Homemade grissini with sourdough

• 3 hours to activate the sourdough starter • 3 hours to leaven • Serves 4

Sourdough again!

Last summer, while I was on vacation, my beloved sourdough passed away.
When I was back, after two weeks, I tried to save it, but it was too late. Since then, I had been without sourdough and, honestly, I missed it a lot.
Even if feeding it takes some time, it's nice having some at home, because it really pushes you to make pizza, or bread. Otherwise, if you don't use it, sourdough will simply go wasted.

Finally, last week, a friend of mine gave me some brand new sourdough, and I couldn't be happier. We named it Bert, and now it is Nina's task feeding it each weekend.

Today I give you a recipe very useful to exploit the fresh sourdough starter, if you have more than necessary for your pizza: homemade grissini!
It takes a little time (basically you need it knead it and make it raise several times throughout the day), but it's definitely worth it. Full credit for this amazing recipe goes to Roberta. Grazie!!

Here are ingredients for a 4-serving recipe (16 grissini):

200 g flour 00
100 g fresh sourdough starter
110 ml warm water
20 ml EVO oil
4 g salt
Maldon salt flakes

1. The first thing to be done is to activate the sourdough. To prepare the fresh, active sourdough, you need 50 g of mature starter, 50 g of extra flour, 50 g of water (better if sparkling). Mix the sourdough with water and flour until you obtain an homogeneous dough. Place it in a clean jar,  close it hermetically, and wait for it to mature for about 3 hours
2. Once the sourdough is active and full of bubbles, take 100 g of fresh sourdough starter, and pour it into a large bowl, together with the warm water and the EVO oil. Stir well until it melts in the water
3. In another bowl, mix the flour with the salt
4. Mix the two bowls together until uniformly moist. Knead if necessary
5. Loosely cover the bowl with plastic wrap and let it sit for 10 minutes at room temperature
6. After this time has passed, knead the dough again very quickly, keeping it inside the bowl. Repeat other 2 times every 10 minutes, then let it raise for 1 hour, covered with plastic wrap
7. Then, take the dough. Generously dust the counter with flour. Very gently lay the dough across your fists and carefully stretch it by bouncing the dough in a circular motion on your hands, carefully giving it a little stretch with each bounce. Once the dough has expanded outward, move to a full toss
8. When the dough is stretched out to your satisfaction, arrange it in a rectangular shape, about half centimeter thick, and let it sit for 15 minutes
9. When this time has passed, cut it into 1-cm wide stripes. Stretch each grissino by pulling it at the ends, and place it on a baking tray covered with baking paper. Let them raise for 2 hours
10. Preheat oven to 270°C (or, better, as far as oven temperatures go) for 30 minutes
11. Place a bowl full of water on the bottom of the oven, and plce some Maldon salt on top of grissini. Bake grissini for about 20 minutes, or until they become golden
12. Remove them from the oven and transfer them to a grill until chill. Serve and enjoy!

Nutrition Facts are detailed in the table below. Data is provided per serving.