WW flour, free form loaves, not much rise. Suggestions please
I generally follow guide lines from Laurel's Kitchen Bread Book and Tassahara. I make the sponge ala Tassahara, and shape according to Laurel's desem instructions.
I've tried adding two teaspoons of high gluten flour to help with the rise but can't see much effect. I always make free form loaves and the always look like big, thick cookies. Not a nice tall free form loaf. I measure carefully, grind my flour fresh for each two loaves, and according to the instructions with my old 70's era self assembled stone grinder kit, I grind it on the gritty side. They claim this will give better flavor. If not making desem, I use the standard amount of active dry yeast for two loaves. 2 pkgs. I use 1/3 cup of butter or olive oil and 1/4 cup blackstrap molasses as the only sweetener. I used to kneed for the full 20 min. I've been cutting that back to see if it helps. So far it doesn't seem to.
I am wondering if I need to start with a stiffer dough. This would be pretty stiff. But would that help it hold it's shape better on that third rise in the 98 or so degree oven? I usually get good rises doing it this way till the one after shaping, the final rise. Don't get much oven spring either . The bread is always pretty good tasting just not much higher than about 3 to 3.5"at the center of the somewhat round loaf. These results are similar to the desem results as well. I bake in a wood fired French Canadian style mud oven. The temp is close to 500 after a soaking period of 15 to 30 min. I erroniously posted this to the general forum so I am repeating it here.
Ron