Yorkville Sourdough Baguettes
Having to practice more to get the rust out of my processes and shaping. I was able to get my preferred organic all purpose flour similar to T55 for baguettes. Also continuing to see how far I can push fermentation with every so slightly more gluten development with each bake. In this bake along with the Rubaud kneading in the bowl when adding the levain and later when adding the bassinage water, I did a total of 300 slap and folds. These recent bakes do support the fact that doing more gluten development does support longer fermentation without loss of grigne/ears. I’ve also adjusted my scoring a bit as the broken straps were bothering me. Although I still overlap the scores still to avoid sausage appearance, I am consciously trying to leave the straps slightly wider, this seems to reduce the number of straps that break during oven spring. To do this, I do have to score a bit outside the middle third lane of the baguette.
One thing that is now happening is that extensibility has increased substantially and my baguettes are too long for my baking steel and even for the cookie tray that the couche sits on. So I over handled this set of baguettes. After 20 mins in the couche, I decided to remove them to cut them a bit shorter, otherwise they would have drooped off the steel. I know I degassed them somewhat during that process of over handling. So I might reduce the dough weight a bit so they aren’t as long next time, or cold retard them en bulk at the end of bulk to tighten the gluten, not sure yet.
Overnight Levain build ferment 75°F 10-12 hours
78°F 9 hours to peak
When levain at peak, mix 28 g water with all the levain mixing to loosen.
In the morning, to your mixing bowl add 353 g water and diastatic malt 5.8 g to dissolve, then add 527 g AP flour to combine. Allow to autolyse for 20 mins. Next add the loosened levain and salt 12 g, pinch and stretch and fold to combine in the bowl. Slap and fold x 100 then add hold back water 23 g gradually working in until fully absorbed by massaging and then Rubaud kneading the dough, then slap and fold x 200.
Bulk Fermentation 82*F until aliquot jar shows 20% rise.
Do folds every 20 mins doing 3 folds
Could do cold retard at this point for up to overnight. (Aliquot jar 20% rise)
Divide and pre-shape rest for 15 mins
Shape en couche with final proof until aliquot jar shows 55% rise then (optional) cold retard shaped baguettes en couche for at least 15 minutes for easier scoring. I often do this for convenience as the oven is pre-heating.
Pre-heat oven 500*F after 30 mins add Silvia towel in pan with boiling water.
Transfer baguettes from couche to peel on parchment
Score each baguette and transfer to oven, bake on steel.
Bake with steam pouring 1 cup of boiling water to cast iron skillet dropping temperature to 480*F.
The baguettes are baked with steam for 13 mins. The steam equipment is removed venting the oven of steam. Transfer the baguettes from the baking steel to next rack completing baking directly on a rack to minimize the browning of the bottom crust. The oven is dropped to 450ºF but convection is turned on and the baguettes bake for 10 mins rotating them halfway. The baguettes are rotated again if needed and baked for another 3 mins to achieve a rich colour crust.
Comments
The crumb didn’t disappoint. These had such a great thin crisp crust, just like I like. The crust had great caramelization, despite this, the crust wasn’t thick at all.
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Sometimes the best results are from unanticipated missteps. The lace distribution in the crumb is divine. They look wonderful.
Alan
You’re right Alan, unanticipated missteps in this case didn’t ruin the bake in the end. I’m not sure that they helped the final results but they didn’t ruin them. These baguettes hung over the baking steel a bit on the tips so they are the best longest baguettes I’ve done and probably no longer actually Demi baguettes. Thanks for the compliments, I’m quite proud of these coming out of a home oven by a hack like me.
Benny
That crumb... impressive. It also sounds like you've managed to achieve what I want for my baguettes, that elusive thin crispy crust (in your opinion is that from the flours used, or the proof). Well done indeed.
Thank you Jon, I didn’t have really high hopes for this set of baguettes due to the extra handling. I didn’t mention that when transferring one of the baguettes it half slipped off the transfer board so really they were manhandled. I think that the thin crispy crust is from a good steam set up, lowish protein flour and good enough fermentation, so likely a combination of everything. But I think a high protein flour and flour with a significant amount of bran in it will give a thicker crust. Also a prolonged cold retard once shaped would also give a thicker crust.
Benny
We are back home from Florida (not sure why given the weather this week). I would like to give these a go again, what brand of flour did you use? I usually find my crust is a bit on the thick side for my liking! These look perfect!
Hi Glenn, welcome back to Ontario! The weather is supposed to improve over the next two weeks. You and I missed the summer like weather we had here a couple of weeks ago.
If you can find La Milanaise organic (I think all their products are organic) all purpose flour that is what I love for baguettes. It is a mill from Quebec and the ash content is 0.55% making this a T55 equivalent which for me is perfect for baguettes. I hope you can find it, I’ve only seen it in health food stores in Kensington Market in Toronto.
Benny
Hey Benny - Nice alveoli distribution you have there and it looks like you've achieved a nice crisp crust.
Tony
Thank you Tony, next time hopefully I won’t need to do any surgery and over handle the dough after shaping. We’ll see that that improves things a bit more. Yes the crust was what I like with an all white flour baguette, super thin and crisp.
Benny
Doesn’t get much better than this. The crumb looks perfect.
Best,
Ian
Thanks so much Ian, I’m so pleased with the outcome considering the challenges I ran into with these.
Benny
A quick question - how gentle are you with slap and fold? My whole counter shakes. It makes a loud whacking noise (I do lift it high enough that it is above shoulder height. And I only do about 30, but I also like to use my mixer for about 2 minutes before that to combine the levain in, which perhaps means I've already got some dough strength.
Don't you see signs of the gluten ripping, which I do see after about say 50? I know you've written about the hundreds of slap and folds before, but I've always thought those numbers sounded high. Now I'm thinking of testing it out for myself, having never done more than about 60 or 70 before.
I don’t lift the dough nearly as high as you do, nowhere near shoulder height. I just lift the dough high enough to clear the countertop and do a flick of the wrists.
Maybe this video will help show what is hard to describe.
There can sometimes be a bit of tearing, but honestly I’ve never really found tearing to be an issue. I have had to do up to 1000 slap and folds when I was in Florida doing an enriched dough by hand. Now if you’re using a mixer to work the levain in, then there is definitely some gluten development happening. I’m doing Rubaud mixing when adding the levain and later the bassinage water so there is some gluten development happening. I think my slap and folds are a bit less “energetic” than yours so it isn’t quite as tiring.
Hi Benito! Those baguettes look exceptional! However, I have trouble understanding how you manage the aliquot jar during cold retard. The first 20% rise occurs at 82F during bulk fermentation. But where do you put this aliquot jar during the overnight retard? In the fridge with the retarding dough? Or Is it a new sample ot the retarded dough that you put in anothe aliqot jar to gage the 50% rise of the final proof? Thank you for answering my question.
Michel
The aliquot jar follows the dough everywhere it goes at the same time except the oven of course. So into fridge for any reason they both go together. The rate of cooling will be faster for the aliquot jar than the main dough but the rate of warming when it comes out is much faster too so I figure it all works out in the end.
Benny
Great result. Wonderful crumb.
Thank you Gavin, I was pleasantly surprised at how well it turned out considering the degree of handling the dough received. I need to repeat this without the extra handling and see if it can be even more lacy.
Benny
I just uploaded this video of how I score my baguettes.