ITJB Vienna Bread - 3rd Time Not the Charm
I baked this recipe for the third time tonight, and I am still scratching my head. For this iteration I made the following adjustments:
1) Reduced the malt to 10 grams, based on Eric Hanner's parallel bake comments and results here [1].
2) Reduced my mixing time to 10 minutes to reduce the level of dough development.
3) Added a wire rack to the middle of my oven to avoid baking directly on my quarry tiles.
The results are strange, to say the least, and certainly not "right" yet. Here is a pictorial tour:
After 10 minutes the dough still seems fairly well developed, but it is certainly much less so than the previous iterations.
This blurry shot shows the dough at the very beginning of bulk fermentation.
Here is the dough 45 minutes later at the end of bulk fermentation. I may have let it go just a bit too long.
Divided into 2 loaves of 521 grams each, shaped and panned, and ready to proof.
After 45 minutes they were proofed to show above the top of the pan.
Here are the panned, slashed and egg-washed loaves in the 350 F oven (that really needs a good cleaning so please ignore that if you would). Note that the loaves are even, there is good clearance all around, and the slashes are down the center. I am using conventional heat, not convection, so the fan at the back is not in use. From here it gets really strange.
These loaves baked for 35 minutes. I tested the internal temperature of the one on the left at 25 minutes, and stuck my big thumb into it getting it out of the oven. That is why it has the big dent in the end. It was not up to temperature yet so I put it back in the oven for 10 more minutes. After a total of 35 minutes the internal temperature was 207F.
The loaves rose unevenly in the oven, or so it appears to me. The slashes now appear to be off center, and the outer edges of the loaves are taller than the inner edges. This could be from weak shaping, or from uneven temperature, or from something I have not thought of. They also have the same caved in side profile (see the next photo) that the previous bakes have shown.
I have not yet cut a loaf, so I do not know what the crumb looks like, or if there is a compressed doughy line up the inner or outer sidewall of these loaves. I do expect to find one, but I will do that in the morning and post it back here then.
Edit on Tuesday, 11/8/2011: Crumb shot added below. This is the less distorted of the two loaves posted above. There is an only-barely-visible compressed doughy line up one side of this loaf, and the crumb is a little less airy and insubstantial than previous bakes. The largest holes seem to be smaller than in previous bakes.
My next steps are going to be to buy some true All Purpose flour, remove my baking tiles entirely for the next bake, and recheck the temperature of my oven in several locations to make sure I am still getting even and accurate heating. It was accurate and consistent (as much as can be expected from a home oven) just six months or so ago, but this project requires re-verifying everything. I will also consider modifying the shaping from that commended by the authors.
Thanks for stopping by.
OldWoodenSpoon