I wanted to do this at the end of 2009 - my way of saying thanks to everyone here who blogged so enthusiastically, sharing their knowhow. But client work got in the way, so I managed to complete it only today.
Well, it's been quite a rainy week here in Arizona. Their predicting up to 4 inches of rain here in the desert, even more in the higher country with up to 4 feet of snow up in the higher mountains! Winds up to 60mph this evening! It's been a wild couple of days with a big storm the night before last, rain all day today and so much more yet to come. We just pulled up the awning on the camper to keep it from blowing away!
I took the day off from work today with the stated purpose of looking for a car for my wife. The company has provided me with a leased vehicle but that leaves my wife stuck at the house most days. With a 45-60 minute commute in each direction, it isn't practical for her to take me to work and then use the car for the rest of the day.
Thanks for the reminder - I finally remembered to go to the hardware store to buy lava rocks. I asked for the ones for barbecues and they produced a fancy box of expensive and large rocks. I had the idea that the lava rocks would be small so I asked for the ones used in landscaping and found a bag for $4.95 + tax. Now I am wondering - did I get the correct ones? I had been thinking of "scrumping" some from the empty house next door but they were pretty grungy.
So I think I finally figured out how this thing works... well, well enough to put up some pictures and some text around them-- this is how my 66% hydration (3 1/3 cups of bread flour and 2 1/3 cups of water?) came out.
The fork is to show how runny the dough-batter is. I kneaded for about an hour-- though i could have stopped after 45 minutes, and I think this is what I ended up with (I took the pictures a while ago so I'm not really sure)
So you want that thin crust that shatters when you cut/bite into it... You also want your loaf to spring fully. You've tried all of those other steaming methods, spray bottle, cast iron steam pan, crazy contraptions to get and keep steam in the oven... I suggest you take a trip down to your hardware or home store and get a bag of lava rocks. I got mine in Brooklyn for $5.34 including tax. People in Manhattan don't know what they are...
I've been trying a couple of things: increasing sourness (based on what I've learned from Debra Wink, and other online references, varying hydration; and feeding portions of my favorite starter different flours, and developing it at different temperatures (part of the sourness investigation.). I've been doing these things one step at a time, so the results don't get clouded.
For the sourness experiments, along with Ms. Wink's super TFL postings, my other main source of information is:
The original blog post can be found on my website: http://www.foodbuzz.com/recipes/1765625-homemade-wheat-thins
