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no ear on new recipe

Seth D Beavis's picture
Seth D Beavis

no ear on new recipe

I've been making sourdough for a couple of months now, working from the sourdough school by vanessa kimball. I've recently moved to a higher hydration dough and an overnight proof in the fridge and can no longer get an ear, or even a good opening in my score. sometimes expansion blows out from a different location on the loaf, sometimes roughly near the score for what its worth. However, with my previous recipe i was getting great results. Can anyone help me with whats going wrong? i'm driving myself nuts trying to get it to work and no changes i've implemented so far have had little to any affect. I'd say this is my 6th run at this recipe. The first time it was very dense and underfermented, which i resovled in the second attempt through allowing my started to ferment longer than recommended (it was winter and my kitchen was cold, even over the fridge). now i'm stumped. Details and pictures to follow.

Current recipe, with no ear:
225g leaven (25g started 100g water 100g organic whole wheat stone milled from bobs redmill)
825g water
800g bread flour (King arthur)
200g Whole wheat (bob's redmill org stone milled)
20g fine salt
makes 2 large boules

sourdough is fed 36 hours before making leaven, then fed again 12 hours before leaven is made
leaven was made at 7:30am
80 percent of total Water added and then mixed with flour to autolyse at noon
bassinage and autolyse through 1pm
Final bassinage and salt added at 1pm
stretch and folds through bulk ferment from 1:30 pm to 4:30pm. total of 6 stretch and folds, 6 folds each time. using coil folds
preshape shape at 4:30
bench time 10 minutes
final shape at 4:40 and moved to banneton
floor time 4:40 to 5:40
moved to fridge from 5:40 until bake
score and bake in earthen baker (from breadtopia) next day at 11am
preheat baker to 500 degrees F lower oven temp to 375. bake covered for 25 minutes, uncovered for 35

results:
note the line where the score was made. this is completely flat after baking

 

My previous successful attempts use all the same equipment and flour but a different recipe and  no overnight proof

recipe:
225g leaven (25g sourdough starter, 100g white flour, 90g water)
735g water
800g bread flour
200g Whole Wheat Flour
20g salt

sourdough is fed 36 hours before making leaven, then fed again 12 hours before leaven is made
leaven was made at 11:00 pm and left overnight in the oven with oven light on
80 percent of total Water added and then mixed with flour to autolyse at 8am
bassinage and autolyse through 12 noon
Final bassinage and salt added at 12 noon
stretch and folds through bulk ferment from 12:30 pm to 3:30pm. total of 4 stretch and folds, 4 folds each time. using coil folds
shape at 4:00
NO bench time or final shape
prove 2 hours on the counte at 70 degrees f
score and bake in earthen baker (from breadtopia) 7pm
preheat baker to 500 degrees F lower oven temp to 375. bake covered for 25 minutes, uncovered for 35

results:

decent ear, bread expand ands opens well from the score

Ilya Flyamer's picture
Ilya Flyamer

Hard to say without a crumb shot, please add it if you can.

For now to me it looks just like too much water. If I did the math right, your recipe is 84% hydration, that is very high. The previous recipe that works is 76%, and that looks good. If you really want to try to increase hydration, do it more slowly and see how the dough and bread change. Try 80%.

Another highly suspicious point is fermentation. You give your bread a full hour of floor time, and then also a long cold retard. That is likely too much. I'd skip the floor time, or limit to to 15-20 min at most. But a crumb shot would help with diagnosing that.

Seth D Beavis's picture
Seth D Beavis

Here's what it looked like when I cut into the loaf I kept this morning. The one I gave away also has a big cavern in the center. 

Ilya Flyamer's picture
Ilya Flyamer

Wow that's a significant detail! Do your breads have big empty caverns like this often? That actually looks underfermented to me.

Seth D Beavis's picture
Seth D Beavis

first time actually. previous attempts had some larger holes but nothing crazy. I was suprised when I got into this one!

Ilya Flyamer's picture
Ilya Flyamer

Any crumb shots from the previous bakes?

I don't know why, but this one seems underfermented, but it shouldn't be.

Seth D Beavis's picture
Seth D Beavis

unfortunately no, i didnt have the good foresight to take pictures after i cut into them. Too busy eating i suppose

WatertownNewbie's picture
WatertownNewbie

What is the temperature of your refrigerator?  If not truly cold (such as 38F or 3C) then the dough can easily continue to ferment (albeit slowly).

Seth D Beavis's picture
Seth D Beavis

My Kitchen fridge is 38 degrees F. Do you think this is too cold? I've heard 41 is preferred so i've been proving a little longer hoping i'd still get some action at 38. 

You can see the crumb on these loaves in my reply to a comment above in case you're interested. 

 

Thanks!

WatertownNewbie's picture
WatertownNewbie

A loaf baked for fifty minutes should have a much darker color.  There was little caramelization of the crust.  Moreover, a crumb shot typically shows a little (perhaps a sixteenth of an inch) ring around the perimeter indicating whether the bake was uniform, and in your case there was none.  Why bake at 375F?  That is very low.  Most of my loaves are baked in the 440-475F range.

Seth D Beavis's picture
Seth D Beavis

I have liked the result, and it is familiar. I commonly have baked finnish and Swedish rye with yeast. These recipes are a 50 minute bake at 375.

When this dough is going in the oven its at 500.

Do you think the wetter (and therefore heavier) dough is pulling heat from the clay baker faster than a dryer dough and is affecting the spring? 

WatertownNewbie's picture
WatertownNewbie

This is a bit of a puzzling bake.  I have no experience with a clay baker and therefore cannot offer any advice on that aspect.  On the other hand, I have some thoughts.

I agree with Ilya that the cavern reminds me of underfermented dough (as does the shallow opening from the score).  That leads me to two primary questions: (1) How much gluten creation occurred at 12:30 pm?  DId you actively mix the dough until you could feel some development?  Or did you merely rely on the autolyse to take care of gluten development as assisted by the periodic coil folds? and (2) Was your kitchen cooler for this bake than for the previous successful bakes?  If so, then I suspect that three-and-a-half hours (from 12:30-4:00 pm) was not sufficient for the bulk fermentation (and perhaps that amount of time was too little even if your kitchen was not cool).  What was the dough like at the time of shaping?  At a high hydration it should have felt billowy.

There are my thoughts after a few days of contemplation.

Ted

Seth D Beavis's picture
Seth D Beavis

1: during throughout autolyse and bassinage stages i hand mix and develop gluten in what i've heard referred to as the "lazy" bread making method. I am hand mixing and not using a stand mixer. one is available, i just like doing less dishes and I like touching the dough more and feeling the changes it goes through. 

2: Kitchen is a bit cooler. 69 degrees F, maybe 72 max during the day on sunny days in winter. I initially fermented in the oven with the light on, which is closer to 80 degrees F. My previous recipes weren't affected much when i abandoned the practice. We'll see how this round goes. 

 

Not sure i would describe the dough here as billowy but it was quite soft and airy. I'm trying to fix the potentially underfermented issue this time around. Should know how it turns out tomorrow morning/afternoon. 

Thanks for the thought and advice!

Seth D Beavis's picture
Seth D Beavis

Today's the day. This time around i've dropped some of the water, and will be fermenting the oven with the light on (no gas) to keep things a little warmer. My kitchen hovers around 69 degrees F in winter. Between these two changes hopefully we get a fuller ferment and a little more structure to tackle the potential underfermented issues. 

Seth D Beavis's picture
Seth D Beavis

My ear is back! 
this time it was at 78% hydration, and fermented in an oven with the light on (about 80 degrees F). Other changes were a bake temp (start at 500 reduce to 415 instead of reducing to 375), floor time ( 20 minutes instead of an hour), and fridge time (from 5:45 until 1pm the next day).

WatertownNewbie's picture
WatertownNewbie

That looks superb, Including the crumb,  Congratulations.  It must taste as good as it looks, and I am sure that you feel great satisfaction.

Happy baking.

Ted