Blog posts

Hi, I was inspired by some recipes I saw here. I didn't end up following any in particular because of my busy schedule. At this point I sort of have a standard protocol which involves roughly autolysing and stretching and folding the dough whenever I get home in the evening, bulk fermenting up till I go to bed, then cold fermenting until I get home the next day. It's worked well for me, this loaf was soo yummy, but I do have a few questions.

Questions

I've been having real trouble with my baguettes but finally found something that works. 

As a semi Frenchmen, I've found I need to take matters into my own hands when it comes to baguettes. 

sourdough recipe. 

60% hydration 95F

100% bread flour (Bobs Red Mill)

2% starter - I will vary this depending on the ambient temp to control for time. 

1% salt

autolyze 1hr

salt in and slap + fold until incorporated and smooth maybe 5 min

Ferment on the counter at 55-60 18-24hrs  

I had cooked white rice and mixed (black and brown) rice in hand so I decided to add in using an adapted brown rice porridge bread recipe from the book, Chad Robertson's Tartine Book No. 3.

The ingredients are:

Spelt flour 50%

Whole wheat flour 50%

Water 85%

Leaven 15%

Sea salt 2.5%

Cooked mixed rice 70%

30 min autolyse, 4 hour bulk fermentation (4 sets of stretch and fold), cold-proof in the fridge for about 18 hours.

The first in a series of experiments on my 'Loaf 3' recipe.

Loaf 5 
250g white flour, 250g wholegrain wheat flour.
80% hydration
15% starter
2% salt

Experiment: Refreshed starter overnight. 

In the morning, did 1 hour autolyse, then mixed in starter & salt.

4 stretch & folds over 2 hours, then a bulk ferment at (cool-ish) room temp for about 5-6 hours.

Pre-shaped and let rest for 30 mins

Can you bring some bread for our old friends gathering?  Sure can, so this is what i put together  i chose to do 20% wholemeal breads,  some sticks using fresh compressed yeast with butter and an egg in the mix .

Much improved this week.  After last week I did some TLC to my starter.  I had been using it and then feeding it and sticking right back into the fridge until the next bake. I wasn't giving it any feeding before I baked.

I finally got around to having a go using a Beer Barm, the flour was 20% wholemeal flour with 80% Black and Gold  supermarket  flour.

Greetings Everyone,

     I am a 74-year-old man, and I recently began to experiment with sourdough starter.  Actually, I never baked bread at all until last week:  I baked some bread just to use up the free flour that I received from commodity (for the first time).

Quite a while back, I was seeking information how to get a chewier, more elastic crumb in my sourdough loaves.

I was advised regarding protein content of flour and going for a higher hydration, and I would like to say a big THANKS to the several bakers who advised higher hydration, because it really did the trick.