History of Sourdough and Leavening

Sourdough, as a leavening agent, is in its moment right now. This ancient form of leavening is easier to digest and better for gut health than commercial bread. The longer fermentation process makes its nutrients more available to our bodies. Have you ever wondered about the history of sourdough and leavening agents? 

Early humans, who were always looking for a bite to eat, discovered that grains treated somehow were a good source of nutrients for the body. The oldest bread record was found in Çatalhöyük, Jordan, and they dated it to around 8,600 years old. This fertile crescent development gave rise to some of the earth’s first civilizations. 

In Asia, the prominent grain would have been rice, which they could make digestible by steaming, boiling, or fermentation. In the Americas, where maize was the primary grain, the people followed Nixtamalization (the cooking and steeping of maize in water mixed with an alkaline solution). This process takes many forms among different groups. Still, all require an interaction of the grain with an alkalizing element, making the nutrients in that grain more available to the body. Some tribes in North America used soda ash from their fires. The chemical reaction in soda ash is where our modern-day baking soda originates.

Our modern-day yeast came to us from the Sumerians in what is now modern-day Iraq. They discovered that capturing the beer foam as a by-product of the brewing process would make the dough rise.  

The Egyptians were the first to record their farming practices, and we got the first evidence of sourdough. They documented that if the conditions were right and you let the dough sit, it would make the dough rise and make it even easier to digest and taste delicious. The conditions were not always right to capture this airborne yeast, so they needed a way to replicate it. They found they could retain a portion of the dough from a batch that had successfully risen, which would consistently make the dough rise. Sourdough was born. 

We can thank the French bakeries for artisan sourdough rolls. The steam during the bake gives the crust a great texture. The crust protects the inner loaf and helps keep your inner dough softer for longer. 

When the gold rush started in California and San Francisco was a boom town, french bakeries discovered that the air in San Francisco was ideal for making sourdough. The tang of sourness was then given as a nickname for all the gold miners that flooded California during this time, both for their preference of using sourdough in their cooking and for their dispositions in general.