alfanso's blog

My wife is off to a Dragon Boat race this weekend.  I won't describe what it is, you can look it up if you have the mind to.  The three main things they do there are 1) race, 2) spend a lot of downtime between races and 3) eat and nap during the downtime.  I thought that I'd add to the groaning table by baking a rather, um, large golden raisin-pecan WW bread for them.

Coming off the recent just-for-the-heck-of-it monster baguette, I decided that it wasn't big enough.  This beast weighs in at 1500g, a full 50% heavier than the prior beast while being a few inches shorter.  A perfect snacking bread with or without butter, soft cheese and/or jam, and makes a fine toast too.  Probably not a great bread for sandwiches.  C'est la vie.

Unfortunately, having hardly any experience with breads this size, it looks as though in the scheme of things a seam  twisted out of position and although it may look artistic is actually a burst seam.  I'll have to somehow console my sorrow and find the inner strength to recover from this tragedy ;-) . 

The little fellow is a 550g batard that will keep my tonsils company over her weekend absence.

The lone slice of the Big Boy that my wife left behind...

1. 1500g x 1 truncheon
2. 550g x 1 batard

 These are loosely based on the fabulous Ken's Artisan Bakery version of this bread.

Timing

• Day 1 – Mix Stiff Levain – 15 minutes
• Day 2 – Mix dough, French Folds & ferment – 2-3 hours (~18-24 hour rest)
• Day 3 – Bake – 1.5 hours 

Method

DAY 1:

1. Mix levain. Ferment at room temperature, covered tightly, turn once or twice during build. (can be as much as 8-12 hours - your mileage may vary)
2. Soak fruit in water.  Reserve water for final mix.

DAY 2:

1. Mix flours and water, include water from fruit. Cover and autolyse for 30 minutes.
2. Add levain and salt and pinch-and-fold mix to incorporate. 150 French Folds / 5 minute covered rest / 150 FFs.
3. Transfer to a clean, lightly oiled bowl and cover tightly.
4. Add raisins and pecans at first Letter Fold.  Stretch dough out into large rectangle on wetted surface and distribute fruit and nuts evenly.
5. With each Letter Fold, try to fold so that the fruit and nuts stay toward the interior of the dough as much as possible.
6. Bulk ferment 2-3 hours with 4 Letter Folds every 25 minutes, one final 25 minute rest, then refrigerate. Dough will start doming after the first fold.  Dough will remain silky and extensible throughout.
7. Cover and refrigerate for as much as 18-24 hours.

DAY 3:

1. Take the dough out of the refrigerator.  For baguettes, divide into SQUARE pieces.  For batards, divide into pre-shaped balls.
2. Cover and allow to rest for 10-12 minutes.
3. For baguettes - these work better as short & chubby baguettes/torpedoes perhaps allowing a little raw flour on surface for rustic look.
4. Onto lightly floured couche, seam side down.  These will shed some moisture.
5. Cover with plastic.  Back into retard.
6. An hour before baking, pre-heat the oven to 500ºF, with baking stone and lava rock pan in place.
7. Score.
8. Bake at 470ºF 10-13 minutes steam, separate & rotate 180 front to back, then another 10-15 minutes or more after rotating.  Vent for 2-3 minutes.
9. These should bake darker than you think.  We want the crust to be dark and thick!

Notes:

• My kitchen is almost always 78-80dF.
• Dough can be shaped anytime during retard cycle, after ~ 2 hours in refrigerator.
• I bake directly out of retard.
• 1 Sylvia's Steaming towel, 1 9"x13" pan of lava rocks.  Towel goes in 15 minutes prior to bake, 2 cups of water onto lava rocks after dough is loaded.
• Recommend the short and chubby baguettes because the fruit and nuts would wind up dominating the girth of a fully sized baguette.
• Can also be scored with a diagonal cross hatch for the fun and look of it.

alan

Apologies to, and inspiration by, Carole King.

Leviathan: Anything of immense size and power...

I had an urge to bake a monster "baguette".  Just for the fun of it.  Lacking any other reason, as if I needed one anyway.  Based on the Hamelman Pain au Levain w/WW & 60% hydration bread flour.  My version uses 125% hydration rye flour and eliminates the WW.

I included the full sized Fuji apple in the lead picture to provide a sense of size.  That's 22 inches or 59 cm.

 The bake allowed the flattened tip of the bread to recover nicely.

965g x 1 Leviathan. 13 minutes with steam, 10 minutes more and 3 minutes venting.

alan

Yesterday's bake was a dry run to see what's what.  Today corrections were made, and hopefully for the better.  This time I used a spring pan which had a slightly wider base than the Angel Food pan, and also employed a small bowl in the center in order to enlarge the hole in the crown.

Otherwise everything else was business as usual.  And although this didn't get quite the loft and open score of yesterday's bake, some of the loft issue may be related to the crown being a little wider in diameter.  I think that overall I'm more pleased with the look of this one.  

1250g x 1 corona

But since it is "Italian bread", let's go with sesame semolina corona.  This is the Jeffrey Hamelman semolina dough with my 125% hydration rye liquid levain in lieu of his 125% bread flour liquid levain.

Neighbors due Friday afternoon for homemade torta di riso, rice cake - courtesy of my better half, home "brewed" limoncello, cheese -courtesy of various cloven-hooved beasts, and bread.  As I've made them my sesame semolina baguettes before, I decided on tackling a new shape, and have a preliminary run-through before subjecting any guests to it without a test bake.

Without a specialty banneton of any kind, it was time for some simple improvisation.  Using a 2 part Angel Food pan, I took the entire dough, already bulk risen and retarded, opened a hole in the center and dropped it into the pan.  Then back to retard it went for an overnight nap.  With a teflon-coated pan, there was no issue with the dough releasing cleanly.  A healthy swipe across the surface of the dough with a wet paper towel allowed the sesame seeds to adhere nicely.

15 minutes under steam, another 15 minutes after rotating and a final 2 minutes venting.  I've never baked anything greater than 750g , and then perhaps only twice, so this was a new adventure for me in a few ways.  Still too fresh out of the oven to cut open.  If all goes as planned, I'll prep the real thing today for a Friday afternoon bake and better form a round hole in the center.

Crumb shot added

1250g x 1 corona

Pain Rustique as a batard and baguettes.  I've seen a few pain rustique posts come through recently.  Well maybe one, maybe more.  And it occurred to me that I hadn't made this before.  Being poolish based, it is a rare bake these days where I don't use a levain as my pre-ferment.

This is modeled on the WeekendBakery version. The poolish is a mix of AP and Whole Wheat flours and is unusual in that it uses a levain starter rather than IDY for the poolish.  Knowing that I was planning on retarding the dough, I cut the amount of IDY for the Final Dough in half and also shortened the bulk rise times.

The dough is surprisingly sticky at "shaggy mass" time considering the overall hydration of the dough is only 65.5%.  But it mixed by hand quite nicely and was quite extensible during Letter Folds.  For this particular bread I attempted to be as gentle as reasonable while shaping the dough so as to avoid disturbing any future open cell structure within.  I did over-flour the couche in an attempt to ward off any recalcitrant dough that would want to stick to the linen.  As it turned out, the dough released without a hitch from the couche and the excess flour was probably not very necessary.

The mixed flour poolish took about 11 hours to mature.  In the picture the small black mark on the container was where the just mixed poolish started.

625 x 1 batard

330 x 2 baguettes

The crumb is surprisingly tight considering the oven spring, which does not bother me.  For a long time now, I'm no longer in search of large open crumb as my "holey grail".  I believe this type of dough is not meant to be shaped, even as gently as I attempted, hence the rustique name as others have pointed out.   But more importantly the taste is mild and pleasing for an almost all AP bread.  And although it received the same amount of steaming as my other bakes, this one does not carry the same amount of sheen as others.

Still, certainly worth placing the formula in my notebook for future bakes.  Man cannot live by levain bread alone.

N.B.  If you want to bake this the same way, without retardation and with the full amount of IDY, refer to the link at the top of this entry for timings.

On May 1st BreadBabies posted her SJSD batard twins.  And they were lovely.  But her post started off with a lament on her rye levain.  After being built and "ready" her resultant bake yielded the comment "Hamelman's Vermont Sourdough was more like a Vermont pancake". 

I suggested that her rye levain was the issue and that it was way past usefulness, having expired all of the yeast's food by the time she got around to employing it.  It was in the throes of death at that point and therefore she shouldn't throw in the towel so soon on trying to use rye levains.  

As her SJSD was so nice, I provided a bastardized version of it replacing David's 100% mixed flour liquid levain with a 125% all rye flour liquid levain.  She replied along the lines of - after you.  So be it.  I guess that was the bee in my bonnet that I needed!  And so BreadBabies - here it is:

One other point that I want to re-emphasize.  Is once you / I / we make a mod to someone else's formula, it is no longer their formula that we are making, it is our own version, a one-off.  And again, to me, a good thing.

First order of business is to know what a ripe and ready 125% rye levain should look like.  Doubled in size from when it was fed, it started out at the horizontal "gelato" line.  This took 5 1/2 hour in my 78dF kitchen:

Changes from David's SJSD formula for this run:

• the obvious switch to the 125% rye liquid levain
• incorporated the levain with the water and flour up front.  Otherwise it would have been a little difficult to incorporate the post-autolyse levain by hand.
• Bulk rise with letter folds at 40, 80, 120 and 150 minutes.  Then whisked into retard for ~16-18 hours.
• baked straight out of retard without a bench proof.

The dough was incredibly extensible throughout the letter folds.  Soft and quite pliable for final shaping.  With a  modestly floured couche they released quite easily, with no sticking although they shed a fair amount of moisture onto the couche.

Baked at 480dF.  Steamed for 13 minutes.  Rotated and baked for an additional 10 minutes.  Vented for 2 minutes more.

375g x 4 baguettes.  

Crumb shot added.  Preparing for my morning toast...

Last week I posted my first run of the Hamelman Vermont SD as baguettes.  Quite happy with the results.  But a recent thread started by ifaey about problems with higher protein baguettes had me rethinking my own run.  

The formula calls for a virtually all bread flour (90%) formula to which I applied 3 Letter Folds during the bulk rise. It seems that "all" of Mr Hamelman's breads use "bread flour" rather than AP flour, so when his formula states "bread flour" I take that literally.

My change here, aside from adding other shapes, was to replace all of the non-levain Bread Flour with AP flour so that the dough would more closely resemble T55 French flour based dough.  I still used the 125% hydration bread flour levain which accounts for 15% of the overall flour component.  I also backed down 1 Letter Fold, from 3 to 2 in an effort to provide a little less "strength" to the dough.  

One significant difference I noticed during French Folds was that this dough was more extensible and less "rubbery".  And that continued on through the Letter Folds and into final shaping as well.  And strangely, although both runs are 65% overall hydration, this batch seemed wetter, by a fair margin.

I corrected my one lament from the prior run in that I did bake these a shade darker.

• 620g x 1 batard
• 375g x 1 baguette
• 250g x 4 batard-ettes

alan

For as long as I've been an attendee at TFL University I continually see postings galore for both the Vermont SD and the Norwich SD.  Which, in an odd way, had me keep my distance from them both.  Until today.  Mr. Hamelman's Vermont SD is the first, foundational entry in his book's entire section of levain based breads, preceding even the venerable Pain au Levain entries.  I'd skipped over it before.  

But I had an urge to get back to building one of his ubiquitous 125% hydration bread flour levains after my romance, still underway, with my bastardized rye version of the same.  So now what to bake, what to bake?  Well, here I am.  As with other breads that I wish to make into baguettes, I did some diligent searching for evidence of this being made before as baguettes.  This time there were a very few instances where someone in the distant past did so (drat!).  I was on board anyway.  Stubby baguettes are my thang, if you haven't yet figured that out.

This is a 90% bread flour, 10% rye flour dough with a 125% hydration bread flour levain.  Clocking in at 65% overall hydration it leans toward the more rubbery side of things during the French Folds.  15% of the flour is in the levain.  Next time out I'll give these loaves another shade of dark before venting them.

375 x 4 baguettes.

and the crumb:

Here is the formula at 1000g, and the way that I do it:

This dough is very workable at the shaping stage.

1. 2 stage build of the levain.  It will hardly grow and will only display frothy bubbles to indicate ripeness.  Depending on ambient temp each build can take from 6-12 hours.  I refrigerate mine if I'm not ready to start a mix.
2. levain, flour & water to "autolyse" for ~30 minutes.
3. Add salt and incorporate.
4. I hand mix "everything" so: 150 French Folds, a 5 minute rest, another 150 French Folds.  Dough into oiled container and covered.  Dough will be rubbery during FFs and break apart and then come together several times.  This is normal with a drier hydration on some doughs.
5. Approx. 2 hour bulk rise.  Letter Folds at ~minutes 50 & 100.  Cover and retard for a total of at least 12 and up to ~18 hours.
6. At some point after 1-2 hours or more, divide, pre-shape, rest 10 minutes, final shape, onto barely floured couche.  Cover couche with plastic bags.  Back into retard.
7. Oven set to 480dF an hour before bake time
8. Sylvia's Steaming Towel into oven 15 minutes prior to bake.
9. Score and load dough into oven.  2 cups near boiling water onto lava rocks in pan after loading.
10. Oven down to 460dF.
11. ~13 minutes with steam.  Then release, rotate loaves and continue baking until ~205dF internally.
12. Vent loaves with oven door cracked for 2-3 minutes.

Caveats & notes:

• My kitchen remains at ~78dF at all times, as most are cooler, then a little more bulk rise time is suggested.
• I don't temp the water, the dough, the finished loaves.  
• For the bulk rise I don't watch the dough, I watch the clock (gasp!).  I know how dough performs in my environment.
• I do hand mix using French Folds (pinch and folds in the bowl for initial incorporation).
• I do use a couche instead of banneton and it rests on a jellyroll pan.  
• The LFs are on the wetted bench with wet hands - no raw flour is ever employed at this stage.
• Bake directly from retard. 
• My lava rock pan permanently resides on the lowest rack in the oven.
• I bake on a granite slab which sits on the rack just above the steam engines.
• Parchment paper facilitates the transfer from oven peel to baking deck. 
• If the levain is from the refrigerator I add it to very warm water.  The levain warms up, the water cools down and a happy medium is reached.

Darth Baker

I've posted these before, the Hamelman sesame semolina batards alfanso-style - meaning subbing out the very liquidy bread flour levain for my very liquidy rye flour levain.  Delivering 15% rye flour (all through the levain) to boost the flavor in this bread.  The composition of flours is; semola rimacinata 60%, bread flour 25%, and rye flour 15% @67% overall hydration.

I believe that I have the consistency part down pretty well.  So instead, let's talk about steam, shall we alfanso?  Okie Doakie, let's roll...  Recently there has been some interaction on the part of a few participants including myself and Doc.Dough, with a series of private messages between myself and the good doctor. Including this top notch video and blog entry courtesy of Doc.Dough - lots of steaming discussion included in the comments.  

As with others on TFL, I employ a double dose of steaming components which have me insert one loaf pan with a Sylvia's Steaming Towel into the lower rack of the oven ~15 minutes prior to the bake.  Once the dough is loaded I add 2 cups of near boiling water to a lava rock filled casserole pan.  This creates dabrownman's so named mega-steam effect.  Historically I've been leaving the steaming going for somewhere in the neighborhood of 11-13 minutes.  And I'm sufficiently happy with the outcome.

Now along comes Doc.Dough with his micrometers, calipers and what-not trying to upset my baking pushcart.  Purveying the notion with engineered knowledge that the effect of steam is negated after somewhere around the 5 minute mark.  Anything beyond that is equivalent to window dressing.  

What is an alfanso to make of all this fact based information, when all along I've been getting the job done by nothing more than "educated" guesswork, experimentation and personal experience?  Well, if I were me, I'd be curious enough to see where the oven spring has taken my dough at that 5 minute mark.  Because as with all of us, I hope to get better and more understanding of baking over the long haul.

For these past few bakes, instead of setting my timer to the trusty 11-13 minute mark I've been setting it to the 5 minute mark so that I can peer through the oven door window and take a gander at what's what.  And ya know something?  For the most part I'm becoming a believer!  The baguettes do open up (almost) all the way at that mark.  However, I find that the batards still have not maxed out yet, and they take a few minutes more.

And so I've turned a corner here and pretty much gotten on board.  I still like keeping the steam going for close to my requisite time, but I can now see the doc's point of view.  I don't see any downside to leaving the steam going, although my experimentation has been limited to maybe 3 or 4 bakes.  So I'l continue to slog on and see how this goes with some other types of dough.  Always something new to be learned in this doughy business.  Thanks, Doc.

And now a very few words on the consistency thing:

Nov., 2016:

 and this morning: