to increase scientific knowledge and study on the one thing the Germans hold near and dear to them. He thought doing this will put France on top, as a leader of the beer industry.

Pasteur was the first to demonstrate that fermented drinks are the result of live yeast turning sugar into alcohol; and that the process occurs where there is no oxygen. Without fermentation, yeast can’t multiply, and to produce alcohol you need the yeast to be very much alive and kicking.

Thanks to the Sumerians we know that the same yeast that makes beer, makes bread; the difference lies in the process of production. In both instances the yeast behaves in exactly the same way: it indulges in the carbs from the grains and as a result, produces carbon dioxide and alcohol. For beer, this is exactly what we want. When it comes to bread, it’s the CO2 produced by the yeast that takes center stage: creating the light and airy pockets Sourdough bread is famous for.

Louis Pasteur’s work on beer and fermentation confirmed germ theory, leading him to isolate many funguses, one of which he called “yeast”. From the Greek word for “boil”, all yeast out in the world is extremely diverse. Travelling and mingling with all sorts of different bacteria. And while both wild yeast and Pasteur’s isolated yeast produce bread; wild yeasts does so at a slower pace allowing for a depth in flavour. Louis Pasteur’s yeast, on the other hand, sacrifices everything for speed and ease.

So although more and more of us today are promoters of Sourdough starters and bread; our modern understanding of fermentation and how to use it to our advantage is because of Louis Pasteur’s passive aggression at losing the Franco-Prussian war - leading him to shed light on the star of the Sourdough world: Yeast and fermentation.

Antoine-Augustin Parmentier (1737-1813). Photo: Wikipedia

Louis Pasteur (1822 - 1895). Photo: Wikipedia

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Links and resources:

Quora / Sumer: Wikipedia / Sumerian inventions / Bappir / Antoine Parmentier 1 / Antoine Parmentier 2/ Louis Pasteur 1 / Louis Pasteur 2 / Yeast, Fermentation & Beer / Beer, Yeast and Louis Pasteur / Ancient History: Beer / Sourdough More than Bread / Sourdough History/ Klondike Gold Rush / * Sourdough Hands / Origin of Hooch / California Gold Rush / American Bread History / Gold Rush Miners and Sourdough Starters / The Dusty Apron: Louis Pasteur / Review: A history of research on yeasts 2: Louis Pasteur and his contemporaries, 1850±1880 by James A. Barnett / The Studies on Fermentation: The Diseases of Beer, Their Causes, and the Means of Preventing Them. Louis Pasteur / Gold Rush Grub: From Turpentine Stew to Hoochinoo / Klondike: The Last Great Gold Rush, 1896-1899 / Jamie Wizniak: Antoine-Augustin Parmentier paper / Rise & Fall of Ancient Bread / Stampeders, Sourdoughs & Chechakos Recipes / Handbook on Sourdough Biotechnology / Science Alert / Feeding France: New Sciences of Food, 1760-1815 / Artisan Bryan: the Ultimate Sourdough Guide /