Blueberry Yeast Water Boule with Blueberry Puree

 The last set of experiments was to determine whether the use of fruit based yeast in the absence of flour in the starter would result in more fruit flavor in the final loaf. Much time and effort went into weaning my standard sourdough starter from a diet of wheat flour and water to a diet of pure fruit puree.  This starter was used to create a boule with the starter, AP flour and peach puree. The result was less than spectacularly peachy. 

 This time the fruit was blueberry.  I initiated my starter from my blueberry yeast water and bread flour, and through  successive refreshments (5X), I created sufficient starter for the following loaf.  I don’t know, but I suspect the loaf was once again, overproofed as I ended up with yet another “muffallata” loaf. The color of the crumb is most striking, almost like a pumpernickel.  The taste is faintly blueberry, sweetish. With cream cheese it tastes very much like a bagel.

Formula: 

70g starter (10 starter/30 flour/30 BYW @100%)

158g blueberry puree (132L,26S)

175g AP flour

4g salt

234:166 = 70% hydration dough

total loaf =407g

To make this loaf, I took 9g of the starter (4th refreshment) and fed it 30g each bread flour and blueberry yeast water.  This I left at room temperature for about 3 hours until it has more than doubled. Then I combined it thoroughly with the blueberry puree, which interesting enough was more like a jelly than I expected, there must be lots of pectin in blueberries.  I stirred in the flour and the salt, gave it a S&F and let it rest for ½ hour. This was repeated for three hours, then not thinking, I put it in the cooler (46*F) for about 3 hours.

Then, remembering that I needed to shape it, I took it out of the cooler, preshaped it and left it out for 30 minutes. Then I shaped it into a boule and placed it into the floured banneton.  This was replaced into the cooler for the remainder of the night. 

The next morning I took it out of the cooler and let it warm up until the oven and combo-cooker was up to temperature (460*F). The loaf was baked for 20 minutes with the cover on, 10 minutes with the cover off, and an additional 10 minute with the oven door ajar.