Sept 1: 70% Whole Grain Lean Sandwich Loaves

Last week was another busy week with a high need for sandwich bread and not a lot of time to make it.  It was also still stupidly hot (27 deg C or more), and continuously hazy / smoky from all of the fires off to the west and south.  We don’t have air-conditioning, and opening the windows was questionable, so I needed to plan leaven amounts and refrigeration for best bake timing.

To keep things simple, I planned on a couple of very straight-forward low hydration loaves, both at 70% whole grain, with timing balanced around our chores and coolest temps.  The first was a mix of durum and khorasan (kamut), and the second was a hard red wheat / spelt / rye mix.

I started out last Wednesday by pulling out 4g each of my 65% hydration NMNF rye and durum starters, and did a gradual build-up over 3 feeds for each to be 80% hydration with 85g prefermented flour.  The final feed was around midnight, and I left them out at room temperature for the night.

 On last Thursday, I stirred the levains in the morning, but left them out until I was ready to use them.  I started both mixes with an autolyse (flour and water) for 2 hours, then added the salt and levain, and kneaded for 200 turns.

After a 20 minute rest, I kneaded again, and turned out in to fermenting containers.  I kept them at room temperature (27 deg C) while doing 4 sets of stretch-and-fold on the half-hours for a total room temp fermentation time of 3 hours, and then refrigerated them for 17-18 hours to be ready for a morning bake.

 At a ridiculously early hour, I pulled the first dough from the fridge, pre-shaped it, and let it rest on the counter (covered with a damp towel) for an hour.  I then did the final shape and placed it in a banneton with the damp towel over it to proof for another hour while the oven pre-heated to 480 deg F / 250 deg C.

I then pulled the next dough from the fridge and pre-shaped it to let it rest for an hour.  Once the first loaf was in the oven, the second was final shaped and left to proof in a covered banneton.

I was rushing too much when I decided to put the first loaf in to the oven, so it went in somewhat under-proofed.  It baked for 25 minutes covered at 450 deg F / 230 deg C, and then 35 minutes uncovered at 425 deg F / 220 deg C until it hit internal temperature of 200 deg F / 93 deg C.  The dough had developed a bit too much of a skin for a smooth oven-spring, so it ended up with some crazy cracking all over, but overall it came out with a great flavour and crumb for our sandwiches. 

The second loaf proofed a bit longer (about 100 minutes after final shaping) and didn’t seem to dry out so much.  I baked the same timing and it came out without all of the crazy cracks, a lovely flavour, and the same crumb.

 All in all, I was really happy with how they came out.  It is even hotter here this week, and our out-of-town chores have slowed down, so I’m not planning a bread bake this week.  We’ve got just enough odds and ends from previous bakes in the freezer for our needs this week, and I’m craving sweets for a change, so it’s oatmeal cookies today, and likely some fruit scones and muffins tomorrow (unless, of course, I change my mind…)

I'm just looking at these and laughing at myself from a few months back, when I couldn't even imagine getting this kind of oven-spring and lightness of crumb with a 70% whole grain, relatively low hydration dough...  Who knew that just a little experience would make this seem a "quick and easy" style loaf!

Hope all are safely out of harm's way from fire or water or wind, and are happily baking their own "quick and easy" or wild and fun experiments!