The Fresh Loaf

A Community of Amateur Bakers and Artisan Bread Enthusiasts.

Panama

david earls's picture
david earls

Panama

Not sure exactly what this is - sort of focaccia, sort of ciabatta, sort of baguette - even sort of pain de mie.. So I'm calling it "Panama" - or pain a moi.

Pretty classic straight up lean artisan bread: 80% hydration, 1.75% salt, no fat, pinches of yeast in preferment and dough. Four stretch and folds.

Bake it in a covered stoneware chestnut roaster for a 200g-flour loaf. Caramelized onions on top. Crust is slightly chewy, not crunchy, but the overall texture of the loaf offers that most pleasing resistance to the teeth - needs chewing.

Sorry no pics - ate the whole thing. The dough at last stretch and fold has a lot of large bubbles, but I think that like pain de mie, the lid forces the crumb to collapse back into itself - so almost no big bubbles.

A lovely loaf, really, and everything I like in bread is right here: a neutral flavor that doesn't deteriorate through the chewing, but which requires many chews - 50 chews a bite at least.

Another micro-baker victory here!!!

 

Mini Oven's picture
Mini Oven

When you want a change from lots of chewing, or want more chews per bite let us know more detail about the rise times and temps for a variation.  

Chewiness is related to crumb bubbles, their size and the tiny bubbles between the bigger ones and when the loaf was baked during the fermenting process and the ability of the dough to trap fermenting gasses.   Bake just before the desired amount of trapped gas is in the dough allowing for trapped gas and water (changes to steam) to expand the loaf as it heats in the oven.  Chew has a lot to do with the crust and how the steam is held on the surface during the bake.  Also the type of flour and the amount of gluten in it.  Gluten tends to be chewy.  (What kind of flour did you use?)

Sounds like you have all the chew factors tuned in on "max."  :)

 

david earls's picture
david earls

when I do lean artisan. I use either King Arthur Sir Lancelot (about 14% gluten), Gold Medal Better for Bread (around 12%), or the two in combo. These days a lot of my effort is going into lean artisan, but I now have a Pullman pan as well, and I'm transferring my loaf recipes for that pan.

The Panama loaf was really quite delicious, but not as chewy as some of my others. Having a really neutral flavor is critical (to me) when you're "going long" on the chew - 

Not sure exactly why, but the first rise after overnight preferment is usually quite slow for me. Usually my preferment is 50% of total flour. Maybe because I use so little yeast in the preferment (0.25-0.5%) and then about the same in dough. Subsequent proofs are much quicker. I proof with something I call my "proofing stick", a little piece of 1x2" marked in inches that stands beside my proofing container. I try to get bulk to 2-4x volume. Getting spectacular oven spring now after experimenting with oven configuration, and closing in on crustiness and crust color.

Just feeling (and eating) my way through this - and having a blast - 

david earls's picture
david earls

Couple of pics of my Panama loaf. This is baked in a 6.25" earthenware chestnut roaster. Both crust and crumb are surprisingly tender. This one went 10 mins covered at 450, and 15 more uncovered.

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Mini Oven's picture
Mini Oven

mmmmm  :)  I can almost taste the onions!    

Yeast appears to start out slow when first introduced to a food source, but with each passing hour or so, the yeast amount doubles...  2x2   4x2  8x2  so it increases exponentially with time.  Depending on when you slow down yeast it could have greater or lesser effects.