Practicing Baguettes - Need more Color
Today, I decided to try Txfarmer's straight dough baguette formula on this post http://www.thefreshloaf.com/node/31945/straight-method-baguette-good-starter-baguette-practice [1]
OK, I'm hooked. I am now, along with many others, on a quest to make a good baguette. I made a bunch at the SFBI class Artisan Bread I and it was so much easier to get a nice brown crust on those baguettes with the professional oven. Now I'm with my home oven and the browning just isn't happening.
Here is a picture of my baguettes to date -
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[2]Close up of the scoring (which could improve but getting better)-
[3]
I would like to get the bread to have a little more color. Not sure what the issue might be. I have a gas oven. I used the towel steaming method that SylviaH explained in detail(thank you). It helped open the scoring. Perhaps I didn't have the steaming loaf pans in the proper positions? I also used quarry tiles on the top shelf over the baguettes in hopes of creating more of a brick oven effect. Was that a mistake? I would like more color on the baguettes. Should I add some diastatic malt to the mix? I was using KAF Bread flour not AP, would that do it? Any and all ideas welcome