August 12, 2011 - 10:28pm
baguette - crust looks weird
I made a couple baguettes, due to time, I had to retard them in the refrig overnight after shaping. When I baked them they did not brown as they should, but looked weird. No blisters, but maybe like they were going to, as soon as the browning started so did the bad appearance. What went wrong? I had a pan of hot water in the bottom of the oven. Could they have been too wet from the fridge? suggestions?
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Are they yeasted, or Levain based (sourdough)? If the former, then retardation in the fridge will most likely cause all residual sugars to be exhausted by yeasts, and your baguette will be pale and rather scorched when overly baked, as opposed to reddish brown. If the latter, then there may be alot of factors that go into crust formation in levain breads. Post a picture of your bread, we may be able to help you out better this way.
Unfortunatly the bread is gone, I intended to photo it but... well. It was made from a poolish. I had cut epi, which also lost their points overnight. It looked like your 'pale and scorched', but I don't think it was overly baked... but could have since I was waiting for it to get that nice 'reddish brown'. It looked to me like blisters before they break. So what I get is that I shouldn't retard this type of bread at the shaped stage. Yes?
Difficult to decide what's the cause of your problem without a photo, but am I right in thinking the colour of the crust was uneven? If that's the case, it occasionally happens with me, too, especially with cold-retarded dough and especially with baguettes, for some reason. I haven't quite made a note to record when it happened and when not, but I have a feeling it happens when the dough was a bit over-fermented. Maybe because yeast has consumed too much sugar in the dough and there's no sufficient sugar left to colour the crust.....??? It's my wild guess.
btw, I don't think epi is really suitable for long retard. The reason being....what you've found out. ;) When I want to make epi with cold O/N retardation, I always bulk ferment in the fridge overnight or longer, and shape and proof at room temperature afterwards. I'm especially careful not to overferment at this stage, too, to keep that pointy shape.
best wishes,
lumos
Hi, Dolcebaker,
Yes, you should not have retarded a poolish baguette, as the typical recipe contains more yeast than is allowable for retardation. If you wish to retard poolish baguettes, or any baguette for that matter, you are better off using negligible amounts of yeast in the final dough. This way, your baguettes would slowly proof, not underproof, and will still have enough vigor to spring in the oven and take color. Try using 1/8 th of the recipe's Yeast in the final dough, and retard. Make sure to proof at room temp. for 45 minutes - 1:30 hours prior to baking.
Oh, yeah, I forgot that was poolish baguette.....Sorry.
I do retard my poolish baguette, but I only use 0.7-8g yeast for 260g total flour. The basic formula is ;
Poolish ... 125g flour + 125g water + 0.2g yeast
Main dough ... 135g flour + 60g water + 0.5-0.6g yeast + 5g salt
I ferment the poolish for 6-7 hrs at room temperature until it peaks, mix all the ingredients for main dough, autolyse for 20-30 minutes and S & F twice, then cold retard in the fridge for upto 21-22 hrs. Been doing this for a few years, but never had the problem of uneven crust colour....unless, perhaps, if I overferment the dough.
(Warning : Let's not talk about other problems you can see in this pic at the moment....:p)
lumos
Not trying to plug it, but if you're interested, I just posted a blog about my formula of poolish baguette with long (21 hrs) cold retard, here.