The Fresh Loaf

A Community of Amateur Bakers and Artisan Bread Enthusiasts.

New recipe: Whole Wheat Sourdough

Soundman's picture
Soundman

New recipe: Whole Wheat Sourdough

Whole Wheat Sourdough (Pictures below)

OK, this is another long description. Skip down to the pictures if you like.

This bread, which I'm happy to say worked out nicely, was new for me for several reasons. 1) Using 30% whole wheat flour was a significant change, as I have been sticking pretty close to Hamelman's Vermont Sourdough recipe, with either 10% rye or whole wheat flour. 2) I was fiddling with my starter. After 5 months of tangy service, the culture was losing some of its sour, perhaps because I don't bake every day and do refrigerate the starter to slow its activity, so that I don't waste a lot of flour. 3) I changed my scheduling significantly, thanks to reading Bill Wraith's extremely interesting table on temperature, inoculation percentage, and timing of sourdough ripening.

http://www.thefreshloaf.com/node/5381/sourdough-rise-time-table

Fiddling with the starter
After reading Antonis's post about regaining sourdough tang, and sensing my own starter's sour was on the wane, I tried using semolina flour, as his post suggested.

http://www.thefreshloaf.com/node/8369/how-get-back-sourness-your-starter-lost 

There is some confusion for me whether the difference between semolina, a coarse grind of the endosperm of durum wheat, or durum flour, which is (according to Practically Edible) "a by-product [of the semolina milling]; the fine powder off-cast", would make a significant difference. But I had the semolina so I figured I'd give it a shot. The results were positive.

I split my starter into 2 separate containers. I maintained one more or less as usual, feeding it AP flour and a small percentage of whole wheat. The other I fed only semolina for 2 days, one feeding per day. This wasn't following Antonis's prescription to the letter, but it felt right. On the third day for this starter I added rye to the mix, as Antonis suggests toward the bottom of the thread. By the end of the third day it smelled (and tasted!) quite sour.

Big ideas
Meanwhile I was implementing a couple of ideas that had been percolating in my head for a while. The first is stirring any mixture, if it includes sourdough culture, as it develops. That means stirring the final levain as well as any intermediate builds, and basic refreshments. Normally I had been refreshing my culture (at 12 hour intervals) with flour and water and letting it sit. I now make sure to stir it at least once, maybe twice, before the next feeding. Antonis tells us that his food-scientist friend says that yeast move around but the bacteria don't move. He suggests stirring for the sake of the bacteria. My results tell me that stirring is good for both the yeast and the bacteria.

Second, I have been letting the culture develop longer between feedings. How often do you refresh your culture? At what ratio of flour to culture? Some people say it takes a minimum of 2 feedings per day to achieve an active enough culture to raise bread. I had been following this path, but started seeing with my own culture that this was too frequent. Too frequent feedings will not only dilute the sour-producing bacteria in the culture, but the yeast as well. My refreshment regimen had lately been a "simple" 1:2:3 ratio (culture, water, flour). What I discovered was that when I let the culture go longer than 12 hours, stirring it once or twice along the way, it kept on rising. No doubt it was letting the bacteria build as well. What if my culture likes to be fed, say, every 16 or 18 hours? It's not very convenient, but I noticed big benefits to extending the feeding duration. Put it this way: isn't it possible that your average garden-variety 12-hour feeding cycle could allow the starter to double, but that there might still be plenty of unused food left in the mixture?

Changing the schedule
(This is where Bill Wraith's table came in really handy.) For scheduling convenience, I had been mixing my final levain in the morning, letting it develop for eight hours and then mixing the dough and letting it ferment. (Sometimes, I had had to find a little extra warmth to help the levain get to the finish line.) By the end of this day I would shape and proof for an hour and retard in the fridge, then bake the next morning. I wanted a longer development for my final levain, so I decided to mix it at night and let it develop for 12 hours, as I had lost any anxiety that the culture would exhaust the available food in 8-hours' time. For the penultimate build of my starters I mixed a 100% hydration version of each, for the sake of measuring and calculating.

For the final levain I used 10 grams of the semolina-rye starter and 20 grams of my regular starter. That meant I was using 15 grams of flour from my starters. I mixed this with 285 grams of flour (divided 70% bread flour and 30% organic white whole wheat) . To this I added 185 grams of water (total 200 grams water in final levain), resulting in a stiff levain, at 67% hydration. Using Bill Wraith's terminology and methodology, if I understand them correctly, this is an inoculation of 5% of the total flour (15 of 300 grams). Bill's table says that it will take such a mixture 12.34 hours to double if kept at 65 dF. The room temperature downstairs was 66 dF, and I used water a little cooler than that (with the help of a couple of ice cubes). I stirred the mixture again after 3 hours and went to bed. In the morning I had a beautifully bubbly final levain, which had more than doubled during this time.

Total flour for the dough I had calculated at 1100 grams, total water 740 grams, 67% hydration. So I put 800 grams of flour, 70% Bread flour to 30% WW again, and 540 grams of water in my KA mixer and brought it together. (Thirty grams of the whole wheat was from red wheat.) Then (as per Janedo's suggestion), I let it autolyse for 30 minutes. After 30 minutes I added the levain and salt (20 grams) and mixed for 2 minutes on medium. The dough came together easily, and was clearing the sides and almost cleared the bottom of the mixer. (This was another good sign, as lately the dough hadn't developed as easily.) After that, slap and fold, slap and fold, until the gluten development was strong but extensible.

Bill Wraith's table's highest inoculation level is 25%. My inoculation level for the dough was 27%, pretty close (300 of 1100 grams of flour). Bill's table indicates for 25% inoculation at 75 dF it will take 4.14 hours for the dough to double. I really liked seeing that number! I had been fermenting my sourdough final dough for 2.5 or 3 hours, according to the recipe, and I felt this wasn't long enough. (BTW it was 73 dF in our kitchen.) So I let the bulk fermentation go for 4 hours, folding twice at 80-minute intervals. I should add that this new recipe used more final levain than I had been using in the Vermont Sourdough recipe. Not surprisingly, given Bill Wraith's comprehensive approach to everything, his inoculation percentages, i.e. flour to flour, make more sense to me than percentage of levain to flour does. (The next time I make Vermont Sourdough I will surely allow for longer bulk fermentation!)

The dough was stronger than my more recent efforts, in spite of the whole wheat flour! And it was rising better, by far, than my recent attempts as well.

http://www.thefreshloaf.com/node/8445/never-give-sourdough 

I let it proof for an hour, and it rose noticeably during this time. (My recent efforts showed little rise until the oven spring pole-vaulted the bread higher.) Then I put it in the fridge, at around 3 PM. What with stronger dough, and a healthy rise in the bannetons, I have to conclude my wild yeast, at least so far, were much happier!

Bake Day
At 8 AM the next morning the dough had retarded for 17 hours. I took it out of the fridge, turned the oven on at 480 dF, and 45 minutes later I was scoring the cool dough and putting it in the oven. (There has been a recent tiny teapot tempest about this technique on another thread.)

http://www.thefreshloaf.com/node/9071/straight-refrigerator-oven#comment-46660 

As usual with cool dough for me, the scoring left the dough standing proud. Loading into the oven, likewise.

I used a steam pan on the bottom rack and spritzed at 2-minute intervals for 10 minutes. (The cooler dough allows this, as the crust doesn't set quite as quickly.) The dough got a good oven spring. The height of each loaf was excellent, and contrary to certain recent efforts, never in doubt. I turned the oven down after 15 minutes to 440 dF and baked for another 10-12 minutes, moving the loaves around to let the second one have the hot spot for a while in order to catch up. Also I removed the steam pan. Once the crust color was established on both loaves I turned the oven down once more to 420 dF and let them bake for another 12 or 15 minutes, when an instant read thermometer said 207 dF. Then, out of the oven to cool on a rack.

Whole Wheat Sourdougy

Whole Wheat Sourdough

WW Sourdough Loaf2

WW Sourdough Loaf2

The bread was lovely to look at and smell, and is delightful to eat. Contrary to certain prognosticators the crumb is consistent throughout, not doughy or gummy in the center in the slightest. (One baker's science is another's test lab I guess.) It has the tang I like, though not a big sour taste. It is wonderfully wheaty. In fact, it tastes just like what it is: sourdough whole wheat.

WW SD Crumb1

WW SD Crumb1

Total ingredients (includes levain ingredients):
1100 grams flour =
 (755 gr bread flour + 300 gr WWW + 30 gr RWW + 15 gr Mix from Levain)
740 grams water (67% hydration)
20 grams salt (.18%)

Levain:
30 grams active culture (100% hydration)
285 grams flour =
 (200 gr bread flour + 85 gr WWW)
185 grams water

Final dough:
800 grams flour =
 (555 gr bread flour + 215 gr WWW + 30 gr RWW)
540 grams water
500 grams levain
20 grams salt

WW SD Crumb2

WW SD Crumb2

Now I just don't know whether to mix my starters or to maintain them both, at smaller weights. But I will definitely make this recipe again.

Edit: It's three days later and the tang is getting better all the time.

Soundman (David)

ehanner's picture
ehanner

Very nice job David. You really put yourself out for that post, very nice detail. I see your crumb is cooked nicely all the way through! Hehehe

I especially like #2 crumb where the crust is a little thinner. Seriously, very nice looking WW sourdough.

Eric 

Soundman's picture
Soundman

Thanks, Eric, for your kind words. It means a lot coming from an accomplished baker like you.

Also, point taken. I'm not claiming anything like success, not yet anyway! I'm just sure that with practice I can manipulate the time and temperature to get what I want.

It's a little weak, but here's my alibi: the difference in the crumbs was 2 or 3 minutes extra time in the oven for loaf 1. I wouldn't normally have had such a long difference, and I would have yanked Loaf1 earlier as well, but I was nursing a painful ankle. It took longer to set up Loaf2 and later when I should have been taking the first loaf out, I chose to wait for loaf2, favoring my leg instead of the bread.

Furthermore, I would and should have controlled the temperature a little better, if I had thought of it. The beauty of baking bread is, I'll get another chance.

Soundman (David)

ehanner's picture
ehanner

But, you toughed it out and continued on. Good job!

You know of course I'm totally joking with you about the retarding baking thing. I do it all the time when I need the flexibility.

Eric 

Soundman's picture
Soundman

Hi Eric, 

You (Wisconsin, right?) folks gave up on him and we (Northeasterner for life, born in NYC, I admit) picked him up. I just hope he can keep throwing touchdowns!

I think you have joked your way to getting me to be more thoughtful about the whole retarding process, so thanks either way. I notice (and don't want Floyd to hear me) that my Loaf1 crumb picture made the front page! I'm a little embarassed! What if he reads this and pulls it? Oh well, it's my first time, so better just enjoy it.

Soundman (David)

ehanner's picture
ehanner

A well deserved cover placement and you are in pretty good company next to you too.

We got tired of Bret holding out trying to decide if this was the year he was going to retire until the last possible minute, year after year. The drama was underwhelming. I'm waiting to see how the NY audience reacts to his crying at a press conference. He is a true dichotimy. On one hand he's the toughest guy to ever play football and a great athelete. On the other he seems to be a troubled soul unable to control his emotions after a big loss. He is fun to watch when things are tight. You can never be sure he won't score on every possession.

Anyway, congrats on the front page post! I'm glad you enjoy my humor.

Eric 

Soundman's picture
Soundman

Well between you and Howard and circling the wagons I did get a lot of laughs.

The company next to me (your name is there on the marquee as well) is blinding compared to my little crumb pic. I'll get to Norm's onion rolls one of these days.

The thing about New York sports franchises is, whatever the sport, they get these great players when they're on their last legs. Why not find some of them when they're in college instead? So much cheaper, and the quality would improve.

Soundman (David)

Floydm's picture
Floydm

The criteria for what makes the front page certainly isn't carved in stone... often it is simply a matter of whether I'm paying attention. But posts that required thought and energy to write, that contain formulas, helpful information, and photos, and that appear to be triggering good discussions are what typically catch my eye. And, yeah, I like getting different people's voices up there.

"Triggering discussion" and "helpful information" both include "acknowledging mistakes," in my mind, so that the featured loaf isn't the perfect one is fine by me. These are some awfully nice looking loaves though.

Soundman's picture
Soundman

Thanks, Floyd,

for your generous words and for the honor of greeting an ever-growing world of bakers who love and esteem TheFreshLoaf! (I thought you wouldn't hear me whispering to Eric.) I'll bet you had no idea what you were creating back when.

Mini Oven's picture
Mini Oven

when the fog lifts and it all starts to make sense? Congratulations! Beautiful shape and crumb!

I followed your writing easily.

Starter: There is one subject that bothers me, and that is, starter maintainence ratio is 1:2:3 (starter:water:flour.) Is that correct? I find that very low, stirring the starter would result in more action because there is so little food. If you don't want to feed it every 4-6 hours, you might want to increase the ratio as this is almost the same ratio of flour to flour as you used in your final dough (actually the final dough had more food.) May I suggest more flour in your starter? Then there is no trouble lengthening the ripening time to over 12 hours. I have to agree with you that letting the starter mature is a good thing, but it needs the food to do it, like when you made the stiff levain. Your starter really liked those ratios!

Bill's table can be used just as easily for a starter as well as for a dough for they are in reality the same, only the sizes have changed. You might want to combine the starters into one again, save some and give it a thicker feeding.

Another Q When did "stretch and fold" become "slap and fold?" I missed that somewhere...

Mini O :)

Soundman's picture
Soundman

MiniOven,
Thanks for your thoughtful remarks and questions. They deserve as thoughtful a set of answers.

Slap and fold came from M. Bertinet's video on sweet dough, link below. http://www.gourmet.com/magazine/video/2008/03/bertinet_sweetdough

 (I have to credit both ehanner and holds99 for posting this link, and anyone else who did as well. It's important to see this baker at work!)

Part of what I hoped would emerge, from this baking experience and its telling, is that one has to be very attentive to one's own starter and its needs. I have been paying attention to this process for a mere 5 months at this point, but what I see for my starter, and believe I demonstrated, is that the conventional wisdom doesn't always prove wise, at least not in all cases.

It's very important to remember that Bill Wraith's table is not absolute. He writes the following: "Your starter may well be faster or slower than mine. ... you can see how your starter compares to these table entries and then adjust your rise times and proof times up or down by the same percentage."

Just talking numbers, I'm not sure that 1:2:3 is "so little food." In Bill Wraith's terms, I have been refreshing with a 17% inoculation, 6 grams of flour of 36 total grams of flour. (White flour at that, so Bill would have me add 20% on for the slower flour.) A lot of books say you can just double the starter for a refreshment. Now that seems a little austere to me.

But if 1:2:3 was too little food, my final levain would have been weak, and I wouldn't have gotten such a good rise out of my dough, especially considering the percentage of whole wheat, and the effect it has on the gluten. I would say my "under-fed" yeasties proved themselves admirably. Admittedly, my methodology for proving anything was absolutely flawed; too many variables. But the starter I used was considerably "less fed" than in all of my most recent efforts, and actually raised the bread better than ever. So maybe less-fed = better-fed? Hmmmm. Check your own starter. (BTW, I had been using a 1:3:4 regimen for a couple of months and it worked fine, but I liked 1:2:3 for its conservational advantage.)

Time and numbers: 4 to 6 hours just seems way too short a recycle period to develop the tangy bacteria, or the yeast for that matter, for my starter, though, again, not necessarily yours. If it works for you, that's exactly what you should use.

As to the effects of stirring, does it really speed things up? Only if you assume or can demonstrate that the yeast will eventually consume all the available food without stirring. According to my recent results, it doesn't appear that all the food would have been consumed without stirring the mixture. Stirring has given my starter "longer legs", not shorter ones. I don't purport to know anything about the food science involved here, and maybe I should. I'm just a practitioner, reporting what I did and what happened afterwards. In my relatively tight mixture I would see the starter rise and then stop. Until I stirred, and then it would rise some more.

If this bake turns out to have been merely a fluke, I will let you and other TFL bakers know. (The whole point of this forum thing is to expand each other's knowledge and awareness, or so I think.) And accordingly I will then follow your suggestion and increase the flour in my starter. (And let it feed longer and stir it more! ;-) )

Soundman (David)

Mini Oven's picture
Mini Oven

and understanding more.  Thanks for getting back to me.  You are saying your starter needs about 16 to 18 hours to mature fully.  That's what it's telling you.  Your evidence supports it.  You've fit it into your schedule and You are happy with the results.  I got it.

I still believe stirring speeds things up (as posted on another thread), speeds up the consumption of the food, also in the case of a long maturing starter.  Slapping or stretching and folding is also a form of slow stirring, it also developes gluten.  Developing gluten in the starter traps the gasses better, longer strands > longer legs to trap gasses still being formed (by-product of feasting yeasts.)  Yes, they are still feasting, but once they reach the first peak and stop, their numbers start to dwindle, granted, with slow multplying yeasts, they will do it more slowly. 

(It would be interesting to set up an experiment that measures the CO2 gasses coming off the starter, when it peaks, after stirring etc.  There must be a way to set up a kitchen experiment ...something with bottles and trapped CO2 gasses.  An exper. everyone could try on their starters.)

Good to know you've got time on your side.  Go with that.  This sounds like a starter that needs little or no refrigeration (except to retard like you're doing for scheduling) or maybe ideal for warmer climates.  Interesting. 

Mini O

Soundman's picture
Soundman

MiniOven,

Thanks again for keeping me on my toes, making me think things through. I agree about slapping or stretching and stirring. It's multi-purpose! Stirring was something the recipe for creating a sourdough starter encouraged, which was what got me thinking about it as an integral refreshment technique.

I do have to refrigerate my starter for a few days, unless I want to feed it every day, which I'm too lazy and cheap to do. But I'm refreshing it now in preparation of another Thursday night final levain build. I'm watching it and calibrating how long it wants to go before it needs another feeding. I should say "them". I'm still working with two starters, dear me. It's not really all that radical: Hamelman has some recipes calling for 2 starters (maybe even three?).

About the point that the yeast start dwindling, I am sure you're right. The issue, it seems, is the timing of the refreshment cycle needed to create the proper balance, optimizing the yeast enough, to the point they will be able to raise the bread, but also giving the bacteria sufficient time to develop and strengthen their numbers to impart that lovely sour flavor that only happens with sourdough.

I love the idea of a kitchen experiment. Let's think about that some more. As we are currently in an election cycle in the U.S. I was imagining how helpful it would be if we could poll our sourdough culture: how many yeast think the feeding cycle... how many bacteria...? It's been a long campaign I guess. An experiment will have to do!

Thanks again,

Soundman (David)

weavershouse's picture
weavershouse

Your bread looks delicious, light and airy.                                                               weavershouse

holds99's picture
holds99

I must be going blind because I missed your blog first time I scanned the posts.  So, not having seen your blog, I posted a note to one of your crumb images.  You did a terrific job; crust, crumb and scoring.  I'm partial to whole wheat.  Looks like you added about a fourth whole wheat to your final dough.  Thanks for sharing.

Howard

Soundman's picture
Soundman

Howard, my apologies for a confusing layout. I thought I would show the pictures among the text after the text took the bread out of the oven. And then I went and interlarded text and recipe among the pictures and it wasn't at all clear.

Not to quibble, I never would do that! (Winks at dmsnyder.) And please correct me if I'm doing the calculation wrong. I had 1100 grams total flour and 330 grams of whole wheat. My calculator says 0.3, so I figured it at 30 per cent. No?

Thanks for the generous compliments. Scoring improvements I owe to you and ehanner and the magic tomato knife. (Eric's also right about my needing to be more careful with the oven temperature.)

I too love whole wheat, and plan on experimenting more with it and other flours leavened with sourdough.

I'll go check your comments on the other page!

Soundman (David)

holds99's picture
holds99

Thanks.  Nothing to apologize about...just total operator trouble on this end.    I must have added wrong, came up with wrong divisor...or whatever (incidentally, that's why I have to give up piloting the space shuttle... :>)  I fully accept 1100, 330 and .30 percent. 

You're doing a great job, keep experimenting and I'll do the same.  Whole wheat is way underated...that being said, I doooo love rye too.

Howard

EDIT: Soundman (David) - I meant to post this under your reply to me... I think I'm going to have to land this thing, if I can get the landing gear down.

Soundman's picture
Soundman

If only my job would allow for more baking time I could get to Norm's Onion Rolls too.

I'm really up for trying my hand at rye. I bought some rye berries and the grain mill attachment for my KA mixer so I'm ready to add some texture and flavor to some homemade rye bread.

That said, I'm a complete novice at rye, not including 10% in Vermont Sourdough. I need to take a TFL crash course from the rye masters around here first. That'll be some fun reading!

Landing gear: I was once on a shuttle flight (airplane) from Boston to NYC and we kept going back and forth between LaGuardia and Kennedy until finally they got the landing gear down. Quite a sight to see all these fire engines on the runway!

Keep up the great baking and here's to your perfect baguette!

Soundman (David)

Soundman's picture
Soundman

I said I would report back after making this recipe again, so here it is, with pictures.

My starter(s), using a 1:2:3 ratio, have gotten a bit more jumpy lately, but still like a longish ripening time (12-14 hours), and love to be stirred during the process. The variant starter I kept strictly on semolina this time. I think rye may add more tang, as this bread is slightly less tangy than last time. Next batch I will use rye for starter number 2.

I made the final levain as before, using 20 grams of regular starter and 10 grams of the semolina starter, but the downstairs temperature was only around 61 dF. I knew it was going to be slower in developing, but I figured that might favor the tangy bacteria, so I let it go. As it turned out, after 12 hours it had risen only about 60%, so I took it up to the kitchen where it was 70 dF and let it finish for another 3 hours. By the end of 15 hours at different temperatures it had more than doubled and was nice and bubbly. I guess maybe I'm a wannabe Detmolder.

Some of the red whole wheat I used this time was from Wheat Montana, and I milled it myself with my KA mixer and grain mill. The bread had a lovely complex flavor I attribute in part to the freshly milled wheat. I sure wish I didn't have to transport the wheat berries from Montana to Connecticut, but I couldn't find a closer source of Hard Red Spring Wheat. Anybody have any sources for this in the Northeast?

I also cut the water down by 20 grams, just because it felt nice and tacky without the last bit of water. The dough was easy to work with. I am guessing that the KAF Organic Whole Wheat is a bit stronger than their bread flour, because the gluten development (using autolyse) was never in doubt and it took little time kneading to get a firm but extensible dough.

Here are pictures:

WW SD 2 Loaf1

WW SD 2 Loaf1

WW SD 2 Loaf2

WW SD 2 Loaf2

The crumb was a little less open than the previous bake, perhaps owing to the 20 grams less water. Here's a typical slice. My seam sealing is in need of work as well. Good to have goals. Right.

WW SD Crumb

WW SD Crumb

That's all for this bake.

Soundman (David)

Mini Oven's picture
Mini Oven

And I adore the slashing -- they almost have a "modern" appearance! 

Mini O

Soundman's picture
Soundman

Thanks for the kind words, MiniOven!

Coming from you, especially, it means a lot.

Slashing: I have gotten so much more relaxed, thanks to the Pure Komachi tomato knife that Howard and Eric recommended, I have to give them some credit.

I did try to put a personal touch on the design. The cuts opened up nicely with the oven spring. Modern is AOK by me (a style I go for!).

Thanks again.

Soundman (David)

Geoloaf's picture
Geoloaf

First off- thanks to everyone on this site for your insight and advice!  I got a brand new KitchenAid Classic Plus mixer for my birthday last Sunday (11/9) and immediately made 2 sourdough catastrophes!  (I also got a good SD starter from my Dad who's been making SD since I was in diapers.)  I didn't know to let the first loaf rise which proved to be lots of fun in the oven; and I kneaded the second loaf too many times and added too much flour without adding sugar and that one elded up looking like a rock hard, white catfish with a crack in its back.  They were good for a laugh, but that's about it.  Then I started another batch of dough, found this site and started reading.  I then added 1/2 cup whole wheat flour and a dash of sugar, folded the dough in from the sides and flipped it over, ran out and bought some oven tiles and a big SS bowl while it rose (which it did quite well), baked it for 40 min at 450, let it cool for 2 hours... and WA-LA!  I did it!  Success!  It has nice crust and crumb, good sour smell and taste, not really dense at all... I like it!  I'm thinking about taking the SS bowl off for the last 15 minutes to brown the crust...  Any suggestions?  By the way, I've been a member of this site for a whole 2 hours now.  Great site!

 

Keith

 

Geologist + beer + sourdough = trouble for sure!

ehanner's picture
ehanner

Hahaha, you're hooked!

Welcome aboard Keith. You sound like a fun kinda guy and will fit right in. I like your determination. I look forward to seeing you efforts.

 Eric

Eli's picture
Eli

and welcome aboard! Share with us your recipe and your dad's starter. I use a roasting pan for some of the baking and do take it off after the first 15 minutes of baking to achieve that golden brown crust. ( I also spray the inside of the pan with water before placing over the loaf)

Welcome again!

Eli

Geoloaf's picture
Geoloaf

I intended to post pictures with my post, but realized post-post that I'd forgotten to attach them.  Would someone please clue me in?

Keith

Geologist + beer + sourdough = trouble for sure!

Eli's picture
Eli

If you are familiar with something like flikr or photobucket your pix reside there. Then you just paste an image link in your post. I am not certain where the instructions are on TFL but it is fairly simple.

Eli

Geoloaf's picture
Geoloaf

I click the little camera icon.  I browse, select and title the photo from my hard drive.  I hit Preview.  I hit Submit.  And I end up with a "picture of my title" on the server.  I don't know what I'm doing wrong.  (I don't use Photobucket or Flicker, etc.)

Keith

Soundman's picture
Soundman

Hi Keith,

Howard's description is very good. One more thing you need to know. Your photo must not be at too high a resolution for TFL. Most digital cameras, I think, take pictures using more pixels than 640 X 640, which is the limit for a TFL-pic-upload.

This is why a lot of people like to use Flickr or Photobucket, 'cause they automatically resize your pictures. To resize a picture on your own machine, you will probably need a resizing program like PicSizer or Picasa.

Here's a link to the Picasa website where you can download their program for free:

http://picasa.google.com/

Welcome aboard the good ship TFL!

Soundman (David)

holds99's picture
holds99

When you say: "I click the little camera icon.  I browse, select and title the photo from my hard drive."  Sounds like you're close.  Try this.  For this exercise let's say your picture is located on your hard drive in My Documents under the folder: My Pictures, under sub-folder Bread Photos, Filename: "My New Loaf". 

1. Click camera icon
2. At the top, under "Browse Images" (to the right) Click the box "Upload a new image".
3. Fill in: Title, Catagories, Keyword (seach criteria).
4. Click on "Image Browse", which should take you to a screen showing a box at the top with a drop down menu arrow (these are your hard drive locations; folders/sub-folders/files).
5. At the top of the screen: "Choose File - Look In" Click on the drop down menu arrow.
6. Select the folder/sub-folders where you file is located (i.e. My Documents), Sub-Folder: My Pictures/Bread Photos, Filename: i.e. "My New Loaf", and double-click on it.  This should load the file linkage to your photo into your original Title Screen (step 3)
7. Click "Preview" and if that's the image you what you want, go back down and click "Submit".  If not go to step 1 and go through the loop again.

Hope this makes sense.

 Howard

EDIT: Make sure the file you're uploading (your picture file) is in jpg format.  That way the interface/upload software will automatically size it for you. 

Geoloaf's picture
Geoloaf

Finally!  Thanks for help David and Howard!  The problem was a # in the title of the photo on my hard drive.  My HD was okay with the #, but TFL didn't like it and wouldn't upload the photo until I deleted the #.  Whew, problem solved.  OK, so here's my first loaf ever, after 2 SD catastrophes not knowing what I was doing.  TFL is largely responsible for my first success.  Any comments, suggestions?  (Thanks again to those who helped me with the photo thing.)1st loaf EVER! (SD wheat)1st loaf EVER! (SD wheat)

Keith

Geologist + beer + sourdough = trouble for sure!

Soundman's picture
Soundman

Double Congratulations, Keith!

First, congratulations on your first SD bread! It's a big moment, the first time your own private culture of microbes leavens some dough into bread. It looks beautiful! How does it taste?

Congrats also on figuring out that nasty '#'! I hate it when stuff like that gets in the way. So you got the photo upload thing down.

Please let us know what recipe you used?

Great work!

Soundman (David)

Geoloaf's picture
Geoloaf

You want the recipe, huh?  Well...  a little background first.  My Dad did SD in the 70's when I was growing up (I'm 42 now.).  Ironically, I didn't really like the taste of it then.  More recently, like since the 80's I guess, I've come to love SF SD bread with clam chowder and Anchor Steam beer!  YUM!  The starter I have now came from my (38yo) brother who lives in Santa Rosa, CA, where he is a winemaker in the Napa Valley and has also gotten into SD after taking a general cooking/baking course at the Culinary Institute of America, also in Napa Valley.  Sounds real impressive, huh?!  Anyway, my Dad visited him, then sent me a bit of his starter through the US mail.  Somehow it made it okay and I kept it going with AP flour and warm water on the counter overnight, then into the fridge.  Along with the starter, my Dad also sent me copies of his old annotated recipes from the 70's.  I don't know what book they originally came from, but they're all scribbled up with notes and corrections  and additional recipes he figured out.  His notes also talk about the long sponge vs short(?) sponge methods.  So...  I immmediately went to his old SF SD bread recipe and gave it a whirl.  After 2 embarassing failures resulting from not fully understanding how dough mixing and proofing works, I finally got one to work.  That's the one you see above.  So, at long last, here's my recipe/method.

1 cup starter

1 1/2 cups warm water

4 cups flour (I used regular old AP flour)

2 teaspoons salt and

2 teaspoons sugar

I mixed all that up after dinner one evening and let it proof until late the next morning.  Then I punched it down and threw it back into the mixer (KitchenAid stand mixer w/ dough hook) to knead.  Seeing that it was still pretty sticky, and having found some tips on TFL, I added

1/2 cup whole wheat flour (tentatively) and

a pinch of additional sugar (so it wouldn't turn out white like the previous failure)

I mixed/kneaded all that in very well, patted it out on a floured cutting board to about 1 1/2 inch thick, folded in the edges, flipped it over, continued folding and rolling into the bottom to tighten up the top, and plopped it back down on the cutting board to rise.  While it was proofing, I ran out and bought some oven tiles and a big SS bowl, a result of reading this post: http://www.thefreshloaf.com/node/5412/baking-rye-breads-under-cloche.  When I returned and tried to pick up the nicely risen dough and place it in the preheated oven, it stuck to the board and collapsed as I pulled on it.  Worried about its fate, I rekneaded, refolded and set it on a piece of aluminum foil (I didn't have any parchment paper) and let it rise again to twice its size, about 1 1/2 hours.  Relieved that it had risen again, I put it (on the foil) in the 450dF oven on the tiles and set the SS bowl over it.  40 agonizing minutes later I removed the bowl to find a beautifully risen, albiet somewhat pale, loaf of SD!  It smelled and tasted fairly sour, had nice crumb, and a crust that was about as pliable/flexible as shoe leather, although much tastier and easier to chew!  I was very excited!  Now that that loaf's been eaten, it's time to try another one.  This time I'll remove the SS bowl about half way through to brown the crust.

So that's my recipe... and history and method in dissertation form!  I hope there's no limit on length in these posts.  That ended up WAY longer than I anticipated!

 

Keith