Levain baguettes first bake from new starter
Heres the first bake from week old starter - results ehhhm, just ok. These seem fairly over proofed or the starter needs to mature more. Having been on a long commercial yeast kick its quite a change of pace using natural yeast whos timing and quantities I've gotten down to minutes. The first major adjustment is dealing with the long bulk and temperature sensitity. I usually cold retard over night and see about 1.5 time rise followed by a quick final. Here I let the dough rise at about 76f for 12+ hours and saw a good rise to near double size. Next is the final - nothing happens at 66f (my kitchen temp in the am) so had to move the proofing to a warmer spot at right around 75-76f and 2 hours later loaves look about right. Since I not confident enough yet to ise my favorite flour I opted to use KA AP which at 11.somthing % protein presents a lot more resistence than Im used to (at 9.4% T65) but despite that, shaping worked out alright. Slashing was a totally different experience, much easier due to the tougher surface. In the end this was a 69% hydration (down 3% from the norm) using a mix of ap and rye starter. Crumb...nothing to write home about - flavor - tangy tangy and more tang. I could get into this if I can mellow out this over abundance of tang and get some more spring here. Seems like it may take some time to nail the finer points and who know maybe a decent loaf can come of this but so far, I can eat it but really miss the flavor of the wheat which seems completely masked by lactic / acetic acid. Whats really been capturing my attention however are some of these multi-grain loaves with seeds and other goodies mixed in - as for a plain baguette made from sourdough its hard to beat the traditional version. Despite that, still excited to see where this starter goes from here :)