Hello!
I have two great bread books that I have been learning from: FWSY and A Passion for Bread. The past two weeks I've decided to branch out and try some interesting breads from A Passion for Bread. I like the sound of his "cinnamon, raisin, pecan" bread:
315 g white bread flour
65 WW bread flour
9g salt
285g water
100g liquid levain
80g raisin
56g pecans
2g cinnamon
I created my starter 3 weeks ago but it wasn't until the last 1.5 weeks that it is reliably peaking in ~6 hrs (thanks to Mini, Danny, and Lechem for their patients and guidance).
The past two weeks, this recipe has failed both times. Last week, admittedly, my starter wasn't up-to-par and instead of following his method of using a stand mixer I chose to use the FWSY pincer and fold method. However this week, I followed the instructions for mixing to a T.
I'm out of ideas unless my starter, which again is reliably peaking in 6 hours, is still not 'mature' enough - a concept that I don't think I fully understand. I've attached pictures of the "2 small batards" that I just pulled out of the oven, as sad as they may be. I've also attached a picture of what Lionel has in his recipe of what they look like for him. You'll notice, the sizes are even close to the same. I've checked and double checked thinking I had to have left flour out but this isn't the case.
Any help/thoughts would be awesome. This naturally sweet loaf is something right up my alley and I'd love to make some weekend French toast with it but I can't get it to work. My only thought for next time is to compensate with 0.2% active dry yeast to give it more rise.
that cinnamon impedes yeast growth. You need way more starter in the loaf to counteract this effect. I am assuming that you mixed the cinnamon right into the dough. The other solution is to flatten the dough before shaping, sprinkle the cinnamon on and then shape your loaf. That way, the cinnamon is localized and isn't in contact with all of your beasties. Or you could use some commercial yeast to help things move along.
I hope this helps.
... is that nearly every problem raised for advice or discussion has been encountered or solved by another TFLer on a previous occasion; clearly us newer members are indebted to some formidable bread baking pioneers!
See the discussion topic - http://www.thefreshloaf.com/node/16487/cinnamon-and-yeast
You might want to try making a starter that contains a proportional amount of cinnamon. This might yield a tolerant strain of yeast. Works with beer and hops - hops also have antimicrobial activity.
Many spices exhibit antimicrobial activity - some quite impressive, e,g., pepper, nutmeg, turmeric, garlic, clove, cumin, thyme, oregano, rosemary, ginger, basil et al.
I make a cinnamon raisin sourdough bread quite often, and have tried a few different methods of dealing with the the inhibiting effects of the spice...I often mix the cin. with plumped raisins, and add them at the very end of the mix, basically just folding them in until distributed. I still may end up having to extend the proof, but it works fine, as the cin. isn't completely mixed in with the dough (it clings a bit to the wet raisins). I also have done what Danni suggests, and that works well too (and I have visited bakers who just use cin. instead of dusting flour on their work bench for this bread).
In any case, the fact that there is some inhibition of microbial growth doesn't mean it will stop the process...so time (and its counterparts, temperature and inoculation percentages) should be able to make any of these methods work.