Accidental success with olive bread

This weekend I ended up with some of the best olive bread I've ever tasted, through a completely accidental process.

The first accident was that I needed to refresh a neglected rye starter. I made a whole lot of it then, rather than throwing out the excess, I mixed it with some all purpose flour. The proportions were 225 g rye starter at 100% hydration, 500 g all purpose flour, 350 g water and 1 1/2 t Kosher salt. After bulk proofing I tossed the dough in the refrigerator for a couple days because I like my bread really sour.

Then, my 3 1/2 year old grandson showed up and reminded me I was supposed to make olive bread with him. So we used the dough to do this, flattening it out and pressing in 1 c pitted olives (I used a combination of Greek green olives and Kalamatas) of which some where left whole and some cut in half at his direction, plus 3/4 t dried Herbes de Provence and 1 t chopped lemon zest. We stretched-and-folded to mix in the ingredients, proofed in bannetons for about 3 hours until doubled, then baked in dutch ovens at 475 degrees, covered the first 25 minutes then uncovered to brown.

The result was wonderful, really tart and zesty. I think, along with the long fermentation and the rye starter, mixing in the olives at the last minute was a key to our success. Who knows what would have happened to the dough if it spent 2 days in the presence of the salty olives?

The official recipe is on my blog, here: http://burntmyfingers.com/2015/05/26/recipe-olive-bread-with-rye-starter/