from Tracey G.

Ever since I bought my King Arthur Flour Fresh Sourdough Starter last fall, I’m always looking for a way to not have to throw away the “discard” when I feed it. It just makes me crazy to remove all but 4 oz, and just throw it away if I don’t have anything to do with it. This recipe for Sourdough Crackers from KAF fills the bill perfectly AND easily!

It’s a very simple recipe – and very made-to-your-taste since the 2 tbsp of dried herbs called for in the recipe are left entirely up to you and what you want! I couldn’t make up my mind, so I used the Pizza Dough Flavor I bought online from King Arthur Flour for other purposes, lol, like pizza dough, and a bit of dried basil. The rest of the ingredients called for include: whole wheat flour or white whole wheat flour, salt, butter and sourdough starter. The extras are some oil to brush with and sea salt to sprinkle on – I actually used kosher salt because that was all I had and it worked wonderfully.

It comes together very easily, and makes an easy dough to work with when it’s time to roll it out. For some reason I thought it was going to be long and tedious – I couldn’t have been more wrong, it went so easily! And fast – I had it all done within about and hour to hour and 15 min – and 30 minutes of that was chilling the dough. I can say I will definitely make these again, but I will get myself a rolling pastry wheel/pizza cutter, it was a little tough cut them with a knife, but certainly not tough enough to keep me from making them again, and soon because I can’t seem to stay out them and they are dwindling fast!

I had one crazy scary mishap though… I pulled my sourdough starter out of the refrigerator, took what I needed for my crackers, and then measured out what was left for feeding. I fed my starter first, so that was taken care of. Next, got the dough made and set to chill. When that was done, I pulled the dough out and turned on the oven while I was rolling it out and getting it ready to bake. I opened the oven to pop the crackers in and was horrified to discover I’d forgotten that that is where I’d put my starter to do its thing – and now it was in the preheated oven!!!! I donned my oven mitts and grabbed it out so fast! The edges cooked to sides of the bowl, but the middle was still goopy – and not too hot. I crossed my fingers, scooped that bit out and set it aside to see if it still lived. And it did! I was so happy to see it bubbling away – so instead of discarding when I fed it today (I decided to keep it out of the fridge for a day or two to feed it back into good health, lol), I made it into 2 batches of starter in case I had a real tragedy the next time – this way I’ll have a backup in the refrigerator!

So, if you’ve got some sourdough starter in the refrigerator and wonder what to do with the unfed discard, this recipe is a great way to use it! And if you want to try getting some Sourdough Starter (or making your own starter) , let me say it’s a fun project to have, and the King Arthur Flour blog, Flourish, has lots of Sourdough Starter information! All you have to do is search “sourdough starter” or even just “sourdough”!

Here’s are a couple of links to get you started should you want some more information on maintaining it:

Maintaining Your Sourdough Starter

Making Your Own Sourdough Starter

from Kris B.

Here in Texas we seem to have gone directly from a very mild winter to summer.  We had a day in the nineties this week.  For me, that means that it is too hot to cook or eat heavy meals.  It’s salad time!  Unfortunately, the crops missed the memo saying that summer was coming early and the fresh seasonal fruits and veggies are not ready yet.  So, I have been on the lookout for light fare to accompany simple garden salads for lunch and dinner.  Enter King Arthur Flour’s recipe for Pirozhki (Stuffed Buns).

Pirozhki means “small pie.”  Traditionally, they are stuffed with meat, usually beef as is the case with this recipe from KAF, and they are glazed with an egg wash to create their characteristic golden color.

The dough for the Pirozhki consists of the usual suspects, all-purpose flour, yeast, salt, sugar, and water; added to that is butter, eggs, sour cream, and King Arthur Flour’s Vermont Cheese Powder.  I did not have any of the Vermont Cheese Powder, so I substituted parmesan cheese.  Since I have never used the Vermont Cheese Powder in anything before, I’m not sure what the effect of this substitution on the recipe really is.  I can say that the dough is delicious as I made it!!

Speaking of dough…I made it using the dough hook on my stand mixer.  The dough comes together easily and handles well.  Though the overall process for making the Pirozhki is simple, it takes some time because the dough requires three periods of rest; the first is 90 minutes, though mine took a little longer; the second happens after the dough is divided into sixteen 2 oz. balls and is only fifteen minutes; and the third one, an hour, comes after the balls are flattened, filled and seamed like dumplings.

The filling, which consists of ground beef, onion, garlic, parsley, cheese, and the seasoning of your choice, can be made during the initial rise of the dough; or, it can be made in advance and stored in the refrigerator until you are ready to use it.  Most of the time I do not read the recipe reviews on the King Arthur website before I make a recipe, but this time, for some reason, I did.  Overall, the recipe received overwhelmingly positive reviews, but two things kept coming up.  The first was that the 8oz. of ground beef called for in the recipe did not make enough filling for the sixteen Pirozhki and that the filling was a little bland.  Armed with that information, and because I had a pound of ground beef, I made and used the full pound, adjusting the other ingredients as necessary.  Having done that and seeing the amount of filling that I put into each Pirozhki, I think having used only half the amount of meat would have made for a disappointing final product.

I was lazy when it came to addressing the complaints about the bland flavor of the filling.  I’m still trying to catch up after my daughter’s wedding last Sunday and we have an elderly dog who is spending the weekend in ICU because of heart issues so my brain did not want to think about which spices to use and their amounts so I just added a little Season-All and called it done.  That said, we all enjoyed the final product and I will definitely make these again.  Next time, I’ll give my full attention to flavoring the filling!

As I said above, this recipe makes sixteen Pirozhki.  I am going to freeze a good number of mine and take them to school for lunch.  A few minutes in the microwave or toaster oven should make them almost as good as hot out of the oven!

Pirozhki (Stuffed Buns)