September 8, 2015 - 11:09am
Sourdough explosion
What the heck happened? Started with a cold oven and refrigerated dough overnight. It doubled in the refrigerator overnight and exploded into this in the oven. It's delicious. Great crust and chew. But it sure ain't pretty.
Any insight would help.
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Wow, your starter really had some oomph!
mentioning this could happen with a cold retard directly into an oven. I think it has something to do with under prooving. Drying of the crust can add to the effect. I will go hunt for the comment...
Thanks. I've been experimenting a bit. I think I may have used too much levian. The proof was 12 hours at 70 degrees and eight hours in the fridge.
here's the link http://www.thefreshloaf.com/comment/243101#comment-243101
Would also like to see what the crumb looks line inside??? Did you get any caverns?
I never quite got the cold oven thing either, however I know it does work in some cases, but I wonder here if the cold dough combined with a cold oven ... the outside will warm up and 'set' then the inside will warm up - the yeasty beasties will start to act and act and act ... before they finally get too hot, but by then you'll have all that hot gas inside - still expanding due to the heat now, with a set, or partially set crust, so it's got to go somewhere!
Where's the Kaboom :-)
-Gordon
Makes complete sense while looking at the anatomy of the loaf, post kaboom. There wasn't enough stretch .
I got a few caverns, but not as much as I'd like. I'm trying the same recipe today, and will bake sometime tomorrow evening. But, I will let it wake up an hour or so and bake at full temp of 425.
about using too much levain? Perhaps retarding sooner might help.
I used a full cup of very active proofed starter in my mix. Perhaps it was just too much yeast without enough stretch.
Hi Unclepauly,
I don't see any notation above about whether the bread was scored or not. From the picture it's a bit hard to tell, but it doesn't seem to be. The purpose of the score is not just to give a bread a pretty bloom and grigne, but to have a controlled and designated place where you want the bread to bloom. Without that, and with a hyperactive dough, the bread is going to split open anywhere it darn well pleases, usually at the weakest points on the surface.
I have no issues on going from retard directly into the oven, but that oven must be preheated and there has to be steam to prevent the crust from setting too early. And if that happens, there may be another clue as to why your bread went ka-boom.
alan
Thanks Alan,
It was scored twice, actually right where the explosions occurred. I think maybe the gluten was underdeveloped and didn't have enough stretch.
The chemistry is fascinating
The crust formed too early. I don't do cold ovens but I would think the dough would need to be covered with something when in the oven. It has to be long enough to get steamed during the oven spring so it can expand. Otherwise the crust starts to form and ... boom. If it was under proofed this would only make it worse.
I've been wrestling with proofing cold, long-fermented dough, and had a few explosions that were close to this, but nowhere near as awesome! Proofing is a negotiation. When we shape the loaves, we want that tight skin. But then we want that tight skin and the unrealized expanding foam inside to maintain equilibrium as the loaf develops.
Covering the loaf in a cloche or dutch oven holds so much steam relative to the volume (an effect you can't get in the oven itself without dedicated piping) that the crust won't fully set while the foam inside expands. This lets you not worry so much about underproofing. But in the open oven, proofing matters more. Spray the loaf with water, make steam in the oven, these things will help, but inevitably the crust will set sooner, and before expansion finishes. This means that we wind up doing a little dance trying to figure out exactly how much time a shaped loaf needs before baking in the conditions we have, in order to get it right eventually.
Scoring is important, but as you've seen with this loaf, slashing with the blade perpendicular to the skin will only allow so much expansion before the slashed surface itself sets. If there's more expansion coming, that area will rupture first, and continue doing its job, just as it did here. What you need are slashes that allow gradual and continuous expansion as the loaf exposes new surface, and that's why a slash angled at about 30 degrees to the loaf surface produces what we call "grigne." As the foam expands inside, the angled slash allows more new crust to show under the edge of the protruding "ear," and that surface sets while it pulls away from the slash revealing new surface, etc.
You might also try a "box" scoring pattern on the boule, cutting a square of connected slashes mostway out to the edge, which will allow the edge crust and top crust to separate completely as it expands. The angle of the resulting bottom/side crust will not be so restrictive as it sets, and the top square is four sides worth of grigne. So rather than reining in that expansive power your dough has, you just give it the space it needs!
Thank you so much for your advice.
My starter has been proofing for about a week at room temperature, fed daily in a quart jar. I dump a cup, feed it, then wait until it doubles (about 6 hours) , stir it down, and use it for my dough, although I may use it sooner or later depending on the quality of the sponge.
That dough fermented for 12 hours at 70°, loaf proofed for 6 hours at 70° and 6 hours in the refrigerator, at 43°, then straight into the oven preheating to 375° and there for the bake.
I sprayed the surface with lukewarm water and a large tray of muffin tins filled with boiling water on the bottom most rack, below my stone.
My slashes were probably more like 45° to the surface.
I've only made about a dozen loaves of bread in my short three week obsession. I've been consistently inconsistent, although I am beginning to realize I need to make notes during my experiments and dial in the precision of my equipment, i.e., a digital scale, and recent manufacture of a proofing box.
... it sounds like you're making excellent progress! Keep up the good work. I'm not ridiculously far ahead of you; I've been doing this since February, even though I had baked the odd loaf of commercial yeast bread from a recipe before.
I do things very differently regarding oven temp and steam, but having not tried it your way I can't say better or worse; it seems mostly to work for you, judging by this loaf. I will say, though, that the faster you can get more steam in, the better for stalling the set of the crust. In my experience thin pans of hot water don't steam off very fast; I use a big cast iron skillet, preheated in the oven already, to flash steam at the start. I understand others here do something similar with thin pans of lava rocks for preheated mass, but I don't have a baking stone, so the cast iron also serves in that role as my heat capacitor. YMMV, but pay attention to how the crust sets as it bakes from a cold oven with boiling water below, and tweak your approach accordingly.