This week-end, I’m heading to Spain in the tracks of the Hairy Bikers for my attempt at their Pan Rustico (virtually, that is, since we’re all in coronavirus lockdown). Think of it as a kind of sourdough for those who don’t want the faff of maintaining a starter: basically, you make a flour, yeast and water mix and leave it to ferment for 24 hours, which you then use in the same way you would a sourdough starter. It avoids all the messing around with keeping the starter fed for a week and gives results that are not dissimilar. You get a bread that’s really soft and aerated, with a nice crust, perfect for a soup or a salad-and-cheese kind of lunch.

Here in the UK, a giant lockdown-induced rise in home bread-making has meant that you can’t buy flour at the moment: apparently, the problem isn’t that the millers can’t mill the stuff but that they’re used to selling to bakeries in bulk, and they’re struggling to get retail packaging for small quantities. Fortunately, I’ve been making bread for a few months now and I’d just placed my three-monthly order from buywholefoodsonline.co.uk when the crisis hit. But the selection of flours in the house is a bit idiosyncratic, so I used wholemeal spelt flour rather than the wheat flour in Si and Dave’s recipe. As it happens, I think that was a win – but that’s for you to decide.

To make bread for lunch, you’ll need to make your starter first thing in the morning the day before; you’ll then make the actual bread on the day.

I’m going to be honest, here: I’m not sure how particularly Spanish the results are… But it was lovely bread anyway!

Starter:

• 150 ml warm water
• 1tsp sugar
• 1tsp dried yeast
• 125g strong white flour

It’s the usual bread-making drill: dissolve the sugar and yeast in the warm water, give it 10 minutes or so to start frothing, then mix in the flour. Leave the whole lot for 24 hours.

The main action:

• 200 ml warm water
• 1 tsp sugar
• 1 tsp dried yeast
• 225 g strong white flour, plus lots more for your board
• 100g wholemeal spelt flour
• 1 tsp salt
• 1 tbsp olive oil, plus a bit more for greasing your bowl

Before you start, choose a bowl in which you’re going to prove your bread and grease it with olive oil. Also preheat an oven to 50℃: as soon as it gets to temperature, switch it off.

1. Start with same drill as before: dissolve the yeast and sugar in the warm water and leave it for 10 minutes.
2. Meanwhile, mix your flours and the salt.
3. Once your wet mix is frothing nicely pour it into the dry mix and add the starter dough you made the previous day, as well as the olive oil. Mix thoroughly with a wooden spoon.
4. Spread generous amounts of flour over your board or other surface and transfer your dough to it. Knead the dough for 5-10 minutes until it’s very elastic, then form into a ball and put it in your oiled bowl. You want to do a lot of stretching and folding in your kneading process, because you’re trying to get air into the dough. If your bowl has a lid, use it now; otherwise, cover it with cling film.
5. Now let the bread rise. This takes about an hour if you do it using the “preheat an oven to 50℃ and switch it off” method; if you’re doing something different like using a boiler room or airing cupboard, I can’t guess… Wait for the bread to have risen nicely, and I’m not even going to attempt to define accurately what that means.
6. Choose a baking tray and cut out a piece of baking paper to put on it.
7. Shove some more flour onto your surface and carefully transfer your dough to it – keeping it in one piece as best you can. Now stretch and fold it a few times: what you’re trying to do is to get more air into it, and to stretch the ends and pull the surface tight, tucking the dough under (this is easier than it sounds). Form your dough into your favourite shape (a ball? and rugby ball?) on your lined baking tray. If you want the traditional pattern on the top, slash a few gashes in it.
8. Now leave your bread to prove. If you have a double oven, put the bread back into the one you used for its first rise, and warm the other one up to 240℃. If you have a single one, you’ll have to find somewhere else that’s warm to do the proving (or be patient if it’s at a cold room temperature).
9. I always struggle with knowing whether the bread has proved the right amount, so I’m not going to proffer advice here either. With me, 40 minutes was plenty enough.
10. Bake for about 20 minutes. Take out and cool on a rack.

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• Food