Forkish-ish Loaf with Homebrewer's Caramel Wheat Malt

Hello all, my first blog post here.

I've been baking bread from Ken Forkish's "Flour Water Salt Yeast" for over a year now, almost exclusively sticking with the basic yeast recipes. I'm going to start dabbling in leavens this week. 

Before that though, I had the idea to go to my local homebrew shop (just a mile away) and pick up some grains typically used for brewing beer and add it to my standard recipe (something that coalesces between the Overnight White and Overnight 40% Whole Wheat). I grabbed 0.8lbs of Weyermann's Caramel Wheat, a malted wheat that adds notes of caramel, toffee, and nuttiness when brewed in beer. 

I ground it to into a flour and added a small percentage to the flour bill. Generally the loaf is 17.5% whole wheat, so I just substituted 6% of that with the ground caramel wheat. 

Mixed it all up at 5pm, autolyse for 30min, did 3 folds over the next 90min, bulked it overnight, proofed at 7am, into the oven by 8:30am, 30min cover on the dutch oven, 20min cover off. Baked at 475F.

Verdict

Great loaf! The malted wheat definitely added to the aroma of the bread, though didn't contribute much into the flavor of the crumb. I dusted the top of the dough with the malted wheat flour, which contributed some very nice flavors in the crust. Chewy but still pretty light and airy. If I experiment with brewer's malted grains like this again, I may introduce it as a porridge instead. For now, I'm excited to move onto more advanced recipes. I'll be posting about my sourdough experience soon!

Cheers