December 28, 2015 - 6:14pm
deflated bread
I have been playing around with the recipe for an overnight sourdough from Ken Forkish (Flour, Salt, Water, Yeast), and have been having some trouble with the bread - it is coming out of the oven deflated.
I am guessing this is an issue with over-proofing, however, wanted to see if there were any other thoughts. I am using his overnight country brown recipe, letting it bulk ferment for 12 hours and then final proof for 4 hours.
any thoughts are greatly appreciated!
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Can you post the recipe?
Which are you using for your bulk and proof stages? If you're going by time, various factors such as temp can mean your dough is ready to bake before your time is up. .
I think the first thing I would try is adjusting the proof time. You could shape the dough right out of the fridge and bake it as soon as it passed the poke test - poke a floured finger into the shaped dough and if it springs back slowly, leaving a slight dent, then score and bake it. Make sure you have the oven fully pre-heated and ready, just in case!
My kitchen seems to be quite warm and my starter fairly vigorous, and I often bake breads that were bulk fermented overnight. They usually go into the oven within two hours of shaping.
the recipe is 202g white flour, 168g whole wheat flour, 108g levain, 342g water, and 11g of salt.
my kitchen is 72 degrees, and i have been leaving it out on the counter over night for the bulk ferment. the final proof sees the dough rise about 30%, but then it seems to be deflated when coming out of the oven.
i was using time and dough feel for the bulk ferment, and only time for the final proof. sounds like my final proof might be too long (and probably wouldn't hurt to do a dough feel at around 2 hours and 3 hours...
Flour: 100%
Water: 92%
Salt: 2.9%
Starter: 29%
Something doesn't sound quite right here. Hydration is very high indeed. Surprised your loaf got off the ground at all. Salt is also quite high. 2.5% of total flour when 1.8-2% is the norm. Starter, although quite high, would be ok but the timings for that amount of starter seems to be off. If I did a 12 hour bulk ferment and then a 4 hour final proof i'd just be making more starter and my kitchen is colder than 72 degrees. To be honest I think back to the drawing board is needed. Are you sure this is the recipe from the book?
looks like i typed in the wrong numbers, let me try that again
Flour: 440g (302g white flour, 138 whole wheat)
Water: 342g
Salt: 11g
Levain 108g
i was skeptical of the overnight bulk ferment, especially outside of the fridge. i re-read the recipe a few times but have not seen any mention of doing the bulk rise in the fridge.
Flour: 100%
Water: 78%
Salt: 2.5%
Levain: 25%
Total Flour: 494g
Total Water: 396g
Final Hydration: 80%
Salt: 2.2%
From memory this looks correct.
Bulk Fermentation is 12-15 hours
Final Proof is 3-4 hours (you said 4 but I seem to remember 3-4, please correct me if i'm wrong)
I do believe it is an overnight bulk ferment at room temperature but if it is over fermenting then follow the instructions for gluten formation with stretch and folds etc and bulk ferment for 12 hours (this is in total including the stretch and folds).
While you can follow up until the final proofing near enough exactly (with minor changes if need be) you've gotta go by feel even more so with final proofing. 4 hours after a 12-15 hour overnight bulk ferment might have been too long. I have followed recipes where it says 3-6 hours final proofing depending on how active your starter is and how warm it is, only to find it has been ready at 2.5 hours. Go for almost doubled and err on the side of caution.
Hope this helps.