In 2012, at 50, Sujit Sumitran left a successful corporate job and turned to his primary passion, cooking. Settling down in a scenic, old-world mansion in Goa, he started baking breads, more specifically the sourdough variety, made using a natural starter culture instead of commercially cultivated yeast. After some misses, he gradually developed an intimate understanding of sourdough, became familiar with its vagaries and, along the way, gained fresh insight into life and living.
Soon, Sumitran began baking sourdough breads for friends and family, and teaching others too. He recalls the positive reception from a cross-section of consumers. “My housekeeper, who takes home the extra breads, always comes back for more. Some of my well-travelled, discerning students are hooked to the taste of made-in-India sourdough breads.”
Breads have, over the years, become a breakfast staple in countless Indian households. The growing demand for food free of preservatives and chemicals has, however, put sourdough breads in the spotlight. Having once tasted the difference, many, like Sumitran, are going the extra mile to bake it themselves.
The baking process is lengthy, usually taking 10 days to ready the starter culture and another 20 hours from dough to bread. The natural, airborne wild yeast in the starter culture and the slow-fermented bread-making process impart a subtle tanginess and rich flavour. Additionally, the bread is light on the palate and the body. Sourdough breaks down the phytic acid in the grains and makes the minerals available for absorption by the body.
In India, starters are mostly made using all-purpose flour or wheat flour or a combination of both. “The sourdough made in India is unique for the microbes, water quality and temperature here, and has a character of its own,” says Sumitran.
“Indian bakers have lifted sourdough another notch with their creativity. The varieties of goodies they come up with, with just discarded starter (the top layer that’s removed when adding fresh flour and water each time), is mind-blowing. In a country that has so many ingredients and techniques of cooking, experimentation is in our blood,” he says.
Being a sourdough baker in India is all the more exciting as several marginal farmers are growing native wheat varieties that are ancient, high on flavour and nutrition, and low on wheat protein gluten (gluten-sensitivity is the cause for celiac disease and wheat allergy, among other disorders).
The primal and deeply fulfilling process of making and eating sourdough has fans the world over, and many of them bond over this mutual love, leading to conversations that dissolve the differences between them.
Through a mutual grain exchange, Sumitran has passed on Paigambari — said to be an ancient non-hybrid wheat variety dating back to the Indus Valley civilisation — to a Californian farmer. In return, he has received many historical and geographical mother cultures as gifts. He remains grateful to all those bread gurus, guides and pals who have helped him along the way.
Thanks to the fame and following he earned through social media, Sumitran is one among 15 bakers chosen as part of a sourdough experiment in Belgium, conducted by Puratos, the creators of innovative bakery products and raw materials for bakeries and the patisserie and chocolate sectors.
The participants were shipped flour samples and had to groom their local starters with the foreign flours. At a certain stage the samples were frozen for DNA testing. Of the three breads baked with the cultures, two were sent for professional tasting and microscopic observation.
The results are expected in November.
Back home, the response he has received in the last three years — both for his breads and his classes — points to the growing acceptance for sourdough in India. At his workshops, he singles out the home bakers for their generosity in spreading the word, and the bread itself.
To absorb the experience completely, any beginner should experiment with all the sourdough techniques to arrive at the one they like, he recommends. The sourdough process allows you to be both playful and ponderous.
“The dough is always telling you something, if you are willing to listen,” he says. “It changes from a shaggy, sticky mass to a silky, glutinous cloud. After a certain point, it appears to ‘grow muscles’ and resists being handled. And when it emerges from the oven — as a majestic loaf — you can hear it sing, making a series of crackling sounds.”
And to those who have tasted, sourdough is as lavish as mass-produced slices are dreary.
Vijayalakshmi Sridhar is an independent writer in Bengaluru