How to Make Potato Water
I found these directions at Mother Earth News:
A simple, economical leavening can be made from potato water. Once you've
established
the starter you can maintain it indefinitely without further addition of
yeast, and it's available
whenever the whim strikes you to get up to your elbows in dough.
Here are the nine steps farm housewives use to make bread by this old-fashioned method.
[1] To establish the starter, save the water from boiled potatoes...or
better, cook a potato and
mash it in its own liquid. Pour the water into the container you plan to
use permanently
(a quart jar is good). Next, dissolve a package of dry yeast in a quarter
of a cup of warm water
and pour the solution into the potato liquid. Add two tablespoons of sugar
and fill the jar with warm
water, leaving an inch or more of empty space at the top. (Remember that
warmth causes the yeast
to work rapidly, but too high a temperature will kill the organisms.) Stir
the mixture.
[2] Let the starter stand for about eight hours.
[3] Just before bedtime, mix your sponge: Pour the starter into a deep
pan or pail, leaving a little
(a layer about 1-1/2" deep) in the bottom of your quart jar. Add two cups
of water to the mixture
in the pan and stir in flour to form a thin batter about the right consistency
for pancakes. Cover the
sponge and let it stand all night. Before you put away the starter that
remains in the quart jar, add a
tablespoon of salt (as preservative) and two tablespoons of sugar (as food
for the yeast). Keep the
container in a cupboard , not in the refrigerator.
[4] It's a good idea to mix your bread early in the morning so that it'll
have plenty of time to rise
during the day. Four loaves of bread require two and a half pounds of flour.
Some types make better
bread than others...each farm wife experimented until she found a brand
that worked well for her.
Whatever kind you use, buy it when you find it on sale to keep costs to
a minimum. Like the
old-time housewife, you can mix your dough in a dishpan. After pouring the
flour into the
container, add a rounded tablespoon or more of lard for each loaf followed
by two tablespoons
of sugar and one of salt (for four loaves). Then wash your hands thoroughly
and use your fingers
and thumb to rub the lard into some of the flour until the fat is in flakes.
Make a rounded, bowl-shaped
impression in the powder and pour the sponge into the hollow. Stir the flour
mixture into the sponge,
pulling the flour in from the edges of the pan and trying to keep the sponge
away from the sides and
bottom as long as possible to prevent sticking. As the mixture begins to
stiffen, dust your hands
lightly with flour and start mixing with a kneading motion. (Pick up the
edges of the paste,
fold them toward the middle and press them into the mass with the heels
of the hands.)
A light flouring on the sides and bottom of the pan will relieve the stickiness,
and dough
that clings to the bowl and your fingers can be rubbed off with flour and
kneaded into the main
mass. In the past, mothers taught their daughters the desirable consistency
for bread dough.
Those of you who missed out on that kind of instruction should bear in mind
that the final ball
must be just as soft as possible and yet smooth on the outside. A mixture
that's too soft will
be sticky and won't form into a sleek glob. Your efforts toward shaping
up a smooth ball of dough
will be helped if you continue to dust the mass lightly with flour as you
work. Until the ingredients
are thoroughly blended they'll stick to the pan and yet feel stiff to the
hands. In the course of the
mixing add warm water as needed—about half a cup a at a time— by making
a small basin in the
dough to receive the liquid. Then fold the edges of the mound into the water
from all sides.
Avoid getting the outside of the ball wet, as this will cause further sticking.
Although much has been said about the importance of kneading for long periods,
farm wives
made very good bread without timing the process. The goal was—and is—to
mix the ingredients well
and to coax the dough into a soft, smooth ball. When you begin to feel air
in the mass,
it's approaching the right consistency. After the paste has reached the
desired state, turn the round
over— the smoothest part will be underneath— grease it with cooking oil
or melted lard to prevent
drying and cover the dishpan with a clean kitchen towel. Let the dough rise
until it's two or three
times its original size. This is likely to take about three hours...perhaps
longer
[5] When the dough has risen, punch it down by kneading it briefly to restore
it to approximately
its original mass. Again form it into a smooth ball and grease the surface.
Cover the bread-to-be
and let it rise a second time for about two hours or until it's once more
two or three times its
original size.
[6] Punch the dough down again, shape it into four smooth loaves and grease
the outsides.
Place the bread in baking pans...two 8" X 10" X 2" containers, with two
loaves in each,
will be about right. Let the dough rise as before.
[7] If you want to make rolls or cinnamon buns, reserve as much dough
as would go into one
loaf of bread and knead in two tablespoons of melted lard and two tablespoons
of sugar. For rolls,
shape the paste into balls about the size of a small egg and place them
in a pan to rise.
To make cinnamon buns, spread the dough half an inch thick with a rolling
pin and sprinkle
it generously with sugar, cinnamon, butter or margarine. Curl the sheet
up like a jelly roll and
cut it into slices one-half to three-quarters of an inch thick. Place the
little spirals in
a greased pan to rise.
[8] When the bread dough is quite light, bake it in an oven preheated
to 350° for about an hour (20
minutes at 375° in the case of rolls). Adjust the heat as the baking
proceeds...reduce the
temperature if the crust seems to be browning too fast, raise it if you
see that the loaves
won't be well browned at the end of an hour.
[9] When you remove the loaves or rolls from the oven, grease them with
butter or margarine,
cover them with a dish towel and let them stand until they're cool. Then
store them in a bread bin
with a tight cover, or in plastic bags. When you want to bake again, fill
the starter jar with
potato water, add two tablespoons of sugar, let the mixture stand for eight
hours and proceed
as before. That's the advantage of homemade leavening: It's always on hand,
ready to serve you
whenever you decide to spend a satisfying day with warmly bulging dough
and the fragrance
of newly baked bread.