Best Point to Retard?

I really love this question because I don't think the answer is concrete at all. I think the answer is based a lot on our own personal preferences and expectations. What do you want out of your bread? What IS the ideal bread?

I am inclined to say that any stage is really appropriate. Once water meets flour, you're getting SOME enzymatic action. The simple fact is that water facilitates chemical reactions.

I think the more appropriate statement is a very unfortunate one. That is to say, it really depends on what you're going for.

Look through these forums. What influences the flavor of your final product? Reduce your ingredients to five things: Flour, water, salt, yeast, and time. Which one influences every other ingredient differently at any given stage? Time.

Time decides the type of bread you're making. When I make pizza dough, I retard during the final rise before shaping. When I make French bread, I retard after shaping and before baking. When I make sourdough I retard during the bulk ferment. The point in time at which I put the dough in the fridge depends entirely on the type of bread I am making. When you retard, 3 days is a fine amount of time no matter what stage you're at. I'd retard for up to 5 days no matter what stage, personally, and be perfectly happy.

I guess this doesn't answer the original question. I'd love to see a definitive answer, but I'm not sure there is one. 

After bulk ferment - before final proof.  The dough needs to have an established sourdough colony in order to derive the benefit from retarding the dough.  

Wild-Yeast

Hi Paul,

There's no real hard and fast rules that I know of.  Retarding under high humidity refrigeration [~38-45 dF] for at least 12 hours is the only rule of retarding.  I retard in plastic bag covered bannetons for 12+ hours at 38 dF - the time varies depending on schedule.

While on the subject - I have been experimenting with ways to further improve the taste attributes of the finished bread. I've found that allowing the dough to settle to room temperature for 6-8 hours after the retard has a definite effect. A pronounced butter flasvor - sort of a cross between sourdough and pastry [taste test subjects find it difficult to stop eating the resulting product]. I'm also using a higher hydration level than usual in an effort to obtain a more open crumb structure though it results in flatter loaves.  I intend to see if it's possible obtain the same flavor profile with lower hydration levels to improve the "eye feast - oven spring" on the next build. Hopefully the improved taste profile / "eye feast" are not mutually exclusive..., 

"Pain au levain est un enfant terrible...,"

Wild-Yeast 

There's no easy formula due to the "everything counts" rule for sourdough - one of the major reasons for the use of commercial yeast. Using small "innoculations" of commercial yeast with or without sourdough starter "accelerates" dough development [still slow though]. Longer proofing periods including retards create a definite taste enhanced finished product.  

Usual routine for pan au levain:

• 45 minute hydration rest
• Salt addition
• 3 - 45 minute stretch and fold periods
• 2-3 hour elevated temperature ferment
• 12-24 hour retard
• 4-6 hour post retard temperature normalization/proof
• Bake

Wild-Yeast

I Like to retard my dough after i shape it.  It is simply what i think works best in a production setting.

Good point. I left out that important step. Entry above should have read:

Usual routine for pan au levain:

• 45 minute hydration rest
• Salt addition
• 3 - 45 minute stretch and fold periods
• 2-3 hour elevated temperature ferment
• Shape loaves
• 12-24 hour retard
• 4-6 hour post retard temperature normalization/proof
• Bake

Wild-Yeast

Hi Paul,

Yes, that's correct, 3 periods of 45 minutes with stretch and folds between = 2 hrs. 15 mins.

Elevated temperature ferment has been 95 dF. I'm going to increase this to 105 dF in the next batch in an attempt to match the Larraburu process - have no idea what the post retard normalization period will be.  Have to play it by observation.

Hi Janet,

It's Central Milling's Organic High Protein Flour - contains diastatic malt. It's a high extraction flour and yields a slightly off withe crumb. I haven't tried using freshly milled whole wheat - moderating the amount of starter will stretch-out the process so that levaining of the bread meshes with the approximate schedule. As always "everything counts" in sourdough so formulaic tweaks can be worked out to improve the resulting bread adapted to the bakers schedule...,

Wild-Yeast 

Hi, in my experience the only doughs that benefits from retarding are sweet doughs rich of sugar and fat: when baked after an initial doubling, 12 hours of retarding and the final proof they come out incredibly soft, much softer than when baked after two simple rises without fridge.

Whenever I retard white breads or pizza doughs (generally done with average strength flours, but even when prepared with bread flour) they come out gummy and not mature, impossible to spread, as if the cold didn't permit the dough to ripen, as if there was no enzymatic activity whatsoever. The temperature of the fridge in that sector is 8°C, measured with two different thermometers.

I'm beginning to  wonder if there's any meaningful enzymatic activity that 8°.