Is my 100% rye sourdough okay?
I'm having lunch with a friend this week and I would like to surprise her with a Russian-style rye bread. She says it's hard to find a good quality one in our area. Her mom in the Ukraine passed away and she couldn't go to the funeral because of the war. I was hoping this might cheer her up a little bit.
After reading a bunch of posts about 100% rye sourdoughs, I finally settled on Andy's Rossisky formula (http://www.thefreshloaf.com/comment/99318#comment-99318 [1]). I have never made a 100% rye before so I made a 500 gram loaf today as a tester.
I fermented the rye sour for 18 hours at room temp (about 71F). Then I added the final rye, water and salt and mixed the dough in a bowl with a spatula.
No bulk fermentation. I spread the dough into a loaf pan. My 20 cm long loaf pan is much too big for the 500 grams of dough, but I didn't mind getting a flatter loaf for this test.
Proofed for 1 hour 50 min at room temp (about 71F). I didn't know how long to proof, but I had to run some errands so I just let it proof while I was out.
Baked at 430F for 35 minutes (10 minutes with steam and 25 minutes without steam).
The crumb was not gummy at all. It's a firm bread, but very moist. The crust was thin and very easy to slice through.
The bread was nice and sour, but not overly or harshly sour. I'm not sure if it was sour because of the high percentage of prefermented flour (37%) or if it's because I built my starter from a rye starter stock that I've had for 3 weeks in the refrigerator. I think it tastes great.
Can someone give me some feedback my loaf? I'd like to know if it seems over or underproofed and if the crumb structure is correct. And should a natually leavened Russian-style rye be sour or mildly sour? I just want to give my friend the best loaf possible. Thanks for any help.
Mary
PS: Here's a link to a short video of me squishing a slice between my fingers. https://flic.kr/p/nYvwZZ [8]