Hi folks!, I've been making loaves, for a few months already and I'm quite satisfied with my white bread so far(this is my way to start mastering the craft)although most of the people here are doing either whole wheat or multigrain with their formulas. My question is I would like to make a big batch of biga or poolish then retard them for future use but I don't know how to compute the ratio against the dough eg: let say i would like to use 500 grams flour as base for the dough so how many percent of biga or poolish should i use. I bet big bakeries have their pre ferments always available for their everyday use.  I hope my question does make sense and thanks for considering it. your help wil be highly appreciated.

I've been trying and trying to get my sourdough bread up but have had little success.  The 1-2-3 recipe worked out ok except it was always too gloppy to make anything but ciabatta.  So I started experimenting with different forumlas, twice a day for two weeks. I think I've hit on something and I'd like some of you guys to maybe try it out and see if it works as well for someon else as it does for me.

I maintain two starters...a 100% hydration white and 100% hydration whole wheat.  I used Gold Medal AP Flour for everything, both refreshing the starter and making the dough.  If I want a wheat bread I use the wheat starter in the recipe, the same a white bread.  All ingredients are measured in grams for simplicity's sake.  So here's the formula:

1. part ripe starter

1. part water

2. parts flour

2% salt

Here's my technique.  I take a nice ripe starter and measure out the first part.  Normally I use 150g as a base.  Then I stir in 1 part water (150g) to make a slurry.  To this I add the 2 parts flour (300g) and mix in to incorporate.  I use a fork and my fingers to get everything mixed completely.  After everything is mixed I let it sit for about 20 minutes to autolyse.

After the autolyse I sprinkle in the 2% salt (12g) and give the dough a quick 5 minute knead in the bowl.  Part of this experiment was to cut down on the amount of crap I had to wash and clean up.  After the knead I let rise until doubled.  This could take anywhere from 1-3 hours.

After the dough has doubled, I flour a work surface and scrape out the dough.  It's should be a little on the sticky side but easily workable on the bench.  I've only made batards and baguettes so far, but the dough could probably hold other shapes.  I shape it into a rough oblong, give it a flatten, then do a quick letter fold and let it rest about 10 minutes.  Now a stretch, flatten and make either the baguette or batard.  I have a makeshift couche (read: old napkin) that sometimes doesn't work so well, so I tend to place the formed loaf right onto parchment with a little cornmeal on it.

After the loaf is formed you can do two things,  cover it and let it rise to about doubled.  I use spray oil to lubricate a piece of saran wrap so it won't stick to the loaf.  Again, this takes about 1-3 hours for me, your mileage may vary.  About halfway through the second rise preheat oven to 450.  Steam the oven, slash the loaf and put bread on a stone or cookie sheet.  After five minutes I give the oven another spray for more steam.  After another five minutes I give the bread a turn for even browning and reduce heat to 425 for another 15 minutes or so.  Here's how the white bread turns out...

and here's the wheat...

I've also formed the loaves and retarded overnight in the fridge.  This really brings out the sourdough twang.  I'm also experiemting with the salt percentage, 2% feels too high in some loaves. 

I would appreciate it if someone else could validate this recipe and let me know if it worked out as well for them.  Thanks!

Does anyone have a good bread formula for cemitas?  These are sandwiches served in Puebla, Mexico.  Here is a link to a recent show featuring them:

 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EYeeUUpPkks

Hi, I have been looking a lot on your site and got excited by the idea of "autolayse". Wheat is naturally water resistant so the idea of letting it sit and soak is great.  While trying to fully understand how autolayse works I ran across "stretch and fold" which also sounds wonderful.  The idea of slowly stretching and folding rather than the hard work of kneading it by hand (I don't have a mixer). I would like to know how to use these methods with all my bread baking.  How can I take recipes that my family and I already like and incorporate the autolayse and stretch and fold methods?  Does anyone know more about one or both of these methods.  I have been searching the web and all I can find are definations and a several descriptions of how wonderful the bread looks.  There must be some basic formulas for both of these methods. 

Pixy

Today, I made Peter Reinhart's master formula whole wheat bread from his new book Whole Grain Breads.  According to the text, soakers "change the way the dough performs, usually sweetening it and creating a richer more golden crust."

Normally, I never add sweetner to my sourdough recipes. Interestingly, I see that most of the recipes in the book call for a whopping 2 - 3 Tablespoons of honey or agave nectar; sugar or brown sugar, so I wonder if that is the reason why the bread is sweetened ....

Diane

Upstate NY 

Interesting article in Winter 07 newsletter from San Francisco Baking Institute on using whole grain flours in bread formulas. Discusses types of whole grain flours, effects on gluten development and suggests adjustments for water content and mixing times. The link is http://www.sfbi.com/pdfs/SFBINewsWI07.pdf