Hi Stephanie - I am with you, I do not care for the sourdough and for some reason, in US is very sour and very popular. I am not a professional baker but based on what I have seen, from grandmothers, learned and experimented, I found that creating a 'stiff biga' works very well - the bread is not only easier to digest but also has fantastic flavour. For the biga I am using 250 ml. filtered water ( no chlorine) + 250 g flour (150 AP, 50 whole grain wheat & 50 rye or any other combination) and 10 g fresh/cake east - mix them well and then keep it in a jar in the fridge for up to two weeks. When I bake bread, I use about 1/3 of my biga that I mix in about 420 ml filtered water for 600g of flour (AP, 00) + 1 tsp of salt (KAF has a fantastic bread salt but you can use any other 'natural' salt and by that, I mean not processed like the kosher salt - the minerals in the salt are good for the bread). I mix first without the salt until flour and biga/water are incorporated, when done, I cover and let it rest for 30-45 min. Then I sprinkle the salt and start the real mixing for about 12-15 min with a stand mixer at low speed and finish with 1 min. a med-high speed - then I let it rest again for 30 min and fold about 45 min. 2/3 times to incorporate more air or I cover and put it in the fridge overnight and start the folding and rising the next day.

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