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Hi friends,

I baked 80/20 mainly white loaves letting it go to 50% rise in bulk based on the recent thread discussing the difference between a 30% and 50% rise and considering the thoughts from Trevor and Maurizio....I realized that I probably was more a 50%ish baker.....as it happens but also experimented with 30% rise in the past...

If you go 50% rise then this also affects retarding and 2nd proof and Trevor mentions this actually in his book at the very end....reading it yet again afresh....

I always make a bit more Levain than I need because some sticks to the walls of the container and then I would end up short. This time, I guess I made a bit too much, and since I hate throwing away something I nurtured along, I figured a quick 1-2-3 bread with left over durum semolina and a touch of honey would do the trick. 

155 g mature Spelt Levain (100% hydration made with Spelt bran and sifted Spelt flour)

325 g water

90 g durum semolina 

375 g unbleached flour

11 g salt

10 g yogurt 

25 g honey

 This won’t be much of a write up because I used the same recipe and method as my last bake except for the following:

1. I used Roger’s Oats with Ancient Grains instead of plain large flake oats. 

2. I added all of the water at the beginning which made for easier mixing. 

3. I threw in an extra fold but kept the total fermentation time at 3 hours and 45 minutes. 

4. I retarded the loaves for only 8 -9 hours and baked directly out of the fridge. 

5. I tried baking for 30 minutes with the lid on and 17 minutes with the lid off. 

Ten years ago, in October, 2008, I first converted George Greenstein's recipe for Jewish Sour Rye from volumetric to weighed ingredients. I posted my formula here, and I make this bread with some frequency. I recently noted that I apparently never did document the baker's math for this formula, which makes it more challenging to scale up or down. So, after making a 3 pound loaf of this wonderful bread today, I worked out the baker's math, and I will share it, along with a more heavily annotated set of procedures.

Jewish Sour Rye Bread

Hello friends! 

This weeks' bake was fun for me, tried a few new things. Second time doing coil folds for gluten development (I like it), first time using a "young levain" (I don't like it), first time using a stencil for my design (I like it!)

Formula: 

160g 100% hydration levain (73% whole wheat, 27% rye), used after 5 hours. [Normally, I'd use it just after it peaks, 10ish hours after feeding. The dough felt a bit different this time, really soft and not as tight. It wasn't terrible, just not what I'm used to.]

294g water 

This bread is similar to another bread I baked some times ago. However, this version is, without a doubt, at least 10 times better than that one!  

5-Grains Black Sesame Parmesan YW Sourdough…with a Kick

Dough flour (all freshly milled):

Recently acquired a Mockmill and decided that Maurizio’s 50% Fresh Milled Whole Wheat Sourdough at 84% hydration would be my first attempt at using fresh milled flour. I stayed pretty close to Maurizio’s procedure, rebalancing the formula a tad for a liquid levain.

Milling organic hard red spring wheat:

And the result:

Why not just use the flour of six grains? I guess for the same reason one mills flour fresh, but also I think the mediocrity of my blender is working with me here by creating variation in the size of particles. I get some noticeable bits, along with some flour soup.

This was a bit of an experiment....my starter peaked in the evening and we needed bread but I realized that a full bulk would mean a late night and I was tired....

so after the baguette and ciabatta approach to bulk I let it bulk for 1 and 1/2 hour with 30 min coil folds until it was bubbly and showed life and then put the dough in the 5C wine cooler for the night.

At 7AM the following morning, I took it out and put it for 2 hours in 75F proofer to warm up and get a little bit more bubbly and lively...I gave it a gentle fold but left it mostly alone...

Like Ulysses to the Sirens.  Like rodents to the Pied Piper, like Cupid’s arrow to the heart, and like Springboks to Spring Break - or at least to the watering hole on the Savannah. Abel Sierra posted his version of Baguette au Levain a few days ago.  Lovely, and that might have been that!  Except that in response to Old Baker’s comment stating that he would try it, Abel’s reply was "Maybe it's difficult to get this result at home.