Bread with an Unanticipated Crumb: 50% Einkorn SD

This is my second einkorn loaf. The first was baked roughly half a year ago when my friend kindly offered me some einkorn berries to try out. It left me with the impression that einkorn makes a slack and sticky dough that weakens with time. For some reason, the experience isn’t quite the same this time. 

50% Einkorn Sourdough

Sift out the bran from dough flour, reserve 28 g for the leaven. Soak the rest, if any, in equal amount of whey taken from dough ingredients. 

Combine all leaven ingredients and let sit until ready, about 4 hours (28.5°C). Roughly combine all dough ingredients. Ferment for a total of 4 hours. Construct a set of 3 minute Rubaud mixing at the 30 and 40 minute mark respectively. Do a set of lamination at the 50 minute mark. 30 minutes before shaping, do a set of coil fold. Shape the dough then put in into a banneton directly. Retard for 10 hours.

Preheat the oven at 250°C/482°F. Score and spritz the dough then bake straight from the fridge at 250°C/482°F with steam for 20 minutes then without steam for 25 minutes more or until the internal temperature reaches a minimum of 208°F. Let it cool for a minimum of 2 hours before slicing.

My hand shook while I was pouring the water into the flour… Oops... The dough was thus a bit too wet than I’d like. After the first round of mixing, it was still quite slack with little gluten development. However, it gained strength on its own as time went by. There was little, if any, stickiness too.

The oven spring wasn’t massive so my expectation wasn’t high. Miraculously, the crumb is rather open compared with my other whole grain bakes. It’s even more confounding when you consider that it’s 50% einkorn (of which more than half is sprouted!) and 50% white wheat. Both are grains that tend to produce weak dough.

Some people don't like einkorn but I personally find it quite tasty. It's got a very distinctive coconut taste that there's no way to mix it up with another grain. This bread is moderately sweet and sour.

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