Ciabatta

With a new baking job I've been overwhelmed to the point of hardly having time to enjoy posts on TFL let alone contribute.  But as the 4th has approached I found a day off to recharge my batteries, revisit some breads I love to bake, and try an experiment in dinner rolls involving ciabatta dough.

First, revisiting old friends - in this case Hamelman's mixed starter pain au levain, and, fougasse. 

Over time I've found that the subtle flavors that are imparted by a mixed starter of my everyday levain and rye levain, combined with a small introduction of whole wheat flour to the final dough, make this pain au levain my go-to bread of choice.  There is noticeable sourness in the baked loaf, yet not so overwhelming that it obscures the other flavors imparted by the mixture of grains and starters.

(A little crackly crust for David S here)

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Plus, I have to admit, it's just plain fun to be able to use both starters simultaneously in constructing one dough.  Usually I find myself grabbing one or the other starters out of the fridge (now that it's unbearable summer here in D.C.) and staring somewhat ruefully at the one which goes unused.  So Hamelman's mixed starter sourdough not only satisfies my taste buds, but assuages any sense of guilt over favoring one levain over the other.

The fougasse I haven't baked in some time, but I had promised compatriots at my favorite pub that on Saturday I would appear with snacks in hand.  And what better way to share than with a niçoise olive and sea salt fougasse! 

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                    The beautiful leaf shape was shortly admired and much more rapidly dismantled by my fellow pub mates!  I've tried these with a variety of additions - roasted garlic, sun-dried tomatoes, and traditional anchovies.  In any incarnation, I find them quickly devoured.  And let's face it, they are a 'fun' bread because of their distinctive shape.

My third bake on Saturday was with a traditional ciabatta dough of 72% hydration.  But instead of creating the usual 1 lb. loaves I decided to cut the dough into 1.5 oz increments and bake dinner rolls with them - ciabattinis as I like to call them. 

The dough makes for a quick and easy dinner roll that can be bagged and frozen once cooled, ready to be pulled out and thawed as needed.  Most of my dinner rolls contain healthy doses of butter, so I find this very simple roll - just flour, water, salt and yeast - to be a nice change and a wonderful sop for any dish that contains oils or juices.

The other eventful recent occurrence was a delightful 2-day workshop at King Arthur Flour in mid-June on wood-fired oven baking, taught by Dan Wing who, with Alan Scott, wrote the 'bible' on wfo's - The Bread Builders.  It was an eye-opener for me in that my conceptions of wfo's as mainly pizza makers were thrown out the window as we not only baked wonderful breads, but cooked equally wonderful meals on them. Those who are interested in reading more about my second 'excellent adventure at KAF' can find my recounting here.

Happy baking and Happy 4th of July to all!

Larry

Good Afternoon everyone,

I would like to share a picture from my ciabatta i baked today afternoon.

I mixed up the dough in the morning around 11am ish. Normaly mix it the night before but this time i never had the time for it. Anyway. I placed the sticky dough into a well oiled shallow container and covered with cling film. Let it rise until 2pm ish. Then strech-fold it once and left it in the tub until 4pm. I switched on my oven for 190C to heat. I poured the dough onto a well floured table and then devided into two. Brushed with some olive oil, dusted with flour and let it rest for 30min. Than carefully I lifted onto a baking sheet and chucked into the oven. It was take abt 25min to bake them.

The colour was lovely golden, nice crispy crust and delicius crumb. Normaly the longer fermentation results with a more open-crumb structure but it was still lovely.

Ingredients: 260gr flour, 230gr water, 6gr dry yeast, 1 tbsp olive oil, 1 tbsp salt + extra flour for dusting, extra oil for brushing.  

I based my recipe on a similar recipe submitted by LilDice on May 10, 2007.     

Happy Baking,

    Zoltan

Hey All,

Just wanted to share with you my bake from last night.  Ciabatta blobs.  I was planning to bake something else, but switched plans last minute...  I'm happy with them.  They have the most open crumb that I have gotten in a long time...  Enjoy!

Recipe is below.

Tim

Recipe

1000g Bread Flour

200g Firm Sourdough Starter (60% hydration)

800g Water

24g Kosher Salt

6g Active Dry Yeast (approx 2 tsp)

2030g Total Dough Yield

Instructions:

7:00pm – Weigh out all ingredients.  Place firm SD starter along with water in large mixing bowl.  Then, add all dry ingredients on top, mix well with wooden spoon and plastic scraper.  Cover and let rest for 30 minutes.

7:30pm – In bowl, turn dough using wet hands and French fold method until dough is smooth.  4-8 strokes.  Cover and let rest.

8:00pm – Turn dough using French fold or letter fold method in bowl using wet hands, cover and let rest.

8:30pm – Turn dough using wet hands, cover and let rest.

9:00pm – Turn dough using wet hands, cover and let rest.

9:30pm – Turn dough using wet hands, cover and let rest.

9:45pm – Turn dough using wet hands, place on well floured linen couche on a sheet pan in 1 piece seam side down.  Flour top, cover, place in large plastic bag, proof for 1 hr.  Arrange 2 baking stones and a steam pan in oven, preheat to 550F with convection.

10:50pm – Using a bench scraper, cut dough blob into 4 roughly equal pieces, stretch them out lightly, place onto floured peel and place in oven directly on baking stone.  When all the loaves are in, pour 1 cup of water into steam pan, close oven door, turn down oven to 450F, no convection, bake for 40 minutes, rotating them between the stones halfway through the bake.  Cool completely before cutting.

This is a project I have been working on and haven't fully perfected yet, but I think I am getting there. I am using King Arthur Whole Wheat flour and my four year old Carl Griffith's starter that I have bult into a whole wheat starter. The dough is at 76% hydration and involves a lengthy cold delayed ferment. Still feels a bit heavy for a ciabatta, but I think I may get it in a couple more tries.

And sorry for the bad pictures. I am currently shopping for a better camera.

Every end of the week,  I'm so looking forward to my baking.  I think it has become an obsession.
Baguette on Friday night, with my old dough from the 5 minutes fresh baked bread.  I forgot to add yeast and salt to the dough, but it worked as well, as I had put aside for slow retard rise.  
I think at least I got the scoring right this time.  Better than most other times. Click here for details.

Ciabatta on Saturday morning.
Woke up this morning, thinking about my Ciabatta dough waiting for me.  I was excited to see how it turns out.  Lovely crumbs,  soft on the inside,  crispy on the outside.  Click here to see details.



Well,  I'm going to make chicken sandwich for lunch this afternoon.
Jenny www.foodforthoughts.jlohcook.com
 

Hey All,

Just wanted to catch up on my blogging here and post some pics of some 80% WW bread and ciabatta from my 1/19/10 bake.  I'll post recipes if requested...

Enjoy!

Tim

Ciabatta Recipe: http://www.thefreshloaf.com/node/16361/12210-ciabatta-and-country-miche

80% Whole Wheat Bread Recipe:

Ingredients:

80% WW Flour (1014g)

20% Bread Flour (254g)

85% Water (1078g)

2.2% Kosher salt (30g)

8% Firm Sourdough Starter (60% Hydration) (100g)

1 1/8 tsp Active Dry Yeast

Makes 2500g dough.

Directions:

7:30pm - Mix all ingredients into shaggy dough with no dry bits, transfer to oiled plastic bin, cover, autolylse for 30 mins.

8:05pm – Knead dough using French fold method 8x, cover, rest.  (Do not use extra flour.  Use lightly wet hands)

8:35pm - Turn dough in bin, cover.

9:05pm - Turn dough in bin, cover.

9:35pm - Turn dough in bin, cover.

10:15pm – Divide into 4, preshape.

10:30pm – Divide into 4, final shape, place into linen lined baskets, proof 45-60 minutes.  Arrange baking 2 stones on separate levels (1 one space from bottom, 1 two spaces down from top, and the long side of the stone should be front to back) and steam pan in oven, preheat to 550F with convection. (I use an aluminum loaf pan filled with lava rocks for my steam pan)

11:30pm – Gently and quickly transfer loaves to a peel, slash as desired, place directly onto stone in oven.  When all the loaves are in, Add 1 cup of water to steam pan, close oven.  Turn down to 450F with convection and bake for 20 minutes.  Rotate, turn down to 425F with convection and bake for another 18 minutes or until internal temp reaches 210F.  Cool completely for about 3-4 hours or overnight before cutting and eating...

Today I made Ciabatta Rolls from the formula found in "Local Breads".  This is of course a very wet dough but since there isn't really shaping involved it's pretty fun to work with.  Instead of loaves I stretched the dough out and used a pizza cutter to make rolls. 

I placed these on parchment and let rise for about 30 minutes, until they start to get 'pillowy' - yes a very technical state of dough.

Pop them in the oven and in a few minutes you have great rolls.

Sorry, no crumb shots, these are for a potluck tomorrow.  They are really light though so I'm pretty sure the crumb is as you would expect, open and chewy.