In This Story

One morning in September, I awoke to the smell of stinky feet and rotting garbage. I was elated.

Normally, this might signify a problem. But that day I was making a salt-rising bread starter. That terrible aroma was the sign I’d succeeded. After a few hours of mixing, rising, kneading, and baking, it would be transformed into a cheese-flavored loaf with a tender crumb.

It had taken me weeks to get there. I’d tested myriad recipes, only to stare at one failed starter after another. I knew this might happen. Salt-rising bread (SRB) is notoriously challenging. While the microbes in, say, a sourdough starter are plentiful and predictable, those in an SRB starter are fickle little divas. The ingredients and steps are simple enough; it’s cultivating the elusively specific conditions required by these microbes that can flummox even the most experienced baker. The great James Beard includes a disclaimer before his own recipe in Beard on Bread*: *“It is unpredictable…I am including it in this collection because it is a worthy recipe, but I do so with a warning that you may be disappointed.”

No kidding. I tried starters with cornmeal and potatoes, flour and milk; I placed jars atop warmed ovens, behind refrigerators, in humming water baths. Each time, I’d set the starter out to ferment overnight, only to awake to a lackluster result. I’d started to wonder why I embarked on this quest in the first place.

A healthy SRB starter. Sam O’Brien

I’d been fascinated by SRB ever since I edited Natalie Zarrelli’s article, “The Forgotten Baking Technique That Turns Bacteria Into Delicious, Cheesy Bread,” in 2022 . When I began writing the Bread chapter of the forthcoming *The Gastro Obscura Cookbook (my current project), *I knew SRB needed to be among its recipes. It was just a matter of mastering it.

For her article, Zarrelli had interviewed Jenny Bardwell and Susan Brown, coauthors of Salt-Rising Bread: Recipes and Heartfelt Stories of a Nearly Lost Appalachian Tradition. The book, a combination of recipes and oral histories, traces SRB back to Appalachia at the turn of the 19th century. While the exact science was centuries away, pioneer women knew that pouring scalded milk or boiling water over cornmeal and/or potatoes, then leaving the mixture in a warm place overnight would yield a leaven. Yes, it smelled, but it also created something delicious (TIP: You’ll find the Bardwell SRB recipe here, and mine comes later in the book!)

The root of SRB’s’s odor and the secret to its rise is a bacteria known as Clostridium perfringens. You read that right: This is a bread that relies on bacteria, rather than yeast to rise. And cultivating that bacteria is a tall order; a degree too hot and they’ll die, a degree too cool and they won’t wake up at all. Hence, my recent struggles.

I chose to make my SRB in a Pullman loaf pan, perfect for sandwich bread. Sam O’Brien

Faced with my umpteenth failed starter this fall, I reached out to Bardwell myself. I’d take any advice, try any superstitious ritual (and there are plenty when it comes to SRB).

The answer was surprising: chickpea flour.

While not a traditional ingredient in salt-rising bread, chickpea flour is crucial in other bacteria-risen breads from Turkey, Greece, and Cyprus. Willing to try anything, I added some chickpea flour to my starter recipe, fired up my sous vide, and went to bed.

When I woke up, the kitchen smelled terrible. I grabbed my jar, which had a frothy head and pungent odor, and showed it to my dog, Hoagie. He took one whiff and fled. Success!

After making the sponge, then the dough, then baking, I had two glorious, bacteria-risen loaves. The terrible smell gave way to a delightful, asiago-like aroma. It was savory and satisfying when toasted with a bit of butter; and its cheesy notes made it the perfect breakfast sandwich bread. I’ve been hooked ever since.

I’m still tinkering with the recipe and trying out some variations. I’ve made salt-rising bread croutons (amazing sprinkled on tomato soup) and plan to try out a pizza dough recipe soon.

Was mastering SRB a maddening challenge? Yes. But Beard was right. It is certainly a “worthy recipe.”

• Gastro Obscura covers the world’s most wondrous food and drink. Sign up for our regular newsletter. *