Hello,

Yes, you can certainly do that, but with the additional factor of chilling the loaves and letting them slowly proof overnight, you'll likely run into a few snafus.  Don't get upset about it when you do -- there's no other way to figure out what yeast quantity, bulk ferment time, or ideal retarding time will work in your particular situation. 

I'd say you'll have to reduce your yeast quantity considerably (maybe start with 0.3% instant yeast), and you might not want to go beyond 30 minutes of bulk fermentation at first.  Adjust that yeast level or time (the next time you experiment) to accomodate whatever happens afterward.  If the loaves collapse overnight in the 'fridge, you might cut back on ferment time or yeast next time.  You can do the opposite if the loaves don't rise much.

Temperature control is critical.  You'll have to familiarize yourself with strategies used to control dough temp, which probably shouldn't exceed 74 degrees in this case.  Jeffrey Hamelman wrote a great book that can help you with that calculation, and it's a valuable source of information about bread baking.  Also, Nancy Silverton's bread book talks a lot about retarding loaves.

If they've proofed properly, you can score and load the loaves into the oven right out of the 'fridge.  If they're a little underproofed, you might need to let them sit out at room temp a while to finish rising.

Good luck with it.

--Dan DiMuzio

I do our baguettes with a no knead recipe that I kind of modified from a couple others. Mix it, do a couple stretch and folds, stick it in the fridge, and bake the next day. Having time to bake on you schedule could be tough though. I bake short baguettes in a chicago metallic baguette pan (each loaf is about 315g of dough). They don't need to proof super long to still get oven spring (maybe 30 minutes) and I bake at 500 for about 15-18 minutes. Works fine, but for you it may be tough to get the oven preheated, the loaves shaped and proofed, the loaves baked, and then cooled enough to make lunch. You could save a little time by shaping baguettes the night before and sticking them in the fridge.

I have three ideas.  

I really only have time to bake on the weekends especially in warm weather (hot in Northern California this time of year), so I bake bread, slice it, and freeze the slices 2 to a zipper sandwich bag with a piece of parchment or wax paper between.  On school mornings my kids zap them in the microwave for about 20 seconds, and the bread tastes freshly baked.

When the weather is cooler (and I'm not worried about heating the house first thing in the morning by firing up the oven) I often  make up a batch of Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day dough.  First thing in the morning I take some dough out of the bucket, roll it into a loaf pan, turn the oven on to preheat while the dough is proofing, and bake.  It's about an hour from fridge to cooling rack  (your bread would be just out of the oven around 7 a.m. and that's too hot to slice and make sandwiches yet).  

Finally, a bread machine might meet your needs.  You could set it up before bedtime so a fresh, cooled bread would be ready in the morning.  I've dug out my old machine and used it this summer when it is just too hot for the oven.  I just find that there is a lot of waste with bread machine bread because of the shape and the hole at the bottom, but it comes in handy sometimes.  

One more suggestion.  If you add some sourdough starter to your dough, it will have better keeping qualities.  I think the ratio is to add about 30% of the total flour weight in 100% hydration sourdough starter.  It's enough to help the dough stay fresh but doesn't necessarily add a sour flavor.  

At night Form loaves in baking pans and place in fridge, ready for baking in the morning.  Overnight Cold will allow a slower rise.  Bake straight from the fridge in the morning.  If they rise too much - accordingly cut back the amount of yeast. I agree with Dan DiMuzio - this may take some experimenting, but worth the smell of fresh bread baking in the morning. 

Thank you all very much for your suggestions.

My experiments have all failed.  I've actually only experimented four times since I posted.  I tried putting the dough in after the first rise, I tried after the second rise, I tried later at night (less fridge time) and I tried longer rise in the morning.

Nothing worked.

It simply took too long to recover in the mornings. It never recovered. The finished product was too flat, not sufficiently risen.

Since putting those attempts on the shelf I've discovered 'bread improver' and have been experimenting with it and my day time baking.  I've actually got a thread here somewhere talking about that.

I'm keen to try the 'two slices frozen' system (with microwave, never thought of that) and the  'artisan bread in five minutes' dough, whatever that is.

For the sake of anyone following this thread hoping for an answer to the same question I can report the first poster was apparently right, it is not an easy thing to do and requires much trial and error.

So far I've failed. Too convincingly for me to want to continue down that track. I'll try those two I've just mentioned.

regards,

 ab :)

For my baguettes I place the bulk dough immediately into the fridge for an overnight proof—takes up much less space.

Then in the morning, divide, form and allow for final proofing while your oven comes to temp. I find that the cold dough is much easier to work with.

Word of caution: Double check the amount of yeast you are using though. A recipe might not necessarily be compensating for a long overnight proof. It really takes very little yeast for an overnight proof and you certainly don't want the dough to overproof. 

Well the short answer is that I'm not taking notes, not doing anything scientifically enough.

I take the point. I fully understand, I appreciate it.  When I get set up for it - I don't even have a thermometer at the moment - and have the time - everything I do gets done in a welter of incidents, ever seen a 'harassed mum' comedy, well it's like that except I'm a dad, not a mum - then I will do it.

I will take precise measurements and note everything down.

I will vary only one variable at a time.

I will be very methodical and I fully expect I'll make some real progress.

Right now I'm stumbling around, catch as catch can, as I said.

Witness the bread improver. I researched the ingredients and didn't like what I read about the enzyme, so stopped using it. Now my bread won't rise as much as it did before! I think! Without precise measurements.....

Now I'll get some gluten. All I've been able to find is some high gluten flour sold in 500mg packs as an additive. I'll try it. It might be the right stuff, it might not. Stumble on....

Measuring the yeast accurately, for instance, is something I need to do...  I just do a vague 'two teaspoons' with a spoon that I'm not sure is a teaspoon or not.

So I'm a bit of a clown, doing a hit and miss thing and promising to do better later.

But I'll tell you what, the bread always tastes lovely  (I even fancy I can detect the improvement in taste when I STOP using the 'improver')  and I'm thoroughly convinced by the guy I read that was saying we should be using stone ground whole meal flour and I'm kinda planning to work  my way there....

:)

You can be as casual or as methodical as you like with bread baking, depending upon how seriously you want to approach it.

It's just that, if you decide that you want to manage the dough consistently, then you will need to be more regimented and precise to get that sort of control over the process.  And the more you need things to happen reliably on-time, the need for precision (and maybe even mastery) becomes even that much greater.

There's no sin in buying good bread from your local baker, or getting good par-baked stuff like LaBrea from the supermarket.  Levain breads, especially, can stay reasonably fresh for 2 or 3 days.

--Dan DiMuzio