The Fresh Loaf

A Community of Amateur Bakers and Artisan Bread Enthusiasts.

TBF (First Time Baker)

TheBrickLayer's picture
TheBrickLayer

TBF (First Time Baker)

Hi folks, 

I baked my first batch of bread today---following Michael Pollan's recipe out of Cooked, a modified Tartine loaf---and it was quite the failure. 

I'll give as much info as possible here to see if anyone can help me out. 

Recipe (very slightly modified from Pollan's): 

Starter: 50g white flour, 50g wheat flour, 100g warm water, 20% previous day's starter. 

Leaven: 100g wheat flour, 100g white flour, 200g water, 35 g starter

Bread: 600g wheat flour, 400g white flour, 900g water, 25g salt

***

Starter: My starter is doing great. Nice and bubbly a while after every feeding. Smells fruity and pleasant. 

Leaven: The leaven for this loaf didn't rise very much. Maybe about half what I was expecting. It did, however, float when dropped in some warm water. I figured that was a good sign. 

Bread: I pre-soaked the flour the night before while the leaven was rising. The following morning I added my leaven to the soaked flour. Note: Pollan's recipe calls for *half* the leaven; I added the whole thing, assuming it wouldn't matter. (I told you, this is my first time.)

Every hour for the next four hours, during the bulk fermentation period, I'd fold the dough over itself by way of quarter-turns of the bowl. At the end of bulk fermentation, the dough smelled rather bland---not "yeasty and slightly sour," as Pollan's recipe advises it should. 

After bulk fermentation I divided the dough up, shaped it into two globes, and left it to rest for twenty minutes. Then I flipped the globes over and shaped them into the "rough rectangle of dough" the recipe advises. After this I dropped them into their proofing bowls (two glass mixing bowls, on the smaller side), and let them proof for around three hours on a warm windowsil. They didn't seem to rise all that much, though they definitely rose some.

Near the end of proofing, my mother-in-law smelled the dough and said it had a distinctly "Elmer's glue" smell to it. I sniffed; darn it, she was right. Not gross but not pleasant at all, either.

At the end of the proofing period, I put the dough into two cast-iron enamel-coated casserole dishes preheated in a 500 degree oven. I didn't have a razor blade or lame handy, so I tried to score the loaf with a sharpened kitchen knife; no good! There was nothing I could do so I just put the loaves into the oven with the pots covered and put the temp down to 450. 

After twenty minutes I uncovered the pots and put them back in for another twenty. I did not observe much rise at this point. (I swiped a knife across the tops of the loaves in a belated attempt at scoring.) At the end of the next twenty minutes I took them out. There was no pleasant bread smell; they didn't really smell like *anything.* The loaves themselves looked goofy and ugly. 

I attempted to remove them from the pots. Well, they were stuck in there, but good. I eventually managed to scrape them out. More or less the entire bottom part of the loaf was left stuck to the pots. 

The loaves themselves didn't actually taste *that* bad. Kind of like a slightly higher-quality cracker. Much of it was undercooked. Radically unsatisfying, given what I knew they could of been. The loaves will go to the chickens, of course. 

Please see photos for reference. 

Any help / advice would be greatly appreciated!

 

Lechem's picture
Lechem (not verified)

It's your first sourdough bread so tell us a bit about your starter. How did you make it? When did it mature and become viable?

You say that your starter behaved well but then after that it began to go downhill. You also put all the leaven into the dough and said...

"Note: Pollan's recipe calls for *half* the leaven; I added the whole thing, assuming it wouldn't matter. (I told you, this is my first time.)"

If you change the amount of leaven then you change the fermenting time and the bread.

TheBrickLayer's picture
TheBrickLayer

I made it by doing 50g white, 50g wheat, 100g warm water. Discard 15%-20% per day, add the 100g flour 100g water again. 

It probably matured in about a week. When I used it to inoculate the leaven, it was eight or nine days old. 

Could the overuse of the leaven be the source of my problems? If so, I'll try it again and follow the recipe strictly this time---but I didn't want to do so, and waste another batch, if I was doing something *else* wrong. 

It's a very healthy looking and bubbly starter. Smells good. Slightly fruity.

Lechem's picture
Lechem (not verified)

It doesn't smell acrylic which can often be the case when it is young. From your photo it looks as if it has risen, peaked and fallen. When using a starter in your dough (or a levain - which is an "off-shoot" starter) you would use it when peaked.

Eventually, when your starter produces a good loaf you want to think about keeping a small amount in the fridge. When it comes to baking, and you wish to go down the levain route, you'll take a little off and build a levain. When this levain has matured then you make your bread with it. When the starter in the fridge has run low then top it back up with a feed or two and return to the fridge.

If you use your starter straight into the dough then you'll feed your starter, allow it to mature and when peaked take some off and use.

For now you are doing both! which will mean you're building up a lot of starter. You're feeding your starter and then taking some off to build a levain. Once you've got the hang of it then you'll need to think about careful maintenance where you won't be slave to your starter.

For now I recommend two recipes.

1: Hamelman's Vermont Sourdough : http://www.homecookingadventure.com/recipes/easy-sourdough-bread-vermont-bread

2: Myweekendsbakery Pain Naturel : https://www.weekendbakery.com/posts/sourdough-pain-naturel/ (they call a levain "poolish" which is wrong, so read as "levain")

 

Both very good first recipes. While you should be watching the dough and not the clock, for now try and follow the recipe as closely as you can as a learning curve. Don't alter levain amounts because that will throw everything off.

Any questions don't hesitate to ask.

TheBrickLayer's picture
TheBrickLayer

Oh man, thank you so much. I will try the Vermont sourdough. Looks a lot easier for a first-timer. 

One question: what is "bread flour?" Is that APF?

 

Lechem's picture
Lechem (not verified)

Is white flour, wheat flour, which has strong gluten for bread making.

In the UK we don't have APF. We have cake flour and bread flour. APF falls in-between so it can lend itself to either. You will be able to use APF for this recipe as long as it's 12+ % protein.

P.s. treat the "overnight starter" in the recipe as a levain build. So take some starter off and build the levain with that. No need to alter your actual starter.

TheBrickLayer's picture
TheBrickLayer

Or should I stick with APF?

Lechem's picture
Lechem (not verified)

In bread baking terms...

Wheat Flour = whole wheat

Bread Flour = white flour (wheat flour with the bran removed) which has strong gluten

APF flour = white flour which isn't as strong as bread flour but stronger than cake flour (or plain flour)

Cake Flour (or plain flour) = white flour which has weak gluten

TheBrickLayer's picture
TheBrickLayer

Sorry!!

Lechem's picture
Lechem (not verified)

Use Bread flour or APF flour (or a 50:50 mix) for the recipe.

Where it says to use whole rye flour you may substitute with wholegrain wheat flour if you wish.

P.s. the levain build is 125% hydration. This will be more liquid than your starter which is 100% hydration. So expect it not to rise as much but it will be very bubbly after the 12-14 hours its left to mature.

TheBrickLayer's picture
TheBrickLayer

Thanks!

TheBrickLayer's picture
TheBrickLayer

Since my starter is 1/2 whole grain and half APF, will I be able to successfully use it to inoculate a leaven of 100% APF?

Lechem's picture
Lechem (not verified)

Will be fine. The Levain build is 12-14 hours. It might not rise as much as your normal starter but will become frothy and full of bubbles. Keep it warm and see what it's like after 12 hours. If need be then wait the full 14 hours before proceeding onto the main dough. 

Which APF are you using? What brand? 

TheBrickLayer's picture
TheBrickLayer

Thanks so much!

TheBrickLayer's picture
TheBrickLayer

I'm having some good success with the recipe, but it's not really rising much during the final proof. It gets a good bit bigger in the oven, but the proof is nowhere near as much as I expect it to be. Any suggestions?

Lechem's picture
Lechem (not verified)

A photo will help diagnose bit from the sound of things it has been a big step in the right direction. Venturing a guess it might be that you're watching the clock and not the dough. But because it's a learning curve that might be a good place to start. Then you troubleshoot, practice and eventually get a feel for the dough. Most of the rising happens in the oven spring. 

Factor in your starter being young and it'll strengthen over the coming weeks.

TheBrickLayer's picture
TheBrickLayer

as the boules are already proving in their bowls. I'll post pictures of each step. 

The Vermont recipe allows for 2.5 hours of proving. Can I go over that? I wasn't sure if that would ruin the bread to allow it to proof for more. 

Thanks for all your help. 

Lechem's picture
Lechem (not verified)

Is the temperature included in the recipe?

You say boules. So a bit of an experiment? One boule stick to the given time. The other... follow your gut feeling. Compare and contrast. Get to know your starter. 

My pleasure! 

TheBrickLayer's picture
TheBrickLayer

475 degrees. 

Let me ask you this: could part of my problem be when I'm preparing the leaven? I prepare it usually about six or seven hours after feeding my starter. The starter usually appears very active and bubbly and everything. But is that too long / too short to wait?