Monge

Hey All,

Just wanted to share with you some baguettes that I made last night...  Nothing fancy, but I think they turned out pretty nice except for the slightly burnt bottom on a few of them...  These are 65% hydration using a firm 60% hydration sourdough starter and active dry yeast...  I think it's a variation on Eric Kaiser's Baguette Monge, but using American flours, and a firm sourdough starter instead of a liquid one...  It's probably closer to Dominique Saibron's baguettes that do use the firm sourdough starter... 

Also, the 2nd one from the right is the one I cut into.  It slid off my peel before I even opened the oven door.  I caught it before it hit the ground, but in doing so stretched it out, and ruined my slashes...  It tasted fine, but looks a little skinnier than the other 7...  Posting the recipe below.  Enjoy!

Tim

Ingredients:

Total Dough Weight: 2850g

Yield: 8 x 15" baguettes at 280g weight after bake

75% AP - 1140g (Whole Foods 365)

20% BF - 304g (KA Bread Flour)

5% Graham Flour - 76g (Bob's Red Mill)

20% Firm Sourdough Starter - 304g (straight from fridge fed day before)

65% Water - 988g

2% Kosher Salt - 30g

0.4% Active Dry Yeast - 6g (1 1/2 tsp)

Directions:

Day before:

Feed sourdough starter, or convert liquid starter to firm starter.  Leave on counter at room temp for 4 hrs, refrigerate until ready to use.

Bake day:

1.  Measure out all ingredients.

2.  Place water and sourdough starter cut in pieces in large mixing bowl.  Then, add all dry ingredients at once, mix with wooden spoon until all is combined in a shaggy dough, knead in bowl with wet hands for about 5 minutes, cover and autolyse for 30 minutes.

3.  After autolyse, knead dough 50 strokes in bowl with wet hands, cover and let rest for 30 mins.

4.  Turn dough in bowl, cover and let rest for 30 mins.

5.  Turn dough in bowl, cover and let rest for 1 hr.

6.  After rest, dough should have doubled in size.  To test, poke dough with a floured finger.  If impression remains, dough is ready.

7.  Divide into 8 pieces approx 356g, preshape and cover with cloth and plastic, let rest for 15 minutes.

8.  Final shape baguettes, place 1st 4 in (lightly floured) linen couche on a tray, place in plastic bag, and retard in refrigerator for 30 minutes.  Shape remaning 4, and proof for 30-45 minutes in linen couche.  Also place these 4 in large plastic bag so they don't dry out.  Arrange 2 baking stones in the oven along with a steam pan, and preheat to 500F with convection.

9.  When oven reaches 500F and 1st set of baguettes are proofed, carefully turn baguettes onto wooden peel, slash 5 times, place in oven.  When all baguettes are in, pour 3/4 cup of water into steam pan (use oven mitts), close door and bake for 8 minutes at 480F with convection, rotate and bake at 450F with convection for another 12-15 minutes or until internal temp reaches 210F.  Take out 2nd set of baguettes from fridge while these are baking.

10.  When first set of baguettes are out of the oven, preheat oven to 500F with convection.  When oven reaches temp, bake the 2nd set.

11.  Cool for 1 hr before eating.

Notes: I preheated my oven to 550F with convection...  This probably caused a few of them that were started on the bottom stone to have slighly burnt bottoms...  Also, my firm sourdough starter was started with organic rye flour, and then at some point converted to AP or bread flour.  Now it has some graham flour in it...  I feed it every few days with either 50g AP, and 30g water, or 100g AP and 60g water, leave it on the counter for 4 hours, feed it again, and return it to the fridge.  I usually use it 1-3 days after the last feeding...

Also, I have been seeing a few thread suggesting that you can bake breads in cold oven without preheating it to 50F to 100F above your desired bake temp...  I just have to say that that is bull-crap! at least for making baguettes, which need that initial high heat from the oven/baking stone to get the full oven spring, and rich carmelized crust...

 Submitted to Yeastspotting on 2/9/10

Last week, I received the book "100% Pain" by Eric Kayser that I had ordered. I had always wanted to try the recipe for his famous "Baguette Monge". First, I was surprised to see the note stating that all the recipes in the book have been tested on a bread machine and second that recipes for all his breads call for straight room temperature fermentation. Checking his website, I found a quote saying that his breads all go through a long fermentation, so being the tinkerer that I am, I decided not to follow his recipe verbatim but instead to use the same formulation (more or less) and modify the execution.

I have been experimenting making baguettes using the James MacGuire techniques that Shiao-Ping had introduced to TFL a couple of weeks ago and have found them simple and easy, resulting in a beatifully developed dough. The baguettes were very good but I thought the high hydration made shaping and scoring the baguettes difficult and the crumb, although light was not as open as I would have liked. MacGuire had warned about the same effects of high hydration on baguettes in his article in "The Art of Eating".

I have had good success with the Anis Bouabsa baguette recipe and techniques that David (dmsnyder) had adapted from Janedo. I found that the cold delayed fermentation helps develop a more chewy and open crumb and gives the bread a more complex flavor.

So, this past weekend, I decided to combine these favorite techniques and use them to make my version of Eric Kayser's "Baguette Monge". I will call it the "Kayser Baguette Monge Hybrid". Here is the formulation:

Kayser uses a Type 65 Flour so I chose a flour mix that approximate the original. The resulting protein content is around 12.5%. Note that although the French Flours have lower protein content US Flours, I read that most French bakers add Malted Barley Flour and Vital Wheat Gluten to their dough.

Kayser uses 58% hydration. I upped it to 72%.

- 100 Gms Liquid Levain (100% hydration)

- 300 Gms KAF AP Flour

- 150 Gms KAF Bread Flour

- 50 Gms KAF WWW Flour

- 345 Gms Water

- 1 Gm Instant Yeast

- 9 Gms Sea Salt

Mix the Levain with the Water then add the Flour Mix, Salt and Yeast. Mix by hand for 2 mins and follow the MacGuire stretching and folding in the bowl at 45 mins interval instead of 1 hr.

At the end of the folding, the dough should rise by 25%. Cover and refrigerate for 24 hours. The dough should double in size.

Divide the dough into third and shape into boules. Rest seam side down for 1 hr.

Shape into baguettes with pointy ends and proof for 45 min. 

Score the loaves and bake in preheated 460 degrees F oven with steam for 10 mins.

Continue baking at 430 degrees F without steam for 12 mins.

Turn of heat and let baguettes rest for 5 mins in oven.

Remove baguettes and let cool on rack.

The baguettes crackled and popped while cooling on the rack and developed nice "shingles".

The grignes opened up nicely and the crust had a beautiful amber color and toasty caramel aroma. 

The oven spring was great and the cross section came out nice and round. The crumb was cream color and very open with different size "alveoles". The gelatinization made it slightly translucent.

The crust was thin and crackly with notes of roasted hazelnut and mocha. The crumb had a nice chewy mouthfeel with a tangy, creamy and sweet toasty wheat finish.

This was definitely the best baguette that I have baked to date , a real keeper.

And the quest for the Ultimate Baguette continues...

Don