davidg618's blog

A few of you may recall a short thread I posted last week describing, with photos, the difference between upward oven spring, and overall expansiion of two loaves made from the same batch of dough, baked coincedentally, wherein the only differences were the slashing patterns used, the loaves positions on the baking stone, and one loaf was loaded approximately one minute, or less after the first.

Today I baked two boules of sourdough, made from the same formula as last week, and, of course, from one batch. I did everything as close as possible to what I did last week. I did use a different starter, but that shouldn't and doesn't effect the outcome.

I made two changes: 1) I loaded the loaves simultaneously, and 2) I slashed the same pattern on both loaves.

The concerns voiced last week were what other things might cause the dramatic difference in oven spring? Uneven oven heat distribution? The first loaf "robbing" heat from the baking stone? uneven steam distribution?

Based on what I experienced today I think last weeks differences were due, for the most part, to the slashing pattern difference. The only slight difference I think today's loaves experienced were minor differences in the slashings' depths and lengths, and I believe the skin on the slightly smaller loaf was drawn tighter than the other loaf. I'm still working on my shaping and slashing skills, but I did the best I could.

Here's the photos, including the before loading pics asked for. I'm satisfied my oven and steaming method are both working fine. I welcome any comments.

David G.

When I started this quest to improve my baking skills, about one year ago, my goals weren't very specific. "Get better at bread baking" was about the best I could do. And "find help" was about as refined as I could codify my approach. Fortunately, I stumbled upon The Fresh Loaf early in my search for that help. I feel I've come a long way in that one year. TFL's members and guests are my inspriation, the helping hand I reach to first, the friends who share my best looking loaves and worst mistakes. I also search far-afield, but my roots are here, still shallow, but growing.

Moreover, I hadn't given a thought beyond, "We'll eat them." to wondering what I'd do with the products of my quest. Since then I've made many more loaves than just the two of us could consume (without becoming well-bloomed, and "doughy" ourselves). I started taking my bread (the best looking loaves) to neighborhood potlucks--our community does a lot of them.  I shared other extras (the second-best-looking loaves) with select neighbors and friends. In the following months, the numbers of loaves shared and neighbors and friends in receipt grew. At Christmas I mailed sourdough loaves, Priority Mail, to select family who whould be honest with me if the bread arrived stale, or was not to their liking. This year i"ll gift loaves to all the family, and some far-distant friends. I'm relied on by neighborhood potluck hosts to bring bread.

Perhaps, the best early advice I received from TFLer's was "Pick a recipe, and practice, practice, practice, and...practice." To date, I'm confident I've got a basic sourdough bread and baguette formulae I trust my new skills to produce reliably and consistently, although I'm still working on shaping and scoring. At the moment, I bake each of them every week or ten days, and I'm working on a third: Jewish Rye. I've shared one loaf, so far, with a close, trusted couple; they rushed out and bought pastrami.

"Practice, practice, practice" has become my mantra.

I've got a slightly more specific goal now, "Build a repertoire of breads I can reliably and consistently produce.". I've got 2 and 1/2  so far. I have more than enough people eager for the output. (Yvonne and I will eat the worse-looking loaves, and the outright mistakes.) I'm havin' fun!

And I can now succinctly state how I might reach that goal: practice, practice, practice.

David G

These two loaves were treated identically through bulk proofing. They were divided into exactly equally portions (737g)  both Preshaped, within 30 secs, rested 15 minutes, shaped, proofed, slashed, and loaded into the oven within one minute of each other.  They were Baked, rotating the loaves positons in the oven--after steaming--and removed within a few seconds of each other.

As you can see in the photographs there is a significant difference in the oven spring realized in each loaf. Three things may have effected the difference.

1. I may have tightened the surface skin on one tighter than the other.

2. I turn off the convection mode during steaming; consequently one side of the oven may be hotter than the opposite side.

3. The different slashing patterns restrain or encourage the oven spring upward.

I'm going to repeat this event, as best I can. (This is our weekly, go-to sourdough bread). I will repeat the different slashings, and reverse the loaves' positions in the oven. Otherwise, I will keep all things identical as best I can.

I've had a recent experience with crust bursting on another bread (entirely different, Jewish Rye); it sensitized me to the effects of slashing, although I've wondered about it in past baking, but I've never experienced such a side-by-side difference.

I'll post the results when I do it again.

David G

Saturday using Rye Sour excess from an earlier baking--3 or 4 days ago--I built more Rye sour, flollowing Greenstein's Secrets of a Jewish Baker; I did stage 3 feeding late Saturday evening, and refrigerated the refreshed sour intending an early Sunday morning bake.

Sunday; early AM: I let the sour come to room temperature (it had nearly doubled overnight, and risen more in the 1 hour warmup. I'd measured 25 oz. of Rye Sour into my hand-mixing bowl, and put the remaining cup of sour in the refrigerator, for another day. I'd previously weighed out the dough's First Clear flour, salt, and yeast.  I was about to pour the dough's water addition into the sour when the phone rang. Five minutes later I was out the door, heading for a local carriage driving show; it's organizer had called and asked my assistance. I couldn't say no. I spent five minutes covering the Rye Sour with plastic wrap, and putting it back in the refrigerator. The rest of the mise en place was left where it sat.

I came home late afternoon, sunburned of face, dusty, weary, and pleased with the day's work. However, I was in no mood to bake bread.

Monday (today) I picked up where I left off. Mixed the dough, and baked two loaves.

Minor differences: obviously the extra twenty-four hours retarding the sour; I restored the salt to the original recipe (I'd reduced it slightly when I made it the first time.), and I made the starch glaze with arrowroot starch instead of corn starch. I use arrowroot starch in lieu of corn startch in most cooking recipes. I find its silkier consistency more to my liking.

The first time I baked Jewish Rye, I had a couple of crust blowouts: unwanted blowouts. (see

I got some good suggestions from other TFLer's, on how to prevent them. I incorporated all (or most) of their suggestions processsing this dough. I scored deeper, and (my idea; a variant of another's suggestion to make them longitudinal) I angled the slashes slightly from being square with the loaves' long axes; and I final proofed until I was certain any further would be over-proofed.

Here's the results, no Grand Canyon bursts!

I am, of course, delighted with the result. I'm certain the crumb will be consistent with the first bake. Thanks again to all those who helped me avoid unwanted crust bursts with this bake--and, hopefully future ones.

There is only one small doubt in my head: did the unplanned retardation influence the absence of unwanted cracking? D**m, I'll just have to bake this formula again, and eliminate the extra 24 hours. Tough, but somebody's got to do it.

David G

Inspired by Shiao-Ping and David (dmsnyder) I decided to try out my new bannetons (bought from SFBI) with two 1-kilo loaves made ala Gerard Rubaud. Rather than copy/scale either of their formulae, I went to the source http://www.farine-mc.com/ and did my own adaptation of Msr. Rubaud's formula. In a phrase...

I messed up!

I made up a quantity of his whole-grain flour mix--10% rye, 30% spelt, 60% Whole Wheat-according to plan; noted his comment he mixed his levain in the same ratio as his final dough: 30% flour mix, 70% All purpose, and proceeded to make my levain entirely fed with the whole-grain flour mix, except for the 18g of seed starter that got it going. Wrong!

The levain contributed 25% of the total flour. Of course it was essentially all whole grain, not the 30/70 split with AP intended. To further exacerbate the error I diligently added 5% more of the flour mix so that now my final dough was 30% whole grain. At 78% hydration the final dough was decidely slack. Applying a zillion French folds, I believe the dough's gluten developed good strength, probably as much as possible, but the dough remained extremely extensible. Nonetheless, I proofed my two basketed boules, and baked them.

And, it was about midway through the early steam cycle my mistake hit me. I went back to the source, and reread Master Baker Gerard's interview. Yep, I'd got it wrong. Bigtime!

The Good News. This bread is tasty! The prefermented rye, spelt, and whole wheat combination lend a distinct flavor unlike anything I've tasted before, but reminiscent of each of them: nutty like spelt, a wheaty base note throughout, and a gentle bite to it all from the rye. I'm going to do it again, rightly, following Shiao-Ping to the letter. But I'm also going to keep this mistake in my formula ecard-file.

David G

I finally invested in a new baking stone, one that fills an oven shelf with only a couple of inches to spare. Now I can make baguettes that approach 18" to 20" in place of the stubby ones I baked before. Consequently, along with sourdough, sticky buns, foccacia, and getting familiar with spelt, I've been baking my own baguette formula that has borrowed heavily from Anis Bouabsa's formula and especially his process, and, in the most recent batch, Peter Reinhart's pain a' l'ancienne procedures. I've made this formula three times, tweaking a little each time, not the ingredients, the procedures. I've nicknamed them "Overnight Baguettes.

Formula for 1000 g finished dough

              All purpose flour    575g    100%

              Water                   414g      72%

              Salt                        12g        2%

              Instant Yeast         1/4 tsp.   ???

I mix all the dry ingredients together in a wide bowl, and add the water. Using a plastic dough scraper I incorporate the water into the dry mix, cover and rest it for one-half hour.I turn the dough out onto a very lightly dusted board and French fold until dough passes the window pane test. Chill (details follow: I tweaked here.). Remove from chiller. Bring to room temperature (details follow: tweak #2). Preshape, rest, shape, and final proof. Preheat oven to 500°F. Pre-steam oven. Load slashed loaves reduce temperature to 450°F immediately. After ten minutes remove steam source (if you can do it safely), vent oven and finish baking.

I did all my mixing with ingredients at room temperature (low seventies-ish) for the first two batches. For the first batch, ala Bouabsa, I left the dough in the refrigerator 21 hours @ 38°F. For the second batch I placed it in our wine closet @ 55°F for seventeen hours. For both batches I did two stretch-and-folds after the first 50 and 100 minutes. These two S&F's leave the dough very elastic and smooth (I think it feels "silky").

In both cases, after I turned out the chilled dough (again, following Bouabsa) I immediately divided the dough into three equal amounts, preshaped, and let the dough rest for one hour.

The first batch's dough increased about one-and-a-half its original volume in the refrigerator. Despite dividing and resting the dough was still chilled when I final-shaped it, and final proofing took two hours and fifeteen minutes.

The second batch's volume tripled in the wine closet (I worried about losing any chance of oven-spring). The dough was particulary puffy after resting an hour (more oven-spring worry). Final proofing took 90 mins. My worries were dispelled in the first ten minutes in the oven. Both batches exhibited good oven-spring, but the flavor of batch #1 was distinctly more bland then batch #2. The crumb of both batches was open, light, and slighty chewy.

I was generally happy with both batches, but the second batch's flavor won out. Whatever flavoring chemistry goes on in retarded dough appeared to work harder at the wine closet's elevated temperature.

Despite the oven-spring experienced in batch #2, I was still worried I was setting myself up for future failures letting the dough triple in volume during its retarded proof at 55°F. I recently broke down and bought Peter Reinhart's  "The Bread Baker's Apprentice". His anecdote about capturing the hearts and minds of his more reluctant students when they are first introduced to pain a' l'acienne dough pushed me to skip to its formula. I was intrigued by his "shock retardation" using ice water to mix the dough.

I mixed the third batch's dough with ice water, and also placed it in the wine closet during its autolyse rest. I checked the dough a couple of times after performing the two S&F, and was a little worried by almost no apparent action. Encouraged by the few little bubbles I could see through the bottom of the plastic container I went to bed, but set the alarm to remove the dough after fifeteen hours chilling. The dough was just short of doubled when removed.  Following Reinhart's directions I let the dough sit, undivided at room temperature (high sixties-ish) for two hours. When I got out of bed the second time the dough was well doubled and the top of the dough was stretched in a couple of places by large gas bubbles. I liked what I saw, and felt.

I divided the dough, preshaped, and let it rest twenty minutes. Following, I shaped, and final-proofed for ninety minutes (I use a poke test to decide proofing status, but I keep track of time too.) Baking proceeded as described above.

The results:

We are delighted with the flavor, and crumb! This is going to be our "go to" baguettes: no more tweaking. 

David G

I've been baking artisanal bread only eight months. TFL has been my primary mentor, and inspiration. Prior, I baked bread, weekly, in our Zojirushi bread machine, dutifully turning out three loaves of sandwich white bread, or 40% whole wheat sandwich bread: machine kneaded and proofed, oven baked. For hearth-baked breads we sought out commercial bakeries--San Antonio in the winter months, eastern Connecticut in the summers. On rare occasions I'd buy a packaged bread mix, and bake it in our Zo; we were usually dissapointed.

Yesterday, I was rumaging around in a cupboard, looking for something. I didn't find what I was looking for, because far in the back I found a long-forgotten bread mix: 9 Grain, Hodgson Mill, at least a year old, likely even more ancient. Let me quickly add, I have never been employed by nor reimbursed in any way by Hodgson Mill--I don't even know what state they call home. Neither is it my intention to write this post to praise their mix, but as things turned out...

For the moment, I forgot what I'd been looking for. The bread mix caught my full attention. I opened it; the sealed-cellophane enclosed flour appeared bug free--hard to tell for certain among the ground seed specks scattered throughout. I was doubtful, however, about the yeast packet enclosed; I searched for a date stamp, but found none, and the label's ink looked...well, faded. I briefly considered tossing it all in the waste bin; my Yankee frugalness kicked in, and I considered saving the scant four cups of flour mix to incorporate into one of my future loaves.

Finally, I decided to just make it.

I got out the bread machine--we still use it every third or fourth week--to make our favorite sandwich breads, but it no longer has its own place on the kitchen counters. I tossed out the yeast packet, and substituted a tsp. and one-half from our freezer-kept IDY, known to be fresh. I put the machine on dough cycle, and bulk proofed the dough an additional forty-five minutes, for a total of one hour and fifty minutes. I panned it, and let it rise until slightly more than doubled, slashed it and baked it at the recommended 350°F. Other than replacing the yeast, extending the bulk-proofing time, slashing the top, and steaming for the first ten miuntes I followed the manufacturer's directions.

Nothing unrecognizeable (nor unprouncable) in the ingredients. I toasted two pieces this morning, and added a bit of butter and a dab of honey. Mmmm-m-m-m!

So what's the point?

For me, it was a reminder, and a little lesson in humility. I don't have to go to the obsessive degree I do to have good bread. Tasty and nutritious home-made bread is within reach of anyone willing to take a very few steps beyond grabbing a loaf in the bread aisle. I choose to bake because it's fun, and I get an ego boost proportional to the loaves' oven spring, its flavor, and my family's and friend's praises. But at the end of the day, I'm only doing what my ancestors have done, at times with only their hands for tools, and an open fire: baking our daily bread.

David G.

I've been reading a lot lately about Spelt flour. My interest was sparked by a seemingly Spelt flour interest-spike among TFLer's, and that I've never baked with Spelt. I've also been wanting to create a 40% Whole Wheat sandwich sourdough bread. We routinely bake a pan-shaped 40% whole wheat straight dough, we're very happy with; however, I wanted a similar, but free-form baked sourdough primarily for grilled sandwiches. I thought it would be fun to do a side-by-side comparison, substituting Spelt flour for the Bread Flour, leaving everything else unchanged, and keeping my dough techniques as nearly identical as possible.

Here's my formula:

Levain:

11 g seed starter (refrigerated, feed every two weeks or more frequently) fed 1:1:1 three time over twenty-four hours yielding 300 g ripe levain. Whole wheat flour used for all builds (represents 16% of total dough flour); levain hydration 100%.

Final doughs:

140 g ripe levain (from above)       16% of total flour contributed

105 g Whole Wheat flour               24%

265 g Bread or Spelt flour             60%

305 g Water                                 70% (includes 70g from levain)

 9 g Salt                                        2%

11 g Olive oil (1 Tbs)                      2.5% 

Procedures: (for both doughs)

Hand-mixed all ingredients to bowl side-cleaning ball; 30 minute rest; French-fold until dough passed window-pane test; retarded bulk proof for five hours @ 55°F with one Stretch and Fold at 45 mins. (The retardation was done only to accomadate my schedule.) Removed from chiller, preshaped, and further bulk proofed at 76°F for two hours. Shaped two batards, and final proofed for one and one-half hours. Scored, and loaded into pre-steamed oven, at 500°F. Immediately lowered oven temperature to 450°F. Baked first ten minutes with steam, removed steam source and vented oven, finished baking: spelt flour loaf 15 more minutes, bread flour loaf 17 more minutes. Cooled completely.

Although these doughs are relatively high hydration, because of the high protein flours the doughs formed soft balls. From the beginning these doughs were different to the touch. Both exhibited comparitive extensibility, but the Bread flour's gluten developed noticeably stronger than the Spelt flour's.  The Bread flour dough shaped more tightly than the spelt flour, proofed more firmly, and exhibited more oven spring.

Obviously, the Bread flour loaf is in the foreground.

The crumb. The bread flour loaf's crumb, while closed (as desired) is lighter, and softer than the spelt flour crumb which borders on the edge of 'dense".

My wife and I taste-tested both breads. The bread flour loaf exhibited the familiar whole-wheat flavor we both like, and the crumb was soft, again as we like in a sandwich bread. The spelt flour loaf had an agreeable flavor--I presume "it" is the flavor of spelt flour--but the whole wheat flour flavor seemed entirely masked.  We shared a second slice of each, but our impressions didn't change. We like them both, but the bread flour formula will stay in our repetoire; spelt flour will have to wait for another formula, another day.

David G

Following the advice of a couple of you, today I baked a 40% whole spelt flour version. Its dough was considerably more slack than the 40% whole wheat flour, everything being the same except for the spelt flour. Consequently, I wasn't able to shape it as tightly, and it spread more during final proofing. Nonetheless, it had comparable oven spring--the crumb appears more open than the whole wheat version.

We like the flavor; it's more subtle than the whole-wheat presence in the alternative loaf. I think for now, we'll keep this formula in our book, and look for a local source for white spelt flour.

The loaf:

and the crumb.

Thank you all for sharing your expertise and advice.

David G.

We usually consume our breads before they stale, but after our recent "open house" party, we had, collectively, about a loaf and a half of two different sourdoughs, and a 40% rye loaf; far too much for just the two of us to eat before staling. I cubed the leftovers, and spread them on a baking sheet, uncovered, for twenty-four hours. Then I put them into the food-processor, and turned it on until I had about six cups, or so of bread crumbs. Not having anything immediate for them, I froze them.

A couple of nights later Yvonne asked me to make baked cod fillets. I usually use panko crumbs in my recipe for baked cod, but when I looked the cupboard was bare, and I wasn't going to make the sixty-mile round trip to the Asian food market just for a bag of of panko crumbs. Out came the sourdough crumbs.

My baked cod recipe is super simple. I season plain crumbs with salt and pepper; add a Tblsp. of sweet, smoked paprika; and a sprinkle of chipotle chilie powder: just enough that makes my guests ask,"Is there chili powder in this?". I mix in about two Tblsp. of melted butter to one cup of crumbs.  I then take the frozen fillets, brush them quickly with hot, melted butter and roll them in the crumbs, patting them into the solidifying butter as I go. Then twenty-five minutes in a 375°F oven, or until the fish flakes easily.

This time, with the dark sourdough crumbs and a hint of rye flavor, I thought the paprika and chipotle wouldn't work, so I mixed up some Herbs Provence: dried thyme, fennel, and rosemary. Added them to the crumbs, with salt and pepper, to taste. And proceeded as usual.

We've got a new favorite, but won't abandon the old one. I thought we'd miss the super crunch panko supplies, but were pleasantly surprised when we found the sourdough crumbs--somewhat soft to the touch when thawed--crisped in the oven to near panko-like texture. I also made some herbed rice (fresh thyme and tarragon) to side the fish.

I think sourdough bread crumbs have become a staple in our home.

David G

I've been trying a couple of things: increasing sourness (based on what I've learned from Debra Wink, and other online references, varying hydration; and feeding portions of my favorite starter different flours, and developing it at different temperatures (part of the sourness investigation.). I've been doing these things one step at a time, so the results don't get clouded.

For the sourness experiments, along with Ms. Wink's super TFL postings, my other main source of information is:

http://aem.asm.org/cgi/reprint/64/7/2616

"Modeling of Growth of Lactobacillus sanfranciscensis and Candida milleri in Response to Process Parameters of Sourdough Fermantation"; Michael G. Ganzle, et al; Applied and Environmental Microbiology, July 1998

and http://www.nyx.net/~dgreenw/whatistherelationshipbetwe.html

an answer provided by the above author to the question, "What is the relationship between temperature and activity?" in a Q and A blog relating to sourdough.

Sourness: flour and temperature

First, an apology, and a plea. Although I am educated as an engineer and scientist, microbiology is far distant from my underwater acoustics speciality. I've struggled, mostly with the  subject-specific techincal language, in my effort to understand what I've read. Nonetheless, I think I've acquired the background of  knowledge that a home baker, obsessed with sourdough, can use in his or her non-laboratory kitchen to effect the flavor profile of their sourdough breads. Please, if you find my efforts have been based on faulty premises, wrong information, or misdirected experimentation point out the errors, and, more importantly the correct assumptions; accurate, alternative references; or suggest appropriate action--including, "Stop your silly mucking around!"

Debra Wink, in one of her postings, commented that that a flour's ash content contributed to the degree of sourness one might achieve in a starter, but didn't explan how. The first of the above references shows that the activity (reproduction) of Lactobacillus is strongly linked to the the starter's pH ( a measure of acidity). As the acidity increases. or decreases, above or below a most  activity-advantageous value (approximately a pH of 4.2) L. Bacillus reproduction decreases. Assuming, for the moment, the temperature of the starter remains steady, and the activity-advantageous pH can be preserved, the amounts of acetic and lactic acid produced is proportional to the concentration of L. sanfranciscensis. However, in any solution the more acid the lower the pH. Some molecular components of the starter's mix may neutralize a portion of the acidity, while maintaning its sourness contribution. In flour and water mixtures that neutralizing (buffering) quality is supplied by the flour's ash content. Simplistically, I thought, the higher the ash content in the feed, the greater the buffering quality of the flour, and, therefore, the more acids produced before the bacteria activity slows down.

With that in mind, I fed a portion of my favorite starter, at room temperature, for three days a steady, every-twelve-hours diet of first clear flour, known to have high ash content. This became my seed starter for three formula-ready levains. In general, this starter, aledged by the vendor to be authentic San Francisco sourdough starter, doesn't produce much discernable sourness, if any at all. On a few occasions, we (my wife and I) have detected some sourness, which has allowed me to conclude there's some L. bacillus in there, maybe.

After 72 hours I built 500g of formula-ready levain,at 100% hydration, using first clear flour; it contributed 28% of the total flour weight. The balance of the dough's flour consisted of 10% rye flour, 31% all purpose flour, and 31% bread flour. The final dough contained 2% salt, at 70% hydration. This formula was used three times; each bake consisted of two loaves, formed into approximately 750 g batards. Every loaf was processed as indentically as possible in a home kitchen: two and one-quarter hour bulk proof with two S&F at 45 minute intervals, followed by an additional 45 minutes. Subsequently, the dough was divided, preshaped. rested for 10 minutes, shaped, final proofed for two hours, slashed and baked at 450*F, with steam for the first 15 minutes. The remaining seed starter was stored in the refrigerator at 37°F.

The only intentional variable was in the levain constructions.

First levain: 20g seed starter, three 1:1:1 feedings of first clear flour, initially and at eight hour intervals. Harvested 500g of levain after 24 hours. The developing levain remained at room temperature (68°F to 72°F) for the entire duration.

Second levain: 20g seed starter, three 1:1:1 feedings of all purpose flour, initially and at eight hour intervals. Harvested 500g of levain after 24 hours. The developing levain remained at room temperature (68°F to 72°F) for the entire duration.

Third levain: 20g seed starter, three 1:1:1 feedings of first clear flour, initially and at eight hour intervals. Harvested 500g of levain after 24 hours. This levain was held at room temperature for the first eight hours, approximately 82°F for three hours, and 89°F for the remaining 13 hours. These temperature choices reflect the findings reported in the first reference: optimum yeast activity occurs at approximately 82°F; optimum bacteria activity occurs at approximately 89°F. Additionally, yeast and bacteria activity are approximately the same at room temperatures, yeast activity falls dramatically at 89°F.

Subjective Results:

First of all, these were not meant to be controlled, scientific experiments. To the contrary, what i wanted to explore was, "Can a home baker influence the flavor profile of his or her doughs, guided by scientific results, with only those tools common to a baker's home kitchen?".  In my case, a small, lidded plastic box,for the developing levain; placed inside a larger, lidded plastic box (my dough proofing box) to minimize the effects of drafts; all placed inside an oven with a manually controlled oven light, to vary the oven's temperature); and a thermometer, aledged by the manufacturer to be accurate to +/- 1°F).

Furthermore, the only way I could test a finished bread's sourness was by tasting it. (in the laboratory they measured the amount of lactic and acetic acid produced.). My taste would be suspect: I was hoping for discernable sourness with the first and third levains; I would taste discernable sournesss with the first and third levains. So, I asked my wife to taste the finished breads. She had no knowledge of the differences in the levain, nor what my expectations were.

The results are a bit anticlimactic:

We both found breads made with the first and third levains had discernable "tang"; in part because we didn't taste them side-by-side, niether she nor I could state with any certainty one was "tangier" than the other.

The bread made with the second levain, fed with all purpose flour, didn't have any "tang". Good bread, but no sourness.

Next steps:

I'm building a proofing box, wherein I can control temperature better than with the oven light. When its finished, I'm going to push a levain to favor only bactieria growth, and add commercial yeast to the dough for gas production.

Here's a picture of the most recent (third levain) bread.