The Fresh Loaf

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alfanso's picture
alfanso

SFBI Pain au Levain "long batards"

My most recent bread comeuppance has been thanks to Msr. Calvel.  Someone recently posted a page from his book which had illustrations of differing bread forms and an accompanying table listing the features of each.  Well, it turns out that my "baguettes" are not even baguettes according to the man.  They match his characteristics of a "long batard": size, weight, shape and number of scores.  Waddya know?  Well, I'll still cheat a bit and continue to call them baguettes because I haven't noticed any bread police nearby to pinch me on this.

I'd nicked this formula from a David Snyder post about a year ago, who in turn got it from SFBI, so I guess this a nick squared.  I ran out of bread yesterday with my last batch, and the dog's bread treat bowl was running on near empty as well.  Since she doesn't get "additives" in her treats I wanted to bake something pretty straightforward.  I decided on this one, which I hadn't baked in months.  However I did post as "baguettes" the first time that I baked them.

If you are looking for an almost all AP flour dough, relatively low hydration (68%) but feels & acts like a high hydration dough, and which has a delightfully crisp snap to the crust with a lovely fresh clean taste - then this is for you.  I was trying to fit in more adjectives but there must be an editing limiter on this website ;-) .  Here is David's post.

 

Minutes away from the morning toast...

I made these extra fat - just because!

430g x 4 "long batards" (darn it)

paodecara's picture
paodecara

Retarding before dividing

Hey!

 

I bake following the Tartine method, and I was wondering about how can I go about retarding my dough before dividing it, and then having the last proofing the day after, for three hours or so. I think Ken Forkish mentions this in his book but says it's only done in bakeries and he does not talk about it any further. I want to do this so that I can bake a number of loaves at once without crowding my fridge.

 

Thanks!

dabrownman's picture
dabrownman

Sunday Poolish Pizza

It has been a while since we made pizza and this is a shame after having it again on Sunday.  We have made Giant Strides in making pizza the past couple of years.  Once we had Biaco’s pizza. the best in the USA, we knew exactly what to do take ours to another level that more than rivals Chris Boaco’s masterpieces.

We had additional firepower in that we used the last of our home grown, heirloom cherry tomatoes to make the sauce this time to go along with the home smoked smoked sausage, onions and crimini mushrooms.  The very thin pepperoni was smoked but done elsewhere half a good as we would have smoked it.   The dough had our usual sundried tomatoes, fresh garlic and fresh rosemary in it.

The 10% pre-fermented flour, Albertsons bread flour, at 100% hydration with a pinch of Instant yeast made for the 4 hour poolish.  We added half Lafama AP and half Albertson’s flour for the dough and brought the hydration down to 70% with 2% sea salt, olive oil and sugar.  The EVOO and sugar are there to get the dough to brown properly in the 8 minutes it is in the 550 F oven.

The gluten is developed with 3 sets of slap and folds on 30 minute intervals and 2 sets of stretch and folds. The slops were 50, 20 and 10 and the stretches were from the major compass points.  The add ins went in on the least set of slap and folds

 As some as the gluten development as done, we oiled a bowl and put the dough in it to retard for 24 hours.  Do not forget this step if you want a dough that is flavorful and extensible but strong enough not to tear when making the pie.

We took the dough out fo the fridge 3 hours before we wanted to stretch it out.  1 hour after warming up we divided it into (3) 250 g pieces for 3 pies and let it proof on the counter for 2 more hours.  This dough stretched easily but we rolled it because we love our alligator rolling pin that is perfect for this. 

The only fresh topping was some fresh mozzarella and the red and orange peppers.  We had a blend of Parm, smoked provolone, asiago, Romano and mozzarella for the base cheese with fresh grated Romano and basil for garnish.

This pizza was thin, crisp and killer - as good as you can get anywhere on the planet.  We have cut down on the topping thickness and increased the flavor dramatically,  Now Chris Bianco has something to shoot for:-)  The next step is to make it on our temporary WFO brick oven so stay tuned.

It's not all about pizza.  Gumbo and cheesecake are OK too

JamieOF's picture
JamieOF

Very Low % Levain With LOOONNG Ferment Question

I was thinking about trying this over the weekend but was wondering if anyone had any experience with it.

25 gms active mature starter (~ 6%) / 288 gms of water / 425 gms WAP unbleached and 6-8 gms of salt. That would work out to about a 68% hydration

What I'm looking for is a long room temperature bulk fermentation, 12-18 hours or longer, with proofing details to be worked out. Right now I just want to see what would happen with the ferment stage.

One of the things I'm concerned with is gluten degradation (don't remember the big word for that process, proto-something-or-other). Would that be a factor?

Jamie

Kendrisa55's picture
Kendrisa55

Tudor ovens?

I am a member of a medieval recreation group, and I want to get into bread baking. I want to construct my own oven that would be historically accurate to something that wouldve been used in 16th century Tudor England. I know cob ovens were used, but are there other options availabe to me? I can't seem to find any further information about the varying oven types. Thank you!

Danni3ll3's picture
Danni3ll3

Einkorn Sourdough

Since I was on a roll making bread, I thought I would make a simple loaf with just flour and no add-ins. The plan was to have a couple of these loaves as testers for baking in the portable pizza oven that one of my brothers made for us.

So here goes:

  1. Autolyse 575 g of water with 30 g local yogurt, 550 g unbleached no additives flour, 300 g fresh milled einkorn, and 102 g Robin Hood Multigrain Best for Bread flour. I let that sit for a couple of hours.
  2. Then I added 22 g of salt and 266 g of a four stage levain (80% hydration), as well as 50 g of water.
  3. I did four sets of folds 20 to 30 minutes apart and then let rise till double. That took about 6 hours since I did part of the fermenting on the counter and part in the oven with the door cracked open.
  4. I divided it into 3 loaves, let rest for a while and then put into baskets. 
  5. The loaves proofed overnight in the fridge.
  6. The next day, I baked one of them as per usual... heat oven to 475 F with pots in, load pots, lower heat to 450 F, bake 25 minutes, remove lids, drop heat to 425 F and bake a further 20-25 minutes.

The other two I tried to bake in the pizza oven. This is a steel oven with two cavities. One where you build the fire, and the chamber above where we normally cook pizza. Hubby lined the upper part with fire brick and my brother built a sleeve that would keep the smoke off the bread. Hubby was not in the mood to do this but fired up the oven anyhow. He then informed me that he didn't have enough wood to keep this going for very long. The oven was at 600 F and even though I knew it was too hot, I slid the loaves onto the firebricks. We put the cover back to keep the heat in and I went back in the house to mind the loaves that were cooking in the oven. Well, less than 20 minutes go by and hubby comes to tell me that he is smelling burnt bread. It was burnt alright! It looked like a lump of charcoal! I cut it open and was actually surprised that it was actually cooked even though it didn't rise very much and the crumb wasn't all that bad after all.

So just for laughs, here are some picts:

You can see how badly the one loaf got burned. The other has parts of it that are rescuable (is that a word?).

I cut into it while still warm so the crumb is a bit smooshed.

This is the bottom of the second loaf.

This is the pizza oven.

Anonymous baker's picture
Anonymous baker (not verified)

Pane Cafone Mark II with better crumb

After the first success I decided to re-do the recipe with slight changes. I'll post the video again and explain where I differed. 

Pane cafone (Neapolitan peasant bread) - original Italian recipe










Well first of all I used pink Himalayan salt. Not a major tangent but nevertheless. 

Instead of forming the final dough, kneading till full gluten formation, doing 2 stretch and folds 20 minutes apart and then shaping before refrigerating for 10 hours... I developed the gluten by doing 4 stretch and folds 20 minutes apart (no kneading) with the last one being a pre-shape. So i incorporated a bit more of a bulk ferment before shaping and refrigerating. 

 The last time I could only refrigerate for 4 hours but this time I got in the full 10 hours. 

This is a low hydration bread so I realise the crumb will never be open but this time was a big improvement crumb wise. 

Taste is really nice. As I described last time... Like a Biga bread only more intense flavour. 

Got-to-Baguette-Up's picture
Got-to-Baguette-Up

scoring wet dough

Hello,

I've recently discovered the towel method for steaming the oven, and am finally getting the richly colored crusts that I see at a bakery, and my loaves even have small ears!  I've never gotten ears, and I always thought it was my scoring method, but now I know it was half that, and half not steaming the oven ( I used the bowl method ).  

That being said, I know I could get better looking ears if I scored the loaves correctly, but I bake a lot of high hydration bread, mostly sourdough, and the razorblade just doesn't cut the dough like a lower hydration dough.  It either catches, and creates a 'dotted line' kind of score, or doesn't do much at all, meaning the dough seals back after the cut.  

Any techniques on how to properly score such bread (73-80% hydration)?  I try to go deep, cut fast, and I can't seem to really get anything going.   I do get ears, but they are small, and not evenly distributed on the loaf.  

Any help is much appreciated. 

 

JamieOF's picture
JamieOF

Starter & Levain Timing Manipulation Questions

Good day folks.

Real life being what it is, we can't always go by the schedule our starter wants us to, so I've been experimenting with ways to manipulate the schedule. I was wondering if any of these methods have the potential to negatively affect the end product. As a note, my WW/rye starter will peak in 4 hours or less, with the white starter peaking in the 6-7 hour range, with levains acting on a similar schedule.

  1. If I need a faster peak, I increase hydration to 125%, and subtract water from levain / dough as necessary.
  2. If I need a slower peak, I reduce hydration to 75%, and add water to levain / dough as necessary.
  3. If the starter or levain is peaking, or has already fallen slightly, but I need another hour or two, I give it a good stir and it will go through a similar, but shorter cycle. (The few times I've done this with levain, I do seem to get a tangier bread but there may be other factors causing this.)

Thanks

Jamie

BurntMyFingers's picture
BurntMyFingers

CIA sauerkraut and red onion sourdough bread?

In "The Making of a Chef" Michael Ruhlman describes a sourdough bread with sauerkraut and red onion that was so good the president of the Culinary Institute of America ate half a loaf a day. It was a regular feature in their bakery at the time (1996). Does anybody have a recipe?

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