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5 Grain Levain with Bulgur

Danni3ll3's picture
Danni3ll3

5 Grain Levain with Bulgur

I have been away from bread making for a month due to other obligations and this was the recipe that called out to my baker’s soul. ? 

The last time I did this recipe, I used cracked rye and oat groats so I changed it to bulgur and old fashioned oats. I also changed the Wholewheat flour from Red Fife to Selkirk wheat. The bran was sifted out and used in feeding my starter to get it up to speed before making the final levain. 

The procedure was also changed a bit as my curiosity was piqued when reading about putting the dough in the fridge at the end of the bulk fermentation. A few of you seem to be getting some amazing results. I do remember getting some really open crumbs when I have occasionally retarded the bulk in the middle of things due to an interruption of some sort, but I have never done this intentionally. And never for several hours! 

 

Makes 3 loaves

 

Liquid Levain build 

272 g Bread flour 

343 g Water 

55 g Starter (bran was used to refresh it at a 100 % hydration)  

Soaker

100 g bulgur

100 g Flaxseeds 

85 g Sunflower seeds 

85 g old fashioned oats (large flake)

484 g Water, boiling 

6 g Salt 

Dough

533 g Unbleached flour 

15 g Vital Wheat Gluten

274 g Sifted freshly milled Selkirk wheat flour  

303 g Water 

30 g yogurt (Greek because that is what I had on hand)

21 g Pink Himalayan Salt 

All of the Soaker 

650 g Levain 

A couple of days or the morning before

  1. Main dough and levain prep: Mill 320 g of Selkirk berries and sift. Use 274 g of the sifted flour for the main dough and reserve the bran and the remaining few grams of sifted flour to revive or feed the starter prior to making the final levain. 

 

  1. Soaker prep: Measure out the bulgur, and oats. Reserve. Grind the flax seeds coarsely in a Bullet or spice grinder. Add to the bulgur and the oats. Toasts the sunflower seeds and add to the bulgur, oats and flax. Add the 6 g of salt. Cover and reserve.

 

  1. Main dough prep: To the 274 g of sifted flour, add the unbleached flour, and the vital wheat gluten. Mix well to distribute the VWG.  Cover and reserve.

 

The night before making the dough

  1. Levain: Twelve to sixteen hours before the the final mixing of the dough, put all of the ingredients together for the levain and keep covered at room temperature (73 F).
  2. Soaker: Add the boiling water to the soaker ingredients and cover. Leave to cool overnight at room temperature.

 

Final mix and bake

  1. Put the water and the yogurt for the dough in a bowl and add the soaker. Mix well to loosen the mass. Measure 650 g of the levain, add to water and soaker, and mix again. Add this mixture to the reserved flour mix and make sure to mix well to a shaggy dough. Autolyse for 60 to 75 minutes.
  2. My dough felt dry so I added another 50-60g of water with the salt. Mix well to integrate all ingredients and do several series of folds to begin developing the gluten. I initially did 50 folds, let rest 10 minutes, do another 10 or so folds, rest 10 more minutes ad do another 5 or 6 folds. 
  3. Bulk ferment the dough at room temperature and do folds every half hour until the dough has risen about 30%. This took 2 hours at 73F. 
  4. Place in the fridge for 4-5 hours. I left mine for 4.5 hours in a 37F fridge. The dough rose to just about double. 
  5. Pour the dough out onto a bare counter and divide into 3 loaves. Lightly flour the top of the portions and gently round into boules using a dough scraper. This was much easier than usual because of the cold dough. 
  6. Let rest 45 minutes. Do a final shape by cinching and rounding the dough with a scraper to make a fairly tight boule, but without deflating the dough. Place seam side down in rice/ap floured bannetons and cover. Let rise on the counter for an hour and then put to bed in the fridge for the night.
  7. The next morning, pre-heat the oven and the Dutch ovens to 475F. Place parchment rounds in the bottom of the pots and place the dough in seam side up. Score if you wish. I chose not to. Cover and bake for 25 minutes at 450F. Remove lids and bake for another 25 minutes at 425F or until the inside temperature is 205 F or or more.

The loaves had pretty good but not fantastic oven spring. That being said, I got great ears even though I didn’t score the dough.  Crumb shots to come later when they cool. That’s the first batch to come out of the oven. I have a second batch of six and a batard to go in as soon as the oven is back up to temp. 

 

Comments

Elsie_iu's picture
Elsie_iu

I miss your posts badly! It felt wrong without your weekly post on TFL.

The bread looks good on the outside so you haven't lost a beat. Can't wait to see the crumb!

not.a.crumb.left's picture
not.a.crumb.left

and your oven spring still has me all in flatters...how do you do it? Looks sooooo good and can't wait to see the crumb... Kat

not.a.crumb.left's picture
not.a.crumb.left

and as I can do a window pane on my 50/50 I will also go with a shorter bulk like you....as around the 2.5 hours  mark and looks strong and bubbly...One has to live dangerously...

:D Kat

Danni3ll3's picture
Danni3ll3

is super important! I did a pitiful job shaping the batard, basically just rolled it into shape. I should have done a much tighter skin on it. Results are that it spread sideways in baking rather than go up. It did stay nicely together when I plopped it out of the banneton but I guess it wasn’t enough.

dabrownman's picture
dabrownman

breads just from the first picture!  This one has a very nice soaker too and I bet the crumb will be open, soft and moist - can't wait to see it.  My only remark to the downside is that an autolyse is flour and water only  - no levain and and no salt.  What you are doing is making a bread without an autolyse at all.  Nothing wrong with that at all either people have made most bread that way for thousands of years.

You know this one is going to taste great as well .

Welcome ack and happy baking Danni

Danni3ll3's picture
Danni3ll3

I am happy with it and it does taste amazing!

dabrownman's picture
dabrownman

These are the kind of breads I  want to toast and put butter on with a bit of jam every other bite:-)  Nice

Isand66's picture
Isand66

We sure missed you and glad yiu are back sharing your bakes with us.

I normally do my bulk rise in the fridge and shape the next day, rest and rise then bake.  Do you think you gained anything by this new method you followed?  The crumb looks real moist and open that's for sure.

Regards,

Ian

Danni3ll3's picture
Danni3ll3

crumb if I compare it to the last time I made this. Mind you, some of the ingredients are different but I am not sure that those can account for the difference.

What I did get was flexibility in time. Instead of watching the dough for a 5 hour bulk rise, I babied it for two hours and then it spent the rest of the time in the fridge. 

Dividing and shaping were also much easier with the cold dough. I plan to stick with this for a bit and see what I get. 

PalwithnoovenP's picture
PalwithnoovenP

Aside from the bulgur, I am familiar with the other ingredients so I can construct the flavor in my mind. The boules look gorgeous. The overnight cold bulk fermentation works for me every single time.

Ru007's picture
Ru007

Your loaves look stunning as always!! 

Love the crumb! 

Happy baking 

Ru