Blog posts

presentando pasta madre, signorina Valentina, Bria. La figlia del signor Slow-Mo.

(presenting mother dough, Miss Valentina, Bria. The daughter of Mr. Slow-Mo)

Time to start adding various ingredients to give this loaf some character. Not sure what ingredients to add, I asked for ideas in a separate post:

http://www.thefreshloaf.com/node/66656/help-narrowing-down-ingredients-add-recipe

I love the taste that seeds impart to my sourdough breads both on the inside or outside of a loaf.  I love using black sesame seeds because they are sesame flavour amped up and great inside the loaf for that contrast in colour in the crumb.

Total Dough Weight 900 g

Total Flour 494 g 

Bread Flour 80%

Whole Red Fife 20%

Total Water 377.5 g 76% hydration

Salt 2% 10 g

Mix 

Bread flour 352 g

Whole Wheat 97 g

Water 320 g

Levain 115 g 

Salt 2% 10 g 

Diastatic Malt 0.5% 2.5 g

This is my third time baking semolina sourdough baguettes and I ran a bit short on the Semola rimacinata flour that I usually use for this. I also hadn’t baked a baguette in some time so I felt a bit rusty, but I think overall the bake went well.

These are likely a bit overproofed I’m guessing based on the so so ears. The kitchen was pretty warm and I didn’t account for how fast they would proof on the counter, that and my starter is now creating levains and dough that ferment more quickly. I will need to take this into account in the future.

I want to tell you a story about a special flour.

One day, I spotted a flour on the shelf of a local shop and it was a sparkling moment: an organic flour with 12% protein content with a greyish colour. Of course, I bought the flour, I had to try it right?

Well, I had some other types of bread listed on my TO DO list but I decided to use it to feed my lovely sourdough Maya.

I think I am going to keep doing these bumper bakes while I work out the kinks in my sandwich loaf recipe. In case you were curious, I dubbed this a "bumper bake" in reference to a bumper crop. I am in the kitchen anyway, I have a double oven, why not just bake a second loaf, just for fun.

The Good:

• This loaf looked BEAUTIFUL! Great oven bloom, nice shape, I was excited when I took the top off. Wow!
• The reduced baking temp and/or the parchment paper stopped the loaf from burning.

The Bad:

Here is a sourdough loaf using 100% semola rimacinata by Caputo. It resulted in a mildly flavored and soft crumb, but  a very crisp crust, which is the perfect combination.

This bake went well enough, I think I am ready to move onto the next phase of perfecting this recipe... flavor.

Recap:

The wife has tasked me to come up with a sandwich bread recipe our family can bake at least once a weak to completely replace our regularly purchased box store sandwich bread.

Requirements

Ok, know your skills - bakers percentages and dough handling. Know how to prepare and use leaven.