My first sourdough with new starter... Failed.
My sourdough starter was started on 4/1/10 based on SourdoughLady's post here (She was a great help with tips on the process)
Thursday night, I started my first bread based on the no-knead recipe on breadtopia (I looked for a basic recipe here, but only found more advanced versions or ones that require a scale)
The first rise took longer than the 12hrs expected probably closer to 15, but it did finally double.
After stretching it out and folding as the video shows, I put it into a bread pan as I don't have one of the fancy cookers shown on that site. The second rise was only supposed to take ~1.5 hrs, but I had to give mine a good 5 before it reached the top of the bread pan. There it stalled and turned into more of a jello than bread. To explain, it became "wobbly" when the pan was tapped or moved.
I did go ahead and bake it... Zero oven spring and when finished baking, the crumb still had 1/2 pea-sized bits of.... dough-y, uncooked goo strewn throughout it :(
Any tips - or basic recipies I should try? I've given up on no-kneads I just can't get them to work
I'm not familiar with the article you mention, but you should know, going in, that different sourdough cultures can vary wildly in the length of time they take to proof, from a couple hours, to over a day. Quite often you need to work with a sourdough several times to get the feel for it's needs and the timing. Don't be discouraged yet. Also, I don't see any temps mentioned, I recommend you get a relatively inexpensive digital probe so you know exactly what the temperatures are when you stop the baking, since you mention uncooked parts.
Kneading is always better than no-knead, incidentally. I've never seen a prime loaf of no-knead.
By the final rise your bread was over proofed. Try cutting your bulk proof time in half, shape, and proof again for 2- 5 hours. Experimentation is the key to success.
My procedure is to mix the dough (by hand) and do a series of stretch and folds at 45 - 60 minute intervals for four hours. I then shape it (usually a boule) and let it proof for five or six hours. Is this the right way? I don't know, but this bread is batting 1000 on the rave review chart.
As your bread is proofing, poke it once in awhile. Getting a feel for what your dough is doing and what you want it to do is a great help.
Larry
I used to have a similar problem that came from expecting the dough to rise higher than the top of the pan. Unfortunately, the pan was made for a larger loaf than I was making, so by the time it crested the pan, it was overproofed. I bought smaller pans (8x5 instead of 9x5) and have not had any problem since. I could have made larger loaves, but I wanted the smaller loaves to give as gifts.
How much dough are you putting in each pan, and how big are the pans?
brad
Thanks for the replies & encouragement everyone.
The recipe I tried was from:
http://www.breadtopia.com/sourdough-no-knead-method/
I'm not blaming that recipe, or the chef there at all. I'll take full responsibility, I must be doing something wrong.. This was my 3rd no-knead version (first sour-dough type) and I just haven't had much luck with that process. The first two weren't failures, but at best gave "so so" results.
AndyM-
Wow, those are Amazing looking breads sir. If I can even get close to that some day soon, I'll be one happy camper. You should be proud!
Larry Clark -
"Overproofed" That's a new one for me. Forgive me if this is a silly question. If the bread doesn't double, when should I go ahead and stop the proofing and do the punch-down/stretch? I'm assuming the "poking" should tell me, but what is it I'm looking for when I poke it? :)
noonesperfect-
The recipe is a basic 1 loaf and the pan was a standard 9x5 loaf pan.