Sourdough bread fanatics have creative names for the starter that forms the foundation for their tangy pastries — Jane Doe, Bread Pitt, Leonardough da Vinci.
Orlando Pagán, executive chef at Wild Common, has never given his starter a name, but his starter has been his companion for longer than many marriages last.
Pagán was born in Puerto Rico and spent several years cooking in “sourdough central,” San Francisco. While he was there — sometime around 2011 — a friend gave him a portion of her own starter, which she told him she had for decades.
When Pagán relocated to Charleston in 2017, he brought the starter with him.
“I dehydrated it by spreading it very thin over parchment and leaving it at room temperature for a day or two,” Pagán said. “It became like a dry paper and then I stored it in a glass jar and I packed it. I have some right now in my freezer drawer just in case of an emergency.
“But the rest, once I got to Charleston, I hydrated it with water and flour. You feed it aggressively two or three times a day until it comes back to life. You just keep an eye on it. There are live organisms in there, so you just have to keep an eye on the bubbles and how happy or sad it is.”
Although Pagán worked with sourdough for years, it wasn’t until the pandemic years that he really began using it in earnest.
“It was the first time as a chef that I had so much time on my hands,” he said. “I made a lot of mistakes and learned from them. For instance, because San Francisco is cold all the time, it takes a little longer to proof the bread than it does here. It was a learning curve and I screwed up a lot. I wanted to develop a recipe that would be a Southern thing, so I developed this recipe that was a blue corn grits sourdough bread. I was so happy with it!”
Pagán began to give the bread to his neighbors until his wife convinced him it was good enough to sell.
“I was baking six loaves a day and we sold 100-plus total to my neighborhood. It was pretty cool. My wife and kids would deliver and leave it on their porches,” he said.
A signature starter
With the end of isolation, Pagán returned to Wild Common, bringing his sourdough with him, seeking to make a new recipe that would become his signature. It took months before he was satisfied.
“We use Carolina Gold Rice. It has kind of a crispy crumb and the inside has a silky kind of mouth-feel because we’ve developed the gluten and the rice has released some of its starch,” Pagán said.
The starter sits in a deli container on the counter at the restaurant, and Pagán feeds it every day but Monday when the restaurant is closed and the starter gets tucked into the refrigerator. Pagán said he or his pastry chef bake four loaves a day, five days a week.
Coworkers or guests have been gifted with a portion of the starter through the years, and Pagán urges them to name their starter.
“It’s pretty funny, the names people come up with. I don’t name my starter — I’m not that crazy,” Pagán said with a laugh.
Pagán’s sourdough may last a lifetime.
“A sourdough starter can last as long as you want it to, as long as you keep it well-fed,” he said, mentioning a vault in Belgium that holds 105 starters from around the world, some rumored to be as old as 500 years in age.
Despite Pagán’s sourdough expertise, he doesn’t eat gluten.
“The last time I ate gluten was in 2012,” he said. “I have MS (multiple sclerosis) and read that the Paleo Diet might be good for me. I do like the smell of bread, though. It takes me back to being a kid in Puerto Rico and getting fresh bread from the bakery every morning.”
Pagán will taste the sourdough bread, but relies on others to critique.
“My biggest critic is my daughter, wife and son. If it’s not good, they’re going to tell me straight up. If they say it’s good, I believe them,” Pagán said.
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