Interrupting autolyse/bulk ferment
Hi everyone, another baking-newbie here and I’ve been pouring over various threads with all the usual questions, but couldn’t find the answer to this one. Any ideas welcome!
I’m attempting two separate recipes at the moment, KA’s extra tangy (https://www.kingarthurflour.com/recipes/extra-tangy-sourdough-bread-recipe) and Tartine’s Basic Country Loaf (instructions from the Bread story on @stretchandfold).
I’m working with a relatively young starter - just shy of a month old, but up to the point of fringing it (for weekly feeds) I had been doing daily feeds, and she’s been rising predictably. I do the float test before building the levain or otherwise incorporating her into the recipe.
My question relates to the KA recipe - I wanted to get a bit of extra oomph so in refreshing my starter for use rather than using just bread flour I used 50/50 whole meal and bread flour. When this was ready I added flour and water, and let it rest at room temp for 4 hours (during which it just over doubled) before sticking it in the fridge for bulk ferment.
I then carried on reading and learned that whole meal flour absorbs more water and needs longer time to rise, and worried that I would end up with a dry loaf I took her out of the fridge (where she’d been chilling for around 2 hours), added a couple teaspoons of water (approx 4g? To what is currently 485g) and stirred. I’m now worried that in doing so I’ve deflated all the lovely bubbles it spent 4 hours building up, so I’ve put her back at room temp (around 65F) for another hour and plan to stick her in the fridge again to carry on with the overnight cold bulk ferment.
Like one of you have commented, it’s hard to know when you’re starting out what you can get away with and what you can’t - things that will really make a difference to your loaf until it’s too late, and I’d be grateful for any insights you might have, whether I’m worrying for nothing, or if I am, whether anything can be done to fix it at this stage.. !
Thanks a million!
It will be fine, as long as it is actively fermenting and not overfermented (probably isn’t, from your description).
next time find a recipe and stick to it. Find one that you like (flavor, texture, etc), then experiment based on that.
It's just about finished the overnight bulk ferment, didn't rise very much in the fridge (but had done before she went in) so I'll soldier on with everything crossed!
For future reference, do any of you have a resource for rebalancing with water if we introduced some whole meal into a recipe that only has white bread flour? I read that it absorbs more water and takes longer to rise (and rises less overall). I'd be going off 1-2 teaspoon of liquid per cup of flour, does that sound about right?
If it all gets too confusing, (and I suspect it might!) I might just plain stick to the recipe.
Another question: as we're told to watch the dough and not the clock, is it ok to stick it in the fridge (covered in a wet towel) to "pause" the progress at most points pre-baking to suit our schedules, or will certain things become compromised like strength/shape etc?
Thanks again
Shoot! I had written a nice post and when I pasted a link everything was erased (yeah, I don't love the interphase, one of the reasons I am not very active here, but it is by far the best place for bread info).
Sorry I won't re-write.
Long story short: experiment as not all WW flour is the same.
Here is a link with some info that might help you http://www.thefreshloaf.com/node/61245/soaker-ingredient-hydration-percents-some-data
Also, the fridge does not pause, it retards. The fridge is your friend, just learn how your starter and flour interact in the cold.
Such a pain when it scrubs a detailed post!
Sadly, I can't tell the effect of this ww flour as I've committed the elementary error of getting distracted and overproofing so I ended up with a tangy-flavoured pancake. I could kick myself..
Doughvid19 - man, wish I came up with that! But, extra water added - won't make a difference you, or anyone else, would notice. Yes - dough was probably deflated a bit, but it'll gas itself up again. Another thing you won't notice. Just keep on going.
PS - there s lot of leeway when it comes to bread making. Amounts, ratios, timings all have a bit of room and varying a bit doesn't make to much difference - with bread. Cakes, pastries and such are a different beast.
Hoorah, that's good to know!
All the things I can get away with but I think that extra proofing may have been the death knell of this loaf, shockingly the crust was nice and crunchy and there were actually parts of the crumb that looked ok (there were also a good chunk of tunneling though)..
It'll probably take another lockdown before I can contemplate experimenting with pastries/cakes without commercial yeast by the sounds of it!
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That's always a tough call. Mostly cuz is hard to really see the crumb in pictures. It could be either.
Signs of under - gummy dense crumb, little oven spring, crust browns normally with normal temps.
Signs of over - gummy dense crumb, little oven spring, usually a pale crust that's hard to get brown.
I can't see the crust, but it appears to have a relatively even distribution of smaller holes (hard to really see) which is a good sign. They we have the big holes and in those there appears to be torn gluten (between a couple of the holes). That could be what I'll call under fermented (this stage of the process is also where most of our gluten is formed - water + flour + time = gluten). And it could be over fermented/proofed as this will break down the strength of the gluten. Last thing I'll mention (cuz it was a long day at the course and I'm tired) is - starter health. If your starter is a little out of whack and gets too acidic, it will effect how much gluten is formed, the rate it's formed, and it's strength once formed. Have a good night!
If you like how it tastes it is fine.
Honestly I hope you like it but don't love it so you can join us on the obsessive side.