Pain de Méteil

This is a rye-wheat bread that is apparently popular in France.  I got the recipe from Bernd's Bakery, a blog that I found through the blog of Stanley Ginsberg, the author of The Rye Baker (which is a masterpiece of a cookbook).  

Bernd's original blog post can be found here.

My (slightly adapted) formula:

PAIN DE METEIL

Liquid Levain

10 g starter (I used a 100% hydration rye starter)

95 g water

95 g Strong Rye Flour (I used BRM Dark Rye Flour)

Mix the ingredients and ferment at warm RT for 12-16 hours.  

Poolish

2 g fresh yeast

140 g water

140 g AP flour

Mix the yeast in the water, mix in the flour until smooth, and ferment for 12-16 h.  (I did 3 h at RT and the rest in the fridge, removing the cold poolish from the fridge 1 hr before the final build).  

Final Build

Liquid Levain (all)

Poolish (all)

140 g water

155 g flour (I used one-half bread flour and one-half Gold Medal AP flour)

205 g Strong Rye Flour (I used NY Bakers Type 1740 Rye Flour - a darkish, whole-rye flour)

12 g salt

Dissolve levain and poolish in water, add flours and salt, mix well, and autolyse 20 min.  (Desired dough temp 77° F)

Mix with dough hook on KA 2 for 2 min., then KA 4 for 4 min. until good gluten development (+ windowpane). 

Ferment for 3 h at warm RT, with a stretch-and-fold twice at 40 min and 80 min.  

Preshape and let relax 15 min.

Preheat oven to 500° F with baking stone and lava rock steam tray.  

Shape in to oval oblong and move to proofing basket.  Proof for 70 min at 75-80° F.

Bake at 480° F with steam for 15 min, then remove steam tray and bake at 420° for an additional 30 min. 

The finished loaf is above.  Here's a crumb picture. 

The bread is really nice -- a beautiful marriage of wheat and rye flavors and textures.  It was SIGNIFICANTLY better on day 2 (like most rye breads), and froze extremely well.  

I might move the salt % up from 2.0% (above) to 2.2%, just because I like it that way.  

I thought this was a nice find -- I hope to try some of Bernd's other breads.  

--Scot Gibson