Good morning everyone,
My first attempt at a sourdough boule went south right as I was doing the final shaping. Here are some details:
Recipe: https://youtu.be/APEavQg8rMw
400g water, 200g active starter, 600g bread flour. (12g of salt and a splash of water added later in the recipe)
Being in the Midwest in Fall, my kitchen is warmed by central heating @ 70°F. I used King Arthur bread flour in the recipe and to maintain my starter (which is 11 days old and passed the float test). My starter is fed partially with bread flour and partially with whole wheat. It is a thicker-type starter. Slightly thicker than pancake batter.
I combined the ingredients, just as alex did in the video. I let proof as long as he requested, putting the dough bowl in the oven (off, we don’t have a light in it) to prevent any drafts. Then I turned out the dough and did slap and fold. It took me a bit to get this right. I put water on my hands to prevent the dough from sticking too much. Then I felt the dough tighten up and was ecstatic. Suddenly it went slack again. I put more water on my hands (i did this several times - this May be an issue?) and worked it until it tightened again.
I placed it in the proofing bowl and waited 4 hours. I added stretch and folds as I had seen in other materials every 60 minutes. When I pulled the dough out and floured it, I flipped it with a little difficulty. I could see it deflating as I looked at it. Alex said it would deflate over a 30 minute rest period into a “bit of a pancake.” Mine was a LOT of a pancake. When I tried to do final shaping, the dough was ultra stretchy (seemed to really pass the windowpane test, never tearing but also refusing to separate from the counter in my hands because it could just... stretch indefinitely). It did not hold its shape during the letter-like folding technique and after a few attempts, any semblance of tautness of the surface was gone. This was a collapsing, sticky mess.
Another thought I have is that my scale seems to be only accurate within 3 grams. I will probably be upgrading today to be safe.
It was too late at night to rest it and try again, but is that even possible? at what step do you begin again? Or is it only good for the trash?
Most importantly: Where did I go wrong with this batch of dough? I was so gutted when it fell apart during shaping! Let me know if you need any more information.
Hi grey,
I used the same recipe, playing with the flour combo. I’m a noob but I’m guessing maybe you overworked the dough. Alex’s method does not call for stretch and fold during the BP, so maybe that was no much? I had a hard time deciding when to stop the slap and fold...all part of the learning curve, I guess!
Good luck, hope to see some nice photos of your first boule soon.
Hi Geoman, thanks for the reply. I think perhaps in my excitement to actually be kneading, I may have done too much. Next time, I will leave out the stretch and folds and stop S+F's when I get surface tension (try not to let it tear like it did last time). I also saw in the comments that I'm not the only one to end up with a pancake puddle. One person reduced the flour by about 50g and said that worked for them.
Curious if you managed to get something bake-able from your efforts and what combo of flour you chose?
and it is very forgiving. Sounds like maybe too much water in the dough if hands were very wet. Hands only need to be slightly damp. You might want to invest in a bench scraper. I usually hit the hardware store looking for a plastic drywall scraper, about 6 to 8 inches wide. Cheap. It makes scraping the dough off the counter much easier and with plastic you won't have to worry about scratching the countertop..
If you are into the bulk rise for 3 to 4 hours and see it's getting late, opt for beauty rest! Chuck that one third inflated dough into the bowl after a tightening fold to deflate it, cover and chill it. The next morning you can turn it out and shape it and if the fridge is cool enough, it will shape beautifully. Then do your final proof and bake it.
Just to make sure I understand: I can put this dough in the fridge overnight after it bulk fermented for 4 hours (and then got sloppy thanks to my messing around) and then just shape it from the fridge the next day? If I had shaped it correctly, the final proof would have been an overnight in the fridge.
I kind of thought the 4 hour BF I had completed was step 2 out of 3. And the third step is an overnight proof in the fridge. So would it be two overnight fridge proofs in a row? Trying to make sense of the advice in case I end up in the same situation on Attempt #2.
Thanks.
How many hours and at what temperatures had the dough been fermenting?
From mixing up the dough to bake.
Mixed. Proofed for 1 hour @ 70F. Slapped and folded. Bulk fermented for 4 hours @ 70F. Took it out to shape it, tried, left it for 30 minutes resting at same temp. Then it was final shaping time. All went south right before I would have proofed it in the fridge overnight.
It was 10:30pm and I had no time to redo the steps without staying up late.
the dough into the fridge overnight into a banneton or a loaf pan for a final proof or reshaped it in the morning to let it prove until ready to bake. Either way would have worked. At 70° F it wouldn't have overproofed. I don't think you over folded it, it probably could have used some more folding or even a roll in a handful or two of rolled oats to soak up some of the water. The starter sounds young so yes, go for the beauty sleep and let the dough chill overnight. In the morning, you will know more. Cut into the dough to look at the bubbles forming inside the dough if you need to. Shape and let proof. If the dough looses it shape too much, heck, fold it again. But cold dough is rather stiff and keeps its shape pretty well. If it literally turns into silly paddy and tries to run off the counter, there could be something else going on but we know how to fix that too. :)
Try next time with a little less water. Sourdoughs tend to feel and act wetter as they ferment so if you were to make a direct comparison to a yeasted dough, mix this dough with a slightly stiffer feel to it. It will later loosen up esp. if using water on your hands instead of flour.
If anyone finds this thread and wants to know what I did to solve the problem, here it is:
1.) Turns out my starter was not as active as it could have been. Something changed and the starter went from increasing in size by 25% overnight to doubling/75% increase in size overnight. Both versions passed the float test but one is obviously more active. I used the active starter in my next attempt
2.) I did not add water to my hands during the slap and fold technique. At all. I put a teeny tiny little bit of olive oil on my hands so I could pick up the dough initially, but it soon faded.
3.) I did not do stretch and folds during the bulk ferment. Whether this helped or not, I do not know, but I stuck to the instructions which lacked stretch and folds the second time around.
My very nicely structured dough is proofing in the fridge for the evening and night now! So happy to revisit with some success instead of sticky pancake mess.