Tartine Failure
Hi Fellow Bakers,
I am turning to you for help after several attemts and failures to make the basic Tartine country sourdough. I have been getting better, but keep getting variations of the same failure: relatively little rise and the crust gets seperated from the bread itself (a picture will follow). First, let me details my process.
I follow the Tartine recipe in quantities without variation.
Autolyse: half hour
BF: 3.5 hours in my oven with the light turned on (folded every half hour).
Proofed overnight (12 hours) in the fridge (important to point out that I have also attempted 3 hours proof in room temperature and received the same results).
Baked in home oven (not in a dutch oven on not a baking stone, both of which I do not own) and while producing steam by spritzing the walls of the oven and a preheated cast iron skillet.
It seems to me I am following everything to the letter (except the recommendation to bake inside a dutch oven) and yet can not get the result I want.
I have two suspicions I would like to confirm or disprove:
1. I am not allowing enough time for bulk fermentation. My kitchen is rather cold. perhaps the oven with the light on is not a hot enough environment.
2. My proofing basket is too large. By being too large, it allows the dough to go flat, resulting in a sort of flat-bread that tempers with the oven rise.
HELP PLEASE!
Do you slash the top before baking? It looks as if to much steam is trapped in the center of the bread.
.. but i could be wrong.. The bottom part of your crumb seems dense, notwithstanding the top large holes. A few thoughts.. tell us about your starter. When do you feed it prior to using it. How do you know it's ready and/or strong enough? As to cold enough, I would be surprised if the oven door closed and light on solution is not warm enough. I would i) make sure the dough is covered (even with cling wrap) when you put it light on oven; ii) I would take the temp of the dough with an instant read thermometer every time you take it out to fold and record it for us (the dough will take on the oven temp during this period, so you could see if in fact your stove is too cold as you suspect - but I would be surprised). Also describe how it feels by hour three when folding.. do you notice it gets "fluffier".. and when you placed it in the fridge overnight - how much rise do you get by the next day? Lastly, when do you shape and proof? Some shape before putting it into the fridge. Others shape the next morning because cold dough is easier to shape and you can get a better surface tension when it's cold. Let us know.. Good luck and don't give up. It's a worthy bread to keep trying at. It might become your favourite (as it is for many) once you 'get it'. Most of all, bake happy! bread1965!
Without the equipment necessary to provide consistent conditions for every bake, baking at home is subject to variations in things like room and water temp et al that can and do affect your dough. Even your oven with the light on will follow a somewhat different temp / time curve if the starting temp differs, which means your bulk ferment won't be exactly the same.
So, if you go by the clock, your dough won't necessarily be at the same stage after the same length of time. Small differences won't make much difference, but one of the things you need to do is to learn, in part by trial and error, how dough that produces a good bake looks and feels pre-bake. All doughs aren't exactly the same, but once you know what a ready to bake one is like, that's a better guide than watching the clock.
I'm not much good at slashing, but I also doubt that the flying crust in your photo is a slashing issue.
Possibilities:
oven too hot
over fermented
gluten under developed
final shaping inadequate
leavener not energetic enough
I am confused as to what seems to the contradictory possibilities of over fermenting and gluten under development.
Over-ferment would mean I need less bulking time, right?
But gluten under development would mean I need to give more time to develop.
What am I misunderstanding?
Both take time and have to be in sync.
Should the yeast work quickly then you need to speed up the gluten development. This is done by kneading or with stretch and folds.
If there is less yeast, or starter, then time is on your side and helps with gluten development.
If you don't develop enough gluten then it doesn't trap the gas and produces a flat loaf.
Should you over ferment then that destroys the gluten producing the same effect.
Trick is to develop the gluten and to ferment the dough enough to give a nice flavoursome loaf which rises well but not to go over. But at the same time you don't wish to not bulk ferment properly as that will effect the taste and crumb too.
Time is everything.
I had a lot of issues with the Tartine bread before I found the right way. Timings in the book are only informational and you really need to watch the dough. Towards the end of bulk fermentation the dough should become airy and fluffy, alive, you can feel that! Because you stretch & fold in 30 minute intervals you degas slightly each time so the dough will increase only about 20 to 30% or even less. Don't stretch and fold for the last hour (or hour and half) or even better, let the dough rise without stretching it for 75% or even more and then shape it. Be sure, that you have passed the BF phase.
Another problem I had was a relatively "weak flour" with only about 10.5 to 11.0% of gluten so I had to reduce the hydration for about 5%. But it seams like that you don't have that kind of issue.
When I mix the dough I use water warmed to 39dC and end up with the dough about 27dC what is just the right temp for the fermentation. So I try to keep the dough at that temp during the whole BF. I keep it in oven and the temp is set to 35dc what results in dough of having about 27-28dC. If I am not using oven, I usually need 4 to 5 hours to get same signs on the dough. With higher temp I usually end the BF at 3 hours or even less if I am using a lot of wholegrain flour.
Hope this will help you a little bit in your experiments! Don't give up, continue, I had many failures as well!
Happy baking,
Joze
Your starter build?
One problem I see is that you followed the recipe to the letter instead of watching the dough. But let's start with the starter and analyse step by step.
Sure.
Started is a half whole wheat half white flour culture. Quite developed (a year old), and very predictable.
I feed it the night before according to the recipe (tablespoon starter, 200 warm water, 200 gr white flour), and leave for 12 hours on the counter, covered with a towel. I know it is ready when it looks bubbly and a teaspoon of the levain floats in a bowl of water.
It floats so you have a strong starter ready to use.
Now the next stages...
Mix, autolyse, adding salt and bulk ferment.
I assume you mix everything except the salt and rest for 30 min. No problem there.
Then you add salt and combine. Again quite straight forward.
Now for the gluten development and bulk ferment.
How does each stage work for you. Is the gluten strong and is the dough aerated and billowy within the recommended time?
Well, I guess this is really the stage where I have to most uncertainties (save for maybe steaming).
I am not sure how much time I should dedicate to mixing the dough before beginning the stretch and folds every half hours. That is, how much time for the initial, first mixing.
I usually try to eye it and only move to proofing once the dough is billowy, but I confess I am never certain as to when is right time, and when is the dough "ready" (no pictures this time, I'll take some next time).
I certainly never looked as airy and flexible as I've seen in some videos on line. The best results I has were when I waited once (about four hours) and the dough has some bubbles on it. Also special on that was that I was water that was a bit warmer than usual.
May I suggest this site from Trevor Wilson (a fellow TFL'er). Some great videos and advice on how to handle dough, judge when it's ready, shaping etc.
http://www.breadwerx.com/
I brought this up with another baker here on TFL. Are you using tap water that isn't treated for hardness, your dough could be suffering. Here's the science behind it... http://www.triangularwave.com/bakeryeffects.htm
too hot for the bulk ferment of this bread. Also spritzing the oven will not provide the steam needed . Get a 8 x 13 inch pan half full of water and either fill it with lava rocks or a rolled up kitchen towel. Once the oven is preheated to 500F place the pan on the bottom rack with the bread level the next rack above. Set the timer for 15 minutes then load the dough. Keep your face away from the door of the oven when you load the dough so the steam doesn't burn your face, Steam the bread for 15 minutes at 450 F then remove the pan to finish baking the bread.
When you mix in the levain make sure you have evenly distributed it by doing 50 slap and folds right away and then do stretch and folds after that. Your problems should go away by watching the dough and not the clock. Your times will be way different than Chads in his SF bakery.
Happy SD baking
Normally I would say underproofed. But I think it's the baking environment itself causing you problems. You don't have enough steam nor conductive heat. A baking sheet won't do it; you will never get the internal structure you want without a stone or thick metal to conduct heat.
I am learning more and more that often when we think there is a problem with over-proofing it's actually underdeveloped dough. Several of the bread books I've read recently (America's Test Kitchen "Bread Illustrated" and Daniel Leader's "Local Bread") say you should knead bread dough for 20 to 30 minutes to adequately develop the gluten, before bulk fermentation (with or without stretch and folds). And at least 8 minutes at a medium speed in a stand mixer. If you are making a high-hydration dough, as many of the Tartine doughs are, you can work it by hand but I'd recommend at least 10 to 15 minutes of fairly vigorous stretch and fold or slap and fold. This step seems to be skipped in many of the videos, under the assumption that a long bulk ferment will adequately develop the gluten. But I've discovered this is not always the case. It works better if you develop the dough before the bulk ferment so it can rise properly and hold the gases.
In my previous post I forgot to say that I am using Trevor's "scoop and stretch" method after initial autolyse. I do that from 5-10 minutes until the dough become really cohesive and you can easily pull it out from the bowl when you finish. After that I do regular stretch & folds in 30 minute intervals.
That sounds like a reasonable amount of development. What kind of flour are you using (did you say)? I had a real problem developing dough when I was in the UK recently, using UK flour instead of my usual Canadian flour. I ended up with flat, dense bread several times.
mixing figuring that what ever you do to the dough in the beginning few minutes doesn't make any difference 3 hours later. I used to do 8 -10 minutes (280- 340 slaps) but now am down to only 40-50 slaps one time. I found that a lot of slaps in the beginning restricted the crumb and that it was better with less slap and folds and more sets of 4 stretch and folds with a half hour in between. Way better crumb that way.