Jeffrey Hamelman's Flaxseed Rye Report
I posted a thread earlier asking about this recipe, tried again last night, waited patiently for 24 hours and just cut in tonight. The crumb is more open than my first try, I am sure it had something to do with the Sir Lancelot flour from KA I am using this time. Also used water rather than flour when I was handling the dough, which might contribute to the better crumb too. I baked 5 minutes less than last time, the crust feels less burnt. Paid extra attention during shaping to make sure there's no cracks on the surface, which I am certain is the cause for the blowout last time. Well, except that I made another mistake! I didn't flour the cloth well enough during proofing, so it got stuck to the dough a little, destroyed the smooth top. I still scored it, but the surface of the final bread is rather ugly, and I am sure the oven spring was affected. Oh well, lessons learned, next time. The frangrant and taste are fantastic though! Here are some photos:
Great job, txfarmer. It's a lovely bread and as good as it was today, the tang and taste gets even better. That's one of the things I love about sourdough rye.
Did you eat all seven slices? :-)
Ha, I was tempted, but no, I stopped at the 3rd piece. :P
The crumb looks perfect, and I don't find the crust ugly at all.
You should get a bit more oven spring by putting the loaves in a hotter over, then turning the temperature down after 10 minutes, if you are afraid of the crust getting too dark.
David
Yeah, I did follow the book's instruction to bake at 460F for the first 15 minutes, then turn down to 440 for the next 35 minutes. I think the oven spring was mostly affected by the tearing of the top skin getting out of the proofing basket, even then, it still had some OK oven spring. Next time hopefully I will get it right. Thanks for all your tips, they were really helpful!
Yes, that looks tasty, beautiful crumb, crust is fine.
:)
That's a great looking loaf Txfarmer. That's one of my favorite breads. Another thing you can do is tent the top with foil for the last 10 minutes after you turn down the heat. I have also been known to brush a little butter over the top after it comes out of the oven.
Eric
Both are excellent ideas! I brush butter on my WW loaves, should be good to do it here too. It's really yummy!
Get yourself some white rice flour and make a 50/50 mix. Use the mix on the basket and I dust the top of the loaf before I put it in the basket. I've never had one tear.
Eric
I have rice flour on hand, I will try that next time, what an easy and neat trick.