Super Sour Sandwich Loaf
Inspired by this comment from Trevor Wilson, I decided to take a run at bread made from dough doubled twice before turning out for preshape. I didn't feel confident that I'd be able to shape something that far along so I also decided to indulge my wife's request for sandwich bread simultaneously and dusted off the 9x4x4 Pullman (sans lid). After calculating how much water it holds, I divided the number by two to determine how much dough I needed (to fill the pan before it doubles), and added 10% to provide just enough to sit proud of the top.
For context, I bake two or three sourdough loaves a week, whole grain exclusively. I have great success with moist and open crumb, deeply flavorful low temperature inoculations. But I've always been chasing more tang. As far as I know, the only real way to achieve this is by fermenting it beyond the point of being able to maintain significant structure, and I didn't want to sacrifice one for the other. My daily loaf is generally risen to a full(ish) 100% before a cold retard, typically 75% in bulk and another 25% proof (using bwraith's models for guidance and planning). I couldn't imagine taking my daily dough to 225% (structure wise), so that's where the Pullman pan comes in. I have to say, this loaf did not disappoint.
With all the other changes to my routine I figured I may as well make a white loaf as well, so I used 80% BF (Central Milling ABC+) along with 20% Heirloom French Renan from Grist & Toll (my wonderful local mill). At 70% hydration I was going for a "stiff" dough at Trevor's suggestion, but this felt very lax and overly extensible and I think it would have performed better at 65%. My NMNF starter and levain were used for a 5% inoculation of the dough that fermented nearly 20 hours total before the final shaping (69/70°F).
I'm blown away by these results. So much so that I've been inspired to delurk here to record my notes. I've never tasted bread this sour. The aroma pops you in the nose and the tang is downright puckering. It's not for everyone, but I love sour profiles. And the texture is just as Trevor described, it's light and fluffy like a cloud. If you haven't before, I highly recommend running this experiment for yourself.
Comments
Your loaf sounds exactly like what I'm looking for. Could I get your formula and schedule?
Hi Gary, I'm not sure what details you're looking for but I'm happy to share. I built up my starter over the course of 12 hours and three feedings, then added it to my autolyzed dough:
I then mixed in the salt (2%) and left the whole thing to ferment overnight for a total of ten hours. The next day I punched it down and performed several stretch and folds over the course of the next few hours. I left it alone again until a total secondary rise of another ten hours. I preshaped (dough was very, very slack) and placed it in the Pullman for about an hour before retarding in the fridge overnight. The process started on Monday and I baked it on Wednesday morning. Aside from the inclusion of sifted flour and punching it down to double a second time, my methodology was similar to my normal everyday batard. When it was time to bake the dough smelled just like very, very ripe starter.
Thanks, one more thing.
You talked about computing the volume of the pan (I get about 2300 ml), dividing by 2, and adding 10%. That would be about 1265 ml of dough. I've read that the volume is about 2/3 of the weight so the dough would weigh about 1900 grams. At 70% hydration that would be about 1100 grams of flour which seems really high to me. I typically use only about 500 grams of flour in my 9x4x4 pan.
What am I missing?
My total dough weight was 1,304g so in line with your original calculation for 1265g. That was 712g flour, 498g H2O, 14g salt, and 80g starter.
OK. Wow. I'll try more dough. When my loaves get sour they also get short. I'll try doubling in the pan. Thanks for the info.
Good luck! I hope to see your results!