Frustratedz first time Artisan bread maker
Hi Everybody,
I'm new here, I had someone recommend this site to me after talking with them about the problems I've been having with my artisan bread. I have never made sourdough bread before so was very excited to try it, but have been very disappointed so far. I do have 3-4 years of other bread baking experience though. I'm following the Trim Healthy Mama eating plan and was trying their recipe. You make your starter by adding one cup rye flour and one cup water everyday for a week. Then "maintain it" by feeding it one cup rye flour and one cup water everyday until using it again. I did that and it got nice and bubbly/sour smelling.
To make the bread you add 5 cups of the starter, 3 1/4 cups water, 31/4 cups rye flour, 4 3/4 spelt four ( I replace two of these cups with rye as we wanted more rye flavor), and 1 1/2 Tablespoons salt. You mix all that until it's like a thick oatmeal and put it in 4 bread pans to rise and ferment for 7-12 hours. Oh, and you also are supposed to slice a X on the top with a water moistened knife. After that you place a pan of water in the bottom of your oven and bake at 400 for 10 minutes, then 350 for 1 hour and 50 minutes. When done baking you pull it out and drape a wet but not dripping towel over the top for about 20 minutes, then you take them out of the pans and wait preferably 2 days before slicing.
The first time I made it I accidentally forgot about it and let it sit longer then the 12 hour rising time. It only raised half way up the pans and got so crusted it felt like a brick on the outside! It also tasted VERY sour since I forgot about it. Oh, and I believe the dough was a little thinner then oatmeal.
The second time I made it I got the dough thicker and places two on a heating pad and two in warm oven to rise thinking that maybe they were too cold the first time. I also placed a clean towel over the top. It rose about 3/4 of the way this time. I baked it the same way, but still very tough. And I cut my finger trying to slice it!
The third time I made the dough even thicker without it getting so dry that you could knead it on the counter, I put it in 3 pans instead of 4 this time, and it rose to the top of the pans! I was getting pretty excited, thinking this time it would turn out! I thought maybe part of the problem that it was getting so tough on the outside was because the oven was up so high. So I baked it at 350 for an hour, and then it felt like it was getting hard again so I turned the oven down to 300 for the last hour. It wasn't as tough, but still tougher then my family would like. They like it better if I cut the top off ;)
All three of these times the inside has felt kind of sticky, not sure if this is normal or not.I don't want to give up on it, but have gotten very discouraged. I have put my starter in the fridge now so I can take a break as we have 5 failed attempt loaves to eat.
I had someone recommend Desem bread to me and I'm very interested in trying this as it's a much thicker dough and can be shaped. More like my yeast breads I used to make ;) She recommenced I buy a starter from Cultures For Health. I found this one: http://www.culturesforhealth.com/new-zealand-rye-sourdough-starter.html
And also this recipe: http://www.culturesforhealth.com/media/docs/CFH_Rye_Sourdough_Starter_Culture_Instructions.pdf
And this one: http://www.healthyfamilyfoodscanada.com/friday-feature-desem-bread/
Any help or advice you can give me would be greatly appreciated. I don't want to give up fully on sourdough bread as I LOVE the flavor and that it's lower carb/ gluten making it 'on plan' for me to eat. Thank you!
Consider dialing back the changes you make to a recipe until after you managed to bake a few successful loaves using it. Spelt in general does not rise as well as wheat. And rye does not allow for the development of gluten. Combining so much rye with spelt is going to make a very difficult bread to handle and bake.
Don't get discouraged, but don't wing it either. Find a formula you can follow which makes a bread that suits your idea of a good bread. Then make it. Get the results that you saw and tweak it from there. If you don't get the results you saw, ask questions and people can help you out.
And ... consider investing in a scale. It is a lot easier to measure flour accurately and consistently if you weigh the flour. It isn't a "must" but it does make life easier.
Thank you so much for your thoughts and help. I did make it exactly the first time except that I accidentally let it rise too long. Would that have made a big enough difference? Do you have a recommended recipe? I do have a scale and would use it in my yeast breads, but the recipe I used doesn't have weights =(
I also had sometime recommend that I try baking the bread in a Dutch oven
Wow, that would be a very difficult recipe to make, I think! With all that rye flour I'm not surprised it's a bit dense and sticky. Here's a recipe I have had good success with for 100% Spelt sourdough. I don't know if it fits your 'plan', but given an overnight fermentation with an active starter (I use a wheat starter with this one), you won't have very much in the way of 'gluten' (or at least the difficult-to-digest proteins) left in it. I have a customer who can't eat most wheat or rye bread, but she loves this loaf and has no problem at all with it. I bake it directly on hot stones but you could also do it in a Dutch oven, I expect. I have no idea how it would be with rye flour substituted for some of the spelt; never tried that.
http://wholelifestylenutrition.com/recipes/how-to-make-a-real-sourdough-spelt-loaf/
Thank you so much!! If it's lower on gluten it's on plan! =D how do you make the starter? I know you said you have never tried it with rye, but after I make it the right way first so I know how it turns out, do you think it would be ok to try? Or should I just not mess with that? I wish I would have known about the rye being more dense as we just placed our buying club order and I only ordered 5 pounds of spelt and 25 of rye =/ I'll find some way to use it though, no problem ;)
I have a starter that I maintain at 100% hydration, which means when I feed it, I use equal amounts (by weight) of bread flour and water. I use it for all my breads regardless of the flour in the finished dough (except for gluten free breads, of course). The recipe I provided the link to (above, in my comment) uses only 1/4 cup of active starter per loaf, so this is a very small amount of bread flour ending up in the finished bread. I make sure my starter is very active by feeding it at least 6-7 hours (and preferably overnight) before I want to incorporate it into dough. To do this, I take a small amount (a spoonful) of the 'mother' culture I keep in the fridge, and mix it with equal amounts of bread flour and water, then let it sit on the counter until is it bubbly, pillowy and has grown substantially. The best test is to put it in water - if it floats, it's ready! The picture I put in my post is a loaf of my 100% Whole Spelt sourdough, baked on stones. It is definitely not flat!
WindyIndy
I would suggest that you go back to step one and re-evaluate your starter. Apparently it is active, which is a good start. I must say however, the process you describe would be more appropriate for a commercial, or large scale bakery and not necessarily for the home baker. 1 + 1 cup daily is way overkill. Plus, I wouldn't have fed it by the clock, but rather by the activity level. When it doubles and falls, feed. Not before to my thinking.
So, now I hold suspect the rest of the recipe. Even if sound and true, this is (as said before) a very difficult bread for a first attempt at sourdough. I would seek a simpler, lower whole grain recipe, one that included a fair amount of Bread or AP flour.
Once you get your feet wet with some success, you can make things more difficult, perhaps with better success.
This forum is rife with such recipes and a simple search for 'beginning sourdough recipes' (or such) should lead you to more than you could bear to read and would probably lead to greater success for you to build on from there. Look for 'Vermont Sourdough' if nothing else. Simple and easy.
Just my opinion,
dobie
Thank you. I will definitely stop this recipe and try something new. =)
I'm searching flours, would whole spelt or white spelt be better?
White would be easier to start with.
Stick with the pans and don't be tempted to bake a free-standing loaf, unless you like your bread in a disk rather than a boule. Spelt tends to slump, rather than 'stand up' like modern wheat, but it rises well and the white will make a light and fluffy loaf with a superb flavour and unique texture.
Most spelt recipes seem to suggest adding honey. You don't need the honey.
Use a recipe which lists ingredients by weight and weigh everything.
For some reason your comment just showed up =/ I thank you for your thoughts though! I will use the pans, and I'm so glad to know that I don't need the honey. I'm trying to stay very low sugar right now =)
I will also weigh everything, that's what I used to do for my yeast breads and I find it really does help. Thanks!
Thank you. I will definitely stop this recipe and try something new. =)
I'm searching flours, would whole spelt or white spelt be better?
Windy
I am not the master of spelt by any means, but my understanding would be that white would be easier to start.
But again, I would suggest to simplify.
Try something with about 15% of the total flour weight as Whole Wheat or Rye to start with at about 65% hydration, just to begin. That is essentially what 'Vermont Sourdough' works out to be. You will probably have some success and start to get a feel for all the nuances of SD baking.
Higher percentages of hydration and whole grain (such as Spelt, Barley and others) can get a little tricky and might be better left for the near future.
I'm not trying to shoot you down, just trying to lead you to some success that will further encourage, rather than discourage you. It's just a little time and flour after all. One loaf, one variation at a time, and with patience and practice, you will get there.
There are a tremendous amount of appropriate recipes and discussions of technique from previous threads on this forum that I'm pretty sure would be quite worthwhile checking out. The 'search bar' is you friend, believe me.
I know it's not nearly as daring and exciting, but any simple success can be quite exciting in itself.
I mean this all kindly.
dobie
I know you mean it kindly and I greatly appreciate your advice, truly!! I need simple right now as I'm starting to get quite overwhelmed. There's just so much out there! I like how you said try one loaf at a time, but if I start a starter for that one loaf I can't use it for another right? So I would have to throw it out and start with something else? Boy do I have a lot to learn!
ps: What do you mean by hydration? Is that basically how 'runny/thin' the dough is?
WindyIndy
First, let me say welcome to the forum. I did not realize this was your first post.
It's OK Windy, don't worry, this will all work out.
What I am going to say next in no way contradicts what mixinator is saying, I will just try to simplify it.
When you start a 'starter' (which apparently you have done), it is traditional among home and commercial bakers to 'ALWAYS' keep some in reserve (at home, usually in the fridge) for the next building of a dough. No matter what, keep some unadulterated 'mother' starter to build from in the future. It doesn't have to be a lot, but just some.
Don't be confused by the terms 'mother', 'starter' and 'levain'. They are essentially all the same thing, perhaps with slightly different meanings.
First of all, different folks refer to all of the same sometimes in different interchangeable terms, but it all comes down to the same thing.
You have built a healthy active starter. This is also sometimes refered to as the 'mother'. Sometimes as the 'mother starter'. Same thing all around. I will call it 'starter'.
In the most basic terms, if you take some of that starter and feed it to some flour and water, you are now 'feeding your starter' or 'building your levain'. Same process, just a matter of what you do with it that makes it a fed starter or a levain.
If you take your starter out to feed it once a week or so (as is common) and let it rise to about 150% of the original volume (as is common) before returning it to the fridge, is that not essentially a levain? Yes, it is. The part that you put back in the fridge for future use tho, is your (now, freshly fed) starter (or mother, or starter mother) and what you keep out to build your dough from, is your 'levain'.
I'm trying to simplify, but I'm not sure I am. I hope this all makes sense. Essentially, all is one and one is all. If I am fundamentally wrong about any of this, I'm sure someone will chime in (but I'm pretty sure most folks will agree with this accessment).
If your 'starter' has been recently fed and is not in need of a feeding, it would be common to scoop out the required bit (usually an ounce or two, tho sometimes more) to build the levain you need for the current dough you want to build. Again, this is all within a typical 'home-baking' scale. Typically you would let it rise to 150% or more and then build you dough proper.
Regarding how wet your dough is, here is how you can figure out the hydration rate (or percentage) of your starter, levain or dough.
Take the weight (not volume but weight, so get a scale) of the water and divide it by the weight of the flour and then multiply by 100. If your starter is made of 4 oz flour and 4 oz water (which is common), then it is at 100% hydration.
Let's leave the starter out of the equation for the moment and let's say you dough recipe is 32 oz flour and 16 oz water. That would be 50% hydration. That's a pretty stiff dough, but not unheard of (particularly for bagels and such). If it were 32 oz flour and 24 oz water, then that would be 75% hydration. 32 oz of four with 21 oz of water would be just about 65% hydration.
Bringing the starter or levain hydration back into the equation (just to point out a bit of an idiosyncracy about sourdough formulas) you must account for the percentage of the flour and water in the starter or levain for your final dough hydration equation to be accurate.
Let's say your starter/levain is at 100% hydration and you add 6 oz of it to the 32 oz of flour and 21 oz of water. Now you have 35 oz of flour and 24 oz of water for a hydration of about 68%, no longer 65%. Just pointing that out.
Now, what could be simpler, 'eh? Seriously, I hope this gets you started. Any questions, feel free to ask, and again, don't worry.
It will all come with time, temperature and experience.
dobie
Thank you for the welcome! Yes, that is starting to make sense, thank you! Do you think I should start out with a new starter/mother? The recipe I followed said to feed it one cup rye/water before putting it in the fridge and when I take it out to keep doing that everyday until the bubbles/sponginess comes back. Said it could take up to a week of doing that and may get something called "hooch" on it. Should I just start fresh with a wheat starter or something? Or buy one?
To make sure I'm understanding this right. I can keep all my starter in the fridge take out and feed once a week then put back in the fridge until ready to use? And the small bit I do take out to use I feed and let sit until fermented? . And what hydration should I strive for for my starter? And if I make, say, a wheat starter I can use that with any four? Spelt, rye, wheat, etc recipe? I thought spelt flour recipes would need spelt starter, rye would need rye, wheat wheat, etc, though Lazy Loafer said they use a wheat starter for 100% spelt bread......
I'm so sorry if I'm just repeating stuff or asking silly questions, I'm very much a hands on learner so it takes me a little bit to catch on when I'm just reading.
I'm trying to find a recipe too, having a little trouble, but not giving up by any means!!
If you've got an active starter that will double when fed at room temp anywhere around 8 or less hours, you're there and don't need to start new.
Once you have an active starter you can adjust it to whatever flour or hydration you would like. You just do it.
There may be advantages to using starters that have been changed over to particular flours with dough built of those particular flours, but I'm not aware of any other than 'purity'. I also just use my wheat flour starter for any and all breads, no matter the flour used.
That recipe for starting a starter is the oddest one I've ever seen. Usually starters are begun 1:1 (by weight) of flour and water. Rye or Whole Wheat are recommended and will quicken the process.
Normally, it would be equal weights of water and flour which would be more like 1 or 2 oz of each with feeds being the same (then 1:1:1 once it gets established). The recipe you used starts with a cup of each which would be about 5 oz flour and 8 oz of water. It's just a large amount that isn't necessary, in fact, just promotes waste.
Normally you wouldn't feed it until you saw bubbles on the top, no matter how long it took. Stirring it a few times a day is also usually recommended. Normally, you wouldn't begin to discard until you have had at least one true doubling in volume from a feed.
I have never heard of a recipe for a starter that included putting it in the fridge each day. It usually goes to live in the fridge only once it is clearly active and even then it's more common to continue the feed, activation to double, then feed again, at room temperature for days (if not weeks), to allow it to mature.
Of course, you will eventually need to discard to keep the volume managable. You can also use any discard to start a dough, or make pancakes or english muffins, etc.
Just do a search for 'simple sourdough recipe' or words to that effect. Hold on, I'll give you a link to AbeNW11's post of Hamelman's Vermont Sourdough recipe, in which he gives detailed step by step directions. Here it is. Just scroll down a bit and you'll find it.
http://www.thefreshloaf.com/node/44371/sourdough-serendipity
Good luck Windy.
dobie
I would like to get a handle on your dough hydration. "Consistency of oatmeal" sounds pretty thin for bread dough.
It will be worth your while to learn baker's math. Here is a sourdough calculator that will come in handy. When I bake bread I go for 59% hydration, but that is a rather stiff/dry dough. Others here will have suggestions for hydration. A digital scale is just the thing for measuring wet ingredients.
Too much starter/levain can affect a sourdough crust in a negative way.
Hydration is basically the ratio of flour to water. In baker's math, all ingredients are pegged to the flour weight, which is always 100%.
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1P7RBFZle75Enp2dmxX3vPFXCiq0cphXtMnkGUiwdkoY/edit#gid=0
Wow, the more I read on here the more I see why my bread didn't turn out! I'm so glad I signed up for this form, you guys are wonderful! I thought I knew a decent amount about bread, but this sourdough stuff sure is humbling. Lol. As overwhelming as it is, I'm also very excited to try these. I'm going to take it slow and really yet and learn the "math" behind it.
I was able to cancel part of my order so I got 10 pounds of white spelt and no rye as I still have about 3/4 of a 5 pound bag. Phew!
Yes, you can reuse starter/levain.
I use a liquid starter which is kept in the fridge until I'm ready to bake. I then add a small quantity of it to a slurry of flour and water and let it proof for 8 hours at room temperature. I'm not being too specific with my portions here because I use white wheat flour and you're using rye and spelt.
I know I can reuse it, I just wasn't sure if the different kinds of bread needed different kinds of starter =)
That kind of starter actually sounds like just the right one for me, or something similar as I don't know how often I'll be baking yet. And the fact that it can stay I in the fridge until needed sounds great. I'm willing to try any flour =) and I'm thinking I'll hold off on the rye like people are suggesting until I can get the hang of things. I just ordered more as we can only order every 2 months. And my daddy likes rye bread so I could always make him non sourdough rye for now. ;)
Since your first steps were pretty complex, I suggest you leave trying other starters until after you've become comfortable using your current one.
How much difference various starters make depends on a combination of factors including but not limited to the proportion of starter in the dough, the type of starter, and what else is in the dough. I don't know that you want to add so much more potential complexity at this stage in your SD experience.
If you create a starter with rye or wheat you can use it to bake a bread that is rye, wheat, spelt or whatever you wish, and it will raise the dough. The flavor may conceivably change but not necessarily for the better or worse.
And if you have a rye starter but get tired of feeding it rye, you can convert it to wheat and vice versa. Just don't change the starter's diet abruptly. So if it was 100% rye, feed it 75% rye and 25% AP for a few feedings, then increase it to 50% AP, then 75% and then 100% and you can then feed your starter all purpose flour regularly if you wish.
I have only baked my sourdough loaves in the lodge combo cooker (like a dutch oven, but with a shallow pan that I use as the base, and a deeper pan that I use as a cover). And my most successful breads have come from Tartine Bakery by Chad Robertson and Flour, Water, Salt, Yeast by Ken Forkish. The latter book is a little more versatile because it contains yeast and sourdough formula whereas Tartine is only sourdough. That said, I have made excellent bread following both methodologies and am glad to have learned techniques from both.
read through Juergen Krauss' blog here on TFL. He has baked an array of sourdough rye breads, some of which might interest you. His formulae and processes are clearly spelled out and easy to follow. Do note that you will need a digital scale, since he lists his ingredients' weights, rather than their volumes.
And welcome to The Fresh Loaf.
Paul
Hi Windy just thought to add my 2 cents worth to this very long conversation :) I noticed you seem into spelt, Im guessing thats because of the digestive thing?... anyhow, we make a loaf with;
200g whole spelt
200g white spelt
350g kamut/khorasan
305g leaven ( 50/50 whole rye and white spelt, hydration about 111%)
415g water
8g malt syrup
13g salt
We do a soaker over night, which could be any grain or seed etc, we add the soaker with the salt after autolyse, we do;
80g buckwheat kernels
80g water
You can read, or perhaps you already have, all about khorasan online, its an ancient wheat considered easier on the digestion :)
What a huge amount of waste. I make at least 2 rye starters a month and have one just finishing up day 3 right now and it is doubling every 4 hours. I use 30 g of whole rye and 25 g of water each day for 2 days - not 125 g each day! after 48 hours you split the starter in half and feed each half 30 g of flour and 25 g of water. On day 4 you feed again the same amounts and 6 hours later you have 2 starters of 220 g each one you can bake a oaf of rye with and refrigerate the other for the next loaf when you retain some of it to refresh your stored starter,. There is no need to use so much flour in making a rye starter. - that is expensive not to mention wasteful......
Happy SD baking