Crumb Structure of my First Sourdough Bread Ever? (A begginer's odissey)
Greetings from Brazil!
I've been lurking for a while here, and wanted an opinion on my first sourdough bread!
I'll try to detail what I've done as best as I can remember (notes not with me right now).
All temps (water, air, dough) were around 27-29°C (81 - 84°F) throughout the whole process.
Let´s start with the... starter!
My starter was built during 10 days straight, around an average temperature of 26°C (79°F).
It started as a 100% whole wheat and I converted to 50% AP / 50% WW day 6 or 7.
The feedings were 24h apart, 1:1:1, with discards, to maintain 50g of initial culture. I did this throughout the WHOLE process. So 50g + 50g + 50g = 150g the whole time.
The starter went through all the expected cycles: Initial day 1 (or 2) growth surge, with acidic, cheesy, vomit like smell.
On day 3 and 4, it developed a very acidic smell, while the foul ones were gone. Not many bubbles. Small ones.
On day 5 and forward, it developed a sweet, yeasty smell, which cycled between fruity, boozy, aromatic (reminding acetone, not ethanol). This marked the initiation of a rise (doubled in volume) and fall, of a period between 8 to 12h. Bubble action sighted. Especially on the walls of the container!
Day 7 to 10, I started feeding 12h apart, so 2 daily feedings
On day 10, 5 days of consistent rise and fall cycles of 8-12h, I decided to do a float test, which passed. There, I decided to give a 1:5:5 feeding and put it on refrigeration.
My first sourdough bake:
For my Levain, I did't know exactly how much I was going to use, so I took 60g of refrigerated starter and build 180g of levain with a 1:1:1 ratio. That was 12h hours before my expected bake time, following what my starter was doing already (not a set time frame or formula)
Next day, on bake time, my levain had doubled in volume and passed the float test, as expected (thank god, whew!)
My recipe was based on a total of 400g flour, as follows:
- 300 g Regular AP Flour.
- 100 g Regular Whole Wheat flour.
- (70%) 280 g Carbon FIltered tap Water (reserved 40 g to dissolve the salt and add after autolyse)
- (20%) 80 g levain (100% hydration, 50% AP / 50% whole wheat)
- (2%) 8 g salt
That's around 750g of fresh dough
So for the bread itself, I went with the "Tartine" method, more or less, aiming for a boule shape:
- Mix (almost all of) the water with flour and levain. Waited 30 min. "Autolyse".
- In the bowl, I've added the rest of the water with the salt, incorporated the water and waited 10 min.
- During bulk fermentation (around 2,5h to 3h) I did 3 sets of folds and 3 sets of coil folds, 25 min apart.
- The bulk fermentation time was guided by visual cue: I placed a small piece of dough inside a small cylindrical container after my first set of folds. When I saw it had doubled in volume, I knew I had to stop the folds and begin preshaping.
- Did the initial pre shaping, taking care not to degas the dough, formed into a tight ball and put it onto a floured surface and covered with a kitchen towel.
- During final shaping, into a boule, I encountered some difficulty during the final stage, where you have to use a scraper/spatula to create tension on the dough. As I had to use water instead of flour (the inverse process of pre shaping) I could't do it properly by hand, so I figured my oven spring would suffer. After I figured I was done, I put the dough into the same bowl, covered with heavily floured towels (No rice flour, scraper/spatula and banneton available. All by hand)
- I refrigerated the dough for 5 hours, so I could bake the same day (at night).
- Took it out of the bowl, straight into a hot (500°F) cast iron pan, scored it, and put the lid on (dutch oven). No Ice cubes, no nothing.
- 20 min bake at 500°F lid on.
- 35 min bake at 450°F lid off (bake to color).
This is the final result, 18,5 cm total diameter. 7 cm height. Does the crumble look ok? Felt kinda irregular, somewhat moist and shiny at some points. I expected something bigger but it seems that a 750g boule would produce something along those lines.
Nevertheless, I assume it was a success, as it has risen, and it was nice and tasty! Not very tangy, could be more.
Opinions?
I think most would say good crumb, save for the big gaps I'll call them up near the top. That could be a sign of things being a tad over, probably fermented.
The train is on the right track and it's pulling into the station you're about there!
The crumb, to me, looks like it was cut before it fully cooled. did you rest the loaf after the bake for at least an hour (better 2 hrs) before cutting it? If not, make sure you do that next time. it is still cooking and redistributing moisture, reabsorbing the steam, etc.
crust looks great. crumb consistency on the sliced pieces look good, but i see some large pockets in the loaf. in your preshape, if there are large air pockets, do pop them. maybe it's just that.
1:1:1 build on the levain with a 12 hr rise sounds like a high percentage of starter. i think 1:2:2 (starter:water:flour) is more common (with maybe just a 3-5 hour rise, depending on temp) and Tartine's is higher (1 spoonful starter to 100g water and 100g flour if i remember correctly for overnight)
-James
Thank you for the reply!
I did rest the loaf, but definitely not enough in my opinion. The culprit was my girlfriend, who was a tad anxious to taste the bread. I did cut it after some 45 minutes after taking out of the oven, at best. I'll definitely not introduce this variable in my next bake!
Preshape didn't result in too many bubbles. I did pop all of them, though.
Regarding which ratio to build the levain with, I honestly have no clue on what to conclude. The main reason being: there is no absolute right or wrong. And this bothers me, as I'm an engineer! People have a billion different ways to go about this. What happened in practice is that the more I read, the more I got confused. So I either fix one parameter or procedure and go with it (I went with 1:1:1 and 20% inoculation) or I'll go mad (and get sh*t results) mixing and matching different procedures.
I believe the levain ratio has to do with how long before it'll mature and the longer it has, the more depth of flavor.
A 1:1:1 at 12 hours at room temp or above probably has produced a lot of acidic notes. Too much acid can contribute to the break down of gluten. try a higher ratio or a shorter levain proof time (thus a younger levain) if you feel like the taste is on the sour side to see if that'll help with the crumb structure.
Nothing to do with bread just thought of something - someone once questioned Edison's method of "experimentation" saying he wasn't learning anything due to his methodology. Edison replied, but sir, I have learned a lot, I know a thousand ways it doesn't work. He eventually found a way to make it work, so will you. Enjoy!