Baked two Ken Forkish breads last night
I decided to experiment... again.... I had recently purchased the Flour, Water, Salt, Yeast book even though I have been satisfied with my Tartine Bread book and its recipes. Just wanted to try something new and his book is excellent for his clinical type writing and description of the bread making process. I used my Tartine bread starter that has been growing fine and working fine for me since I had that laying around and didn't need to go another week trying to grow a starter.
His baking times are different for Levain type breads or breads that rely solely on wild yeast starter. Also using a dutch oven, the covered baking time is 30 minutes instead of 20 for Tartine and the oven temp. is 475, not 450. This will get you a much thicker crust I believe. Then the uncovered time is about 25 minutes, again at 475. The results are a much darker loaf in terms of color and crunchier, crustier crust. I guess on could bake the Tartine bread at higher temps and for longer times... but it really boils down to personal preference. Everyone who tasted the finished product liked the taste, just feel that with such a hard crust, we will have teeth problems eventually.
BTW: Happy New Year to TFL folks from Illinois