Help with Coccodrillo Ciabatta Bread
I tried making this last night and subbed out some "discard" sourdough starter to use it up. I have 100% hydration starter so for 200g I figured sub out 100g of flour 100g of water. Then followed the recipe, at first it climbed the paddle then switched to bread dough (on KA) and kept going. It never "pulled up from the bottom" so after about 40 min I added tbls's of flour once or twice to see if it helped, no change. It was def showing window pane though. So moved it to greased container and watched, at the 2.5 times size (waiting for triple) it suddenly stopped growing. Then it started to fall, so I went to the next step immediatley. The dough was basically impossible to work with and I threw 3/4 away after wrestling with and then throwing one in the oven but it had to be reworked first just to get it on the parchment. Could I have overworked the dough? There was zero oven rise on pizza stone. Please help. I want to try again maybe with no subbing but I am now scared about how long to beat it. Help is appreciated.
Hi CocoZ,
I don't have much experience with this formula, and can't help on the subbing out IDY for levain/sourdough front. But I ran three quick "experiments" with it and came to some detail and conclusions that I documented here on TFL last October. Even if it doesn't help with the conversion from commercial to SD, you may still be able to glean something valuable from my experience. Also look at this Ciril Hitz video , particularly between minutes 6 and 9.
And - if you will be mixing anything in a mixer at high speed (should be using the dough hook and not the paddle) for anything more than a few minutes, you should seriously consider using very cold water, perhaps refrigerated flour and even subbing some of the water out for small ice cubes or ice chips. What you don't want is the mixing friction to superheat your dough. All you are looking for is that the dough comes off the sides and bottom of the mixing bowl, you hear a distinct slapping sound of the dough as it whips against the sides of the bowl and develop a good window pane.
You also have a duty to stand sentry by the mixer so that it doesn't take a walk off the countertop and that the dough doesn't climb up over the top of the hook. Shut the mixer and ease the climbing dough back into the bowl.
Good luck and keep posting...
alan
But from my (very limited) experience with sourdough, when it starts to fall, it's run out of food and needs to be fed. I think thats why you got no oven spring.
I think it needed to go into the oven sooner.
Hope this works out for you.
Happy baking :)
I used to make this all the time and have never had anything but perfect results. This is a recipe that was developed as a yeasted bread, you can't just substitute tired starter and expect it to behave the same.
The thing I love so much about this recipe is that it is so simple and pretty quick with remarkable results. Here's how I do it:
Mix Flour and water in KA bowl - autolyse 30 min
Add salt and yeast and start beating with dough hook (I use the hook from beginning to end). Bring the speed up in steps until the KA is running full speed and beating the ever lovin shit outta the dough.
Anywhere from 10 -20 min the dough will come together, clean the sides of the bowl. I wait until I can see the dimple on the bottom of th KA bowl. That's my indicator that it's done.
Stretch plastic wrap over the KA bowl and let it rise (usually 2.5 hrs does it)
Flour hands and well flour work surface. Dump out dough, work it slightly to get the big bubbles out. This is an insanely sticky dough and will require ample flour. shape into ball(s), spray with oil and flour liberally.
After an hour grab the risen dough, stretch it out and drop it upside down on a parchment covered baking sheet. Bake for 20 min @ 500 deg. No steam, no stone. awesome oven spring and a great crust.
Actually I didn't sub starter I added it to the dough and used yeast. I had it "clean the sides of the bowl" from 15 min in but continued to beat it til about 40 minutes passed because it was supposed to "lift off the bottom of the bowl" and never did. I had windowpane. I held down my mixer. When it fell is when I lost what seems like all gluten elasticity. The dough previously stretched beautifully in previous stages then ripped and tore like a thick batter. I have seen muffin recipes with more gluten. The loaf I managed to cook was flat and few holes.
I appreciate the response as I should have known from years of experience, never sub anything out the first time of a recipe. I have been having such great luck with my sourdough boules that I got cocky. Well it got me to join here so at least something positive came of it, I stopped lurking. I will take the tips here and try again, fingers crossed because I could see me using this often in the future!
I'm no bread scientist but my guess would be that it was over kneaded in the mixer. Next time stop when it gets to the "cleaning the bowl" stage. I bet it'll turn out great.
I was wondering if its possible to over work gluten to the point of it "breaking" but couldn't find that information anywhere.
Thanks for the help everyone! I made a half batch today and cut 1 loaf into 4 sandwich size and 1 loaf, as you can see great success this time. Special thanks to Paradiso's advice, it helped me a lot.