First Foccacia (Glezer/Acme)--questions
I made my first foccacia today. It is from Maggie Glezer's "Artisan Baking" book. It is fabulous! It has fresh rosemary and olive oil in the dough that give it wonderful flavor. They use a technique where the loaf is flipped over after 5 minutes to keep it very flat. Everything came out just wonderfully. This recipe uses a poolish with a very small amount of yeast, then 1/4 tsp additional yeast in the dough. Here's my question--the book recommends a bulk ferment of 6 hours, followed by 3.5 hours of proofing. Since I'm in Denver, yeasted bulk ferments usually take about half to 2/3rds the amount of time reccommended (I forgot to adjust the yeast down for that reason). I found I was fully proofed by 6 hours and ready to bake. I can't imagine the mess I would have had if I'd waited the full 9.5 hours. Why would they recommend that amount of time for a yeasted bread? Is foccacia supposed to be overproofed? Next time I will make some adjustments to slow down the ferment (just a pinch of yeast).
Comments
It may be that we bakers at lower elevations will need the full 9.5 hours.
Good job on following the dough, not the book. Nice looking bread.
Duh...it does sound like I answered my own question in the post :)
Doesn't 9.5 hours seem like an abnormally long time though even for lower elevations? Plus I'm wondering if slightly over-proofing foccacia is a technique used for big holes and low oven spring (that's just a crazy speculation on my part). Thanks!!
Sue
Hi Sue,
I just pulled out my Glezer's Artisan Baking and took a look at the recipe.
The poolish is made and fermented overnight for 12 hours.
The next morning, the ingredients and poolish are mixed and allowed to bulk ferment until it has doubled. Since there's such a tiny amount of yeast, that might take the six hours Glezer notes, but you have to go by what the dough tells you, not the clock (as you did). The dough is to be folded three times during the bulk fermentation.
The dough is then cut in half, preshaped, bench rested for 20 minutes, then shaped and proofed for about 1.5 hours.
She then stipples the dough (which degasses it a bit) and moves it to parchment for final proofing - around 2 hours.
Glezer notes the total proof time is about 3.5 hours, and that sounds fine.
I've never made this recipe, and I should, since it sounds pretty good. That long bulk fermentation is going to nicely develop the flavor.
Do you remember how long it took your dough to double during the bulk fermentation?
Thanks for pulling out your book. It is quite tasty...a very buttery taste. I guess the olive oil does that? Anyway, my bulk w/ 3 folds was about 4 hours, then proofed a little over 1 hour. Even though I've been baking regularly for over a year, gauging my proofs is still a challenge. But it appeared that about 45 min after my initial shaping my proof was about done...so I did the final shaping instruction and turned on the oven. I think my total proof was about 75 min.