The Fresh Loaf

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Holiday Cranberry SD v2

rgreenberg2000's picture
rgreenberg2000

Holiday Cranberry SD v2

We have friends coming into town this week, so I needed more bread on hand.  Seemed like a good time to take a run at Holiday Cranberry v2 (now BASED on Trevor Wilson’s formula, but tweaked more to my starter/process.)  Everything went very well with this bake EXCEPT for a hydration issue……. After I got all the water, levain and flours into my Ank, it was dry as dry could be!! I was completely confused, as I have mixed this volume of flour at this hydration so many times, and never had this problem.  I added water bit by bit until the dough finally came together and felt roughly the same as it normally does.  It was at this point that I noticed that I had about 1.5 cups of my water I had measured out still sitting to the side!!! Grrrr!!!!  I had mixed SOME of the formula water into my container for the levain, and completely forgot to add the rest!  Oh, well, disaster averted, and onward…….

Formula:

Bread Flour 435g (CM High Mtn)

AP Flour 434g (CM Beehive)

Whole Wheat 219g (fresh milled, CM hard white winter)

Water 749g

Levain 250g (100%, WW fed)

Dried Cranberries 300g

Salt 25g

 Process:

 Combine water and levain, mix in Ankarsrum on low until well combined.

Add WW, AP and bread flours, continue mixing on low until well mixed, rest for 20 minutes.

Mix on medium speed until dough is well developed (about 12 minutes in Ank).

Add cranberries by the handful over about 2 minutes, mix until well distributed.

Move Ank bowl to proofer @ 72°F. Stretch/fold twice at 30 minute intervals.

Dough after 2nd stretch/fold:

Bulk proof ~2:45 @ 72°F, or until dough seems a bit puffy (doesn’t seem to get jiggly with all the cranberries)

Dough after bulk complete:

Divide and pre-shape into rounds.

Dough divided/preshaped:

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Shape into final forms (round, batard, etc.), then place into bannetons @ 72°F for 60 minutes.

Move to fridge and continue proof overnight (these went about 15 hours.

Dough just before heading to fridge:

Just out of fridge:

Slashed and ready to bake:

Bake, covered, in a preheated oven @ 475°F for 15 minutes.  Remove cover and bake for 25 more minutes.

Loaf #1 after removing inverted roaster:

Finished loaves:

Cool thoroughly, slice and eat!

Comments

Benito's picture
Benito

Excellent bakes Rich, cranberry walnut is such a great combination for the holidays.  Good thing you noticed your dough looking dry and was able to compensate.

Question, when you add the flours to the water and levain, do you just add all of it at once or do you add it gradually?  Everything I’ve seen for mixing in the Ank suggests not adding all the flour at once.  Just wondering what you do?

Benny

rgreenberg2000's picture
rgreenberg2000

The dough wasn't even a dough at first.....just some slightly moistened flour! 🤣 I'd guess I was well below 50% hydration at that point!

I know the general advice is to add dry to wet in the Ank.  I have added dry to wet, wet to dry, fast, slow, and just about everything in between.  My observation is that it really doesn't matter, and the Ank doesn't seem to care at all in what order I do things.  Now, I suspect that with my mid-70's hydration, there's not really any "right" way to do it as the dough is wet enough to just come together as expected.  If you were mixing a drier dough (say, for pizza or bagels), it might become more important to follow the mantra of adding dry to wet.

My usual method is to weigh out my flours in the Ank bowl, mix them with the roller, then add my starter and water and let it rip.  Salt usually goes in after about five minutes or so, or after a 20 minute rest/fermentolyse.

I think you'll come up with your own method/preference after a few runs with your new mixer.

Rich

Benito's picture
Benito

Thanks Rich, good to have feedback from current Ank users.

Benny 

Isand66's picture
Isand66

I’ve tried adding the water to the flour and it was a disaster.  I add 85-90 % of the water in the bowl and add the flour while mixing.   I do like to add the starter to the water first since mine is at 66% and it’s easier to incorporate that way.

Benito's picture
Benito

Thank you Ian, good to know how you are using it, very helpful.

Benny

HeiHei29er's picture
HeiHei29er

Nice looking loaves and a great pivot mid mix to save the bake!  They look delicious!

rgreenberg2000's picture
rgreenberg2000

Still kicking myself for leaving almost half of my water out, like a dummy! 🤣

Rich

Isand66's picture
Isand66

I’ve made similar loaves and it’s one of my favorites.  How did the crumb turn out?

rgreenberg2000's picture
rgreenberg2000

It's a delicious bread for sure..... The crumb is still a bit tighter than I'd like, so have to work on that.  I think the inclusions are definitely going to make it tougher to open the crumb up a lot, but I think that I rushed the fermentation a bit on these loaves.  Don't get me wrong, I'm not complaining.  Super tasty, and perfect toasted up with some butter, peanut butter, or jam!

Isand66's picture
Isand66

With so many inclusions it’s tough to get an open crumb so don’t worry too much 😉

Heres a porridge version I made which is one of my favorites https://mookielovesbread.wordpress.com/2016/02/04/cranberry-walnut-porridge-bread/

rgreenberg2000's picture
rgreenberg2000

I may give that one a try.  I've got some leftover rice that I was thinking I'd use to do a version of Danni's Wild Rice/Cranberry loaf.

Rich