Hello! New baker looking for "beginner" French T65 based recipe

Toast

Hello!

To introduce myself, I'm a 54 year old former pilot who has stumbled upon "the world of sourdough" and baking perhaps ironically not as a great lover of bread, but more as someone who like to understand things.  My wife suggested before Christmas break this year that perhaps we could learn to make bread over the holiday, so as the resident "researcher" at our house, I jumped in and started trying to figure out what to do.  Here we are a few weeks later with our own starter (unnamed as of yet) and orders placed for a Sourdough Home and Proofing box, with 20 lbs of French T65 flour patiently waiting to be used (I ended up reading an article on how French wheat may be healthier for some people - my wife and kids all have Crohn's disease so we are trying to manage our ingredients so as to eliminate things that could potentially be a source of GI issues for them) .

I've baked a few loaves already with not-great results (organic KA bread flour was used up until this point).  The flavor was mild and not very sour, but the bread had none of the large airy bubbles one sees from good bakers.  I suspect I have a number of issues based on the reading I've been doing.  I never realized how many variables go into sourdough baking and I think that's what has drawn me in - the desire to learn and understand the process and develop my own by figuring out how to control the variables.  This is what led me to buy the Sourdough Home and proofing box - it became pretty obvious that my environment must be NOTHING like the one used by the person who wrote the recipes I initially have used, so I started researching ways to improve that, and well, here we are!

I'm still working on getting a grasp of all of the terminology, so please be patient.  

What I'm looking for (I think) is a T65 based sourdough recipe that has thorough instructions to start from.  I understand that I will need to adjust it for my environment, but I need something to use as a solid foundation to build from.  My starter seems healthy (but went in the fridge yesterday after a week of daily feeding using the KA flour) and I will switch over to the T65 and begin using the "Home" and proofing box once they arrive.  Ideally, I'd love to find a schedule/process that (for now at least) lets me do most of the prep work in an evening with baking happening early the next day.  I'll likely bake primarily on weekends (prepping on Fridays).

FWIW, I'm is the US (southern Maryland to be precise) if that matters.

Thanks in advance for any advice!  I'm happy to be a sponge, so if I've missed anything obvious, please let me know. 

Cheers!

My most recent loaves (not great, but not terrible for a new guy!):

Welcome to the world of bread baking.  I'm also a former pilot - I'm a tail-dragger (and glider) guy: I soloed in a J-3 and got my license in a PA-12.  I would compare most home bread-making as closer to low-altitude VFR flight as opposed to IFR flight on ATP routes.   This means that you want to pay attention to the ground, the nearby horizon, and the local weather. You can go the ATP route but as you know, that takes a lot of training and flight hours. It's also less fun.

All T-65 flours are not alike.  I have some imported T-65 right now, and it has proved to be tricky to handle - if you use slightly too high hydration, it falls apart over time. The thinking here on TFL is that there may have been a poor growing season in that part of France and it affected the wheat. The miller isn't compensating by mixing in other wheats. If the hydration is kept low, it works fine.

All things considered, I suggest that you stick to standard US flours until you feel you have things under control.   Think of your first long 3-leg cross-country. You needed to get a certain amount of experience in controlled conditions before being signed off for it.  With bread you don't need to get signed off, and any disaster will have no real consequences, but it's a similar idea.

From the pictures I think that your bake looks pretty good. The loaves have a good height and the crumb looks quite decent. It didn't expand much in the oven, which suggests that the hydration was low and the proof on the long side.  Or your starter might not be active enough yet.

Know that those large, irregular holes in the crumb you mentioned are not all that common, and many bakers don't really like them.  You are more likely to be able to get them with a smallish loaf at a higher hydration.  They are also affected by the shaping technique, and that takes a lot of practice.

 

Good luck and keep asking questions!

TomP

After that overview, I have used my French T-65 to make baguettes. I don't have a lot of experience with baguettes and mine are usually just so-so.  Here is the recipe and process I used:

Recipe
--------
- 300g - T65 flour (100%).
- 180g - water (60%).
- 80g - starter (27%) (90% hydration, 80% KA bread flour, 20% atta,
       a few grams rye bran).
- 6g - salt (2%).
overall hydration: ~65%.

Process
--------
- mix all ingredients, rest 40 minutes.
- knead/stretch. Rest 30 minutes.
- S&F.  Rest 30 minutes.
- S&F.  Rest 45 minutes or so.  Into bulk tub. rest 1 hr.
- Coil folds in tub.
- Total bulk ferment time: ~6 hours.
- Divide in 3 pieces, 195g ea.
- Light preform, rest 10 minutes.
- Shape. I used the standard couche method  to support the loaves during proofing, although it's a little tricky with only three loaves.
- Proof 45 minutes. Preheat oven 450°F.
- Bake on steel with initial steam, temperature to 425°F.
- Total bake time 25 minutes; 450°F last 10 minutes for more browning.

An all-white starter would have worked just fine, I'm sure. "S&F" means Stretch -and-fold. Exactly how you do them is not usually very important.  Here are a few pictures of these loaves:

As an analyst you will find that you will produce most of your own data, and over time you will make sense of it. 

My first suggestion is to get a sample of a known-good starter so that you have something to work with. Then scale your maintenance sample size to somewhere around 30g which is plenty big enough to make to make a lot of levain overnight and from that as much bread as you can handle. Feed your homegrown starter in parallel with your known good starter (btw the King Arthur starter is widely used as a place to start - no pun intended).  There is a lot to learn from comparing starter growth behaviors. 

Second, stick with the KA bread flour until you can routinely make a loaf that you like. Then you can begin to diversify your inputs. That will take a few months if you are baking a couple of times a week. 

Third, T65 is a difficult flour to work with and is a challenge even for experienced bakers. Do not get discouraged but stay away from high hydration formulas until you can routinely make a good loaf at 65%. It is easy to overmix. 

Lastly, don’t trust any advice until you have demonstrated to your own satisfaction that the underlying assumptions are valid. Sourdough baking is dominated by wives tales that sound logical but are not based on science.  Read the journal articles, and study them to understand why. Many of the best are as old as you are. It is a new science by comparison. 

Doc

Plus, since you're in the exploration phase of baking bread, keep notes of each bake.  Include things like the formula, process steps, temperatures, results, etc.  After you've accumulated a few months' worth, you'll probably be able to see some patterns emerge.  Correlations between inputs and results will be more apparent.  Some might related to environmental conditions, such as "Wow, fermentation is going a lot faster since things warmed up than it did when the weather was colder."  Some might be process-related, like "Huh, most of the bakes I liked best occurred when I autolysed the dough."  And so on.

Best of luck to you as you progress with your baking.

Paul

THANK YOU to everyone who has weighed in!  Today has been a crazy day at work and I don't have the time at the moment to reply in the way you all deserve, but I will get to that as soon as I possibly can.

 

Again - THANK YOU!

I agree with previous comments regarding hydration when baking with T65 - keep it low, at least initially, overall 65 - 68%. Also, do as the French do, refresh your levain in 2-3 stages before baking and make your levain weight 40-50% of your main dough flour weight.

Here is a post I made last year about using T65 to make an authentic French style pain au levain - maybe somewhat advanced for you at the moment, but it might give you some clues:

https://www.thefreshloaf.com/node/74692/pain-de-tradition-au-levain

And add in 0.1% of instant yeast to your main dough - as permitted by French law.

 

Lance

Toast

Hello again, and thank you EVERYONE for the excellent words of wisdom!  I took the advice to stick with the KA flour for now until I better learn what I'm looking for to get a good loaf.  

I was busy last week preparing for our companie's annual offsite and Christmas party, so I apologies for not responding to your responses earlier.  I was away between Thursday and yesterday afternoon, and I started to think of a plan last night to try to make a loaf "start to finish" in a day (today).  I did my best to make decisions based on what I thought I should be looking for in terms of rise, etc. as opposed to just following the times listed in the recipe I used the first time (see above). TLDR: here's a few pics of the final result:

I'll post my notes on the bake along with some "along the way" pics in a separate post, but I'm pretty happy with my progress and would love suggestions on how to approve!

 

Thanks again!

2025-01-20 (7:00am) - HYBRID RECIPE BAKING NOTES

  • (Jan 25 inside room temp was set on Nest to 68 - thermometer in room showed 70 degrees)
  • Used cold starter that has been in Starter Home @46 degrees all week
  • Fed with ½ cup KA organic bread flour and ¼ cup filtered water warmed 35 sec in microwave
  • Transferred starter back into Starter Home at 77 degrees
  • Starter is ready and passed float test at 12:10pm

 

STEP 1 - Make dough (12:45PM)

  • 250 g water (warmed 35 sec in microwave)
  • 150 g sourdough starter
  • 25 g olive oil
  • 500 g bread flour (such as King Arthur)
  • 10 g fine sea salt
  • Mixed all ingredients until all flour was incorporated

 

STEP 2 (AUTOLYSE)

  • Autolysed for 60 min (sat on counter with damp kitchen towel over bowl)

 

STEP 3 (BULK RISE) - Started around 1 PM

  • Used the microwave propped open with the light on
    • Microwaved a cup ow water for two minutes to try to warm the interior before placing dough inside
    • Went into microwave at 1:53pm in dough tub with lid on
      • Microwave with door cracked & taped = 77 degrees
      • Timer set for 30 min (for time until 1st stretch)
  • (1:58 pm) - the dough begins...
  • After 15 min, thermometer probe placed on top of dough tub in microwave is showing 81 degrees
  • After 30 min temp showed 81 degrees. 
  • Dough taken out & given 1st stretch (stretching was weird.  My dough was MUCH firmer than what is shown in this video and had to be held up & shaken somewhat to get it to stretch (how do I make mine more pliable like this?): How to Stretch and Fold Sourdough )

 

  • (2:24pm) Dough at end of 1st 30 min (before 1st stretch):
  • When dough went back in microwave temp shown on probe thermometer was 75
  • 15 min later temp is 79
  • At 30 min temp is 78

 

  • ( 2:56pm) Pic after next 30 MIN:

 

  • (3:28pm) Before Stretch 3

 

  • (4:02pm)  Before Stretch 4 -

 

  • (5:03 pm):

     

  • (6:00 pm) end of bulk rise: (6:00 PM):
    • This looked "high enough" to my untrained eye based on reading that the dough needs to have risen "about twice as high" as the original...

 

(6:04 PM) Beginning of “Second Rise” 

  • Decided to let it rise at room temp in the banneton (Nest still set to 69 / probe temp in room says 69 degrees)
  • Pre-heated oven at 475 with dutch oven in it (using parchment paper cut into circle at bottom of dutch oven)
  • At 7pm I made the cut on the top of the loaf (tried to cut on an angle to get the crusty "ledge" thing...), and put the dough in dutch oven, placed lid on, put it in the oven and turned oven down to 400.  Set timer for 20 min

 

  • After 20 min - removed lid and continued to bake:
  • 10 min after lid came off I turned up oven to 425 since it’s lower on internal analog thermometer compared to actual oven setting (setting 450 on oven controls shows ~400 on the analog thermometer haning inside the oven).
  • At 7:35 (10 min after lid came off) I turned oven back up to 450 because the top of the loaf didn’t seem to be browning as much as I wanted
  • Pulled at ~7:40 or so (when internal temp was 206 - measured using Thermapen)

     

So, it tased very nice but isn't terribly sour (I personally don't care but people who want SOUR sourdough would probably be disappointed in that sense...).  The loaf rose higher than the last one (it's not apples to apples since I halved the dough to make two loaves the first time but this time just made one big one) but it's more airy.  It still lacks almost any BIG bubbles.  

 

I would love to know how mine looks as compared to whatever is considered "ideal".

Thanks again for your wisdom and input!

 


 

So, progress. This time your dough was very dry (50% hydration: 250g / 500g flour) and that's why it felt stiff during the S&Fs). The bread flour would absorb more water than all purpose flour, making it even drier. Yet it still rose pretty well. Pores were small which is to be expected with the low hydration. The crust exposed by the opened score looks very nice and probably adds to the flavor.

You've now tried a span of hydrations.  Go for a moderate middle ground, around say 62 - 65%.  Everything you wrote about the process seems reasonable, except you didn't say how much old starter you used when you refreshed.  BTW, it's better to measure flour and water by weight even for the starter. You can be more consistent, and more sure of its hydration.

Sourness is a whole other story.  Some people make sour bread without any problem, others like me can't do it reliably. There is a lot of information out there about how to make bread more sour and much if it is contradictory or doesn't work for everyone.  The most reliable way seems to be to retard the dough in a refrigerator.  For myself, I like a little tang but not very sour. Don't worry about it for now.

You might want to try a loaf using all purpose flour, too. The dough will need a little less water and will be less tight, with a softer crumb, than with bread flour.

Thanks for your suggestions!  

I baked another loaf yesterday/this morning and incorporated them.  I used 300g of water this time (still with 500g of KA organic bread flour) instead of 250g and the dough was MUCH more like the videos - thanks!  I'm going to make another tonight and may try 325g just to see how things feel and turn out.  

A few other notes:

  • I wanted to try retarding the dough overnight to see if it would add sourness.  This led to some deviations from the recipe which resulted in some less than optimal (but still delish!) results.  All good - I'm learning things!
  • To your comment above about my starter - I have not been very disciplined about managing its hydration or volume.  I basically have added 1/2 cup of flour and 1/4 cup of water in the morning after discarding about half of what's there (if it has been unused), or just adding these to what's remaining after taking some for a bake.  Today it seemed pretty thick so I added almost an extra 1/4 cup of water (I was winging it).  I suppose I need to control this process more closely and get deliberate about things here...
  • I made the dough around 1pm (500g KA organic bread flour, 150g starter, 300g water, 12g fine sea salt, 25g olive oil)
  • I let it autolyse for 50 min
  • I put the dough in my plastic proofing container and put that in my proofing box at 77 degrees
  • I performed four stretches at approximately 30 minute intervals
  • By about  6:30 or 7:30pm (I forgot to annotate the time) the dough was at least twice the size as the original and I started to worry about over proofing it so I decided to put it in the fridge overnight.  I wasn't sure if I should leave it in the sealed plastic proofing container or put it in a baneton, so I decided on the latter & dusted it with rice flour put a damp cloth cover over it (this was a mistake...).
  • I realized after I did this that the rice flour would likely complicate my ability to stretch the boule before shaping.  I'm guessing that the portions covered with rice flour would not adhere to& meld into the main body of the dough after being pulled and folded into the bottom of the loaf.  Oops.  Decided to figure that one out in the morning before baking...  
  • Couldn't sleep (unrelated reasons) and was up by 3:30 (ugh).  At 5:00am I started preheating the oven and dutch oven at 450 degrees.
  • I inspected the boule and found after removing the cloth cover that the surface was just a bit dryish and leathery.  That didn't seem ideal...
  • I decided (not sure why) to let it rest on the countertop for the 45min to an hour left before putting it in the oven.
  • At 5:30 I did my best to give it a little pull/shape/tuck with my hands.  This worked a little but again, the top wasn't as pliable as I'd have liked - that "leathery" / dry-ish issue" - so I didn't use much force for fear of deflating it.  I figured it might have a thicker top crust and not rise as much, but oh well...  Live and learn.
  • It went back into the baneton for the last 25 min or so
  • Baked in the dutch oven with the lid on for 20 min (temp lowered to 400 when the pot went into the oven)
  • After the 1st 20 min things were looking pretty good.  Based on the last bake & the fact that the crust was pretty pale at the recipe temp, I bumped up the temp to 415 to try to get better browning.  
  • Baked 15 min at 415 with the lid off (35 min total baking time elapsed)
  • Turned up the oven to 450 for the last 7-10 min to get the dark brown edges
  • Checked core temp with Thermapen and pulled it when it read 206.
  • Total baking time was around 45 min

RESULTS

  • Better bubbles and more airy - yay!  I'm wondering if this will improve even more with 325g of water?  I also wonder if my forst loaf may have been over-proofed in addition to being too dry...
  • The top has tears at the ends of the cut I made after it baked.  I assume this is related to the leathery feel of the top and resulting lack of flexibility.  QUESTION: can I leave it in my plastic proofing container with the lid on for the overnight in the fridge?
  • It still wasn't very sour (not surprising since it was only in the fridge for about seven hours or so) but it was delish!

THANKS AGAIN for all of your help!  If anyone has suggestions PLEASE feel free to jump in!

Congratulations on baking a fine-looking (and tasting) loaf of bread, and also on adapting to unexpected circumstances.

The top has tears at the ends of the cut I made after it baked.  I assume this is related to the leathery feel of the top and resulting lack of flexibility.

The tears happened because the loaf had a lot of rising potential, which is a very good thing to have. Tears will tend to happen at locations that concentrate stress, and the ends of scores can be such places.  Any toughness would reduce tearing, not increase it.

QUESTION: can I leave it in my plastic proofing container with the lid on for the overnight in the fridge?

Absolutely.  I do it all the time. Shaping will be easier with the chilled dough.  I usually let it warm up for half an hour or so before shaping but some people don't wait. The top surface of the dough may come out a little dried out, but not enough to cause problems.

If you chill a shaped loaf, you do want to keep it covered well.  I usually proof my loaves free-standing, on a sheet of parchment paper supported by a plastic cutting board and without a basket or banneton.  I cover them with a sheet of plastic wrap. Loaves can go right from the fridge into the oven if they seem to have risen all right.  Note that dough can seem to shrink a little after a night in the fridge.  This is fine - thing tends to contract when cold, and cold dough absorbs more CO2 than warm dough. The shrinkage can happen if the dough isn't producing CO2 fast enough to counteract any shrinkage.

By about  6:30 or 7:30pm (I forgot to annotate the time) the dough was at least twice the size as the original and I started to worry about over proofing it so I decided to put it in the fridge overnight.

The dough will keep fermenting in the fridge for perhaps another hour, so it's a good idea to put it into the fridge before it doubles.

You mention that the tears happen due to having a lot of rising potential. How do I fix them?  It would seem there are two approaches: reduce rising potential (not ideal) or change something to allow more flexibility in the dough. 

Is there something I should change to try to address the issue?


Thanks again!

You could reduce tearing by proofing longer. This is basically reducing what I called the rising potential - more of the rise would occur before baking - and the dough would soften and deform more easily.  Or you could add more scores, which by opening would reduce stress concentrations other places. Or, if it turns out that you always get tearing in the same place, add several little scores running off the end of the main score at an angle. IOW, where the dough wants to tear, make some scores there.

You can also change the scoring pattern.  Here are two examples among many other possibilities:

   

     

Toast

So, I tweaked things yesterday again based on what I've seen the first two bakes. In hopes of achieving a higher rising loaf that doesn't have cracks.  This was another "all in one day" bake - I've decided to defer working on overnight proofing/retarding in order to better understand the level of sourness until I could work out the kinks in getting the basics right.

The factors I changed are as follows:

2025-01-23 BAKE #3

  • Used 315g water (last loaf I used 300g and the dough was still a touch firm)
  • Stretched only three times (I've been doing four sets before).  I wanted to see if this would leave the dough a bit more pliable and let it rise more).
  • Bulk rise at 77 degrees from around 2pm to 7:30
  • Pulled out of proofing box a bit earlier - a bit less than 2x original volume (less than the time before.  That time it was DEFINITELY 2x bigger (or more).  I think the second loaf may have been a little over-proofed, leading to the smaller bubbles).
  • Tuck & shaping, then final proofed in baneton on the counter from 7:30 to 8:30 (missed this step last time - see earlier post).
  • Made slit a bit longer (almost edge to edge) to try to avoid cracking at ends of the cut
  • Baking:
    • Pre-heated at 450
    • 10 min after lid off at 415
    • ~10 min at 435 (until internal is at 206)

Here's the results:

I'm very happy with the results!  Any more suggestions?
 

That is one beautiful-looking loaf.  I don't have any suggestions because I don't see anything that's lacking.  How was the flavor?

Well, OK, just one thing.  Breads like these are usually baked to a higher temperature, even 210 deg F.  Of course that's only a matter of preference depending on how you like the crumb and crust. Leaving more moisture in the crumb will tend to soften the crust as the bread sits around. You could experiment to see how you like it. Or if you are at altitude, you won't be able to get the temperature that high anyway (at 6000 ft altitude I used to bake to about 198 deg F).

Anyway, nicely done.

 

First, thanks for your kind words!  The flavor is really nice.  It's mild and not really sour at all but that was expected given I did it all in one day I guess...  Thanks for the wisdom re: 210 vs 206 - I'll definitely try that on my next bake!

A question for anyone: I subscribe to Maurizio's newsletter (the guy behind "The Perfect Loaf") and he sent something today discussing winter baking and how it's easy to under proof bread.  When I looked at the picture of the bread in question, I thought it looked BETTER than my most recent loaf, and this has me questioning exactly what I should be looking for / aspiring to.

Can someone perhaps point me toward a picture of an "ideal" version of sourdough crumb, preferably with some discussion of what is being shown and WHY that's the ideal?

As always, I appreciate all the help and wisdom!

This weekend I intend to begin experimenting with the T65 flour.  I'll do some research today and make a plan to hopefully arrive at something edible enough to eat at least that I can learn and iterate from.  I feel like I've started to understand more or less what I wnat to see & feel at the various stages of the process (what does the starter look like when it's ripe?  What should the dough look and feel like after mixing? After autolyse?  What shoukld it look and feel like after the bulk rise to not be over or under proofed?).  I assume all of these factors will be somewhat different (maybe a LOT different?) using the T65 - is that a fair assumption or is it more correct to say I should be looking for similar results but may need to use different techniques and/or ingredient ratios to get there?

 

Can someone perhaps point me toward a picture of an "ideal" version of sourdough crumb, preferably with some discussion of what is being shown and WHY that's the ideal?

No, because there isn't any such thing.  Even for one particular bread type, different people have different ideas of what they want or like. Some people like large cavities, some like a very open crumb not not with large cavities, some want a crumb that is less open.  Some like their crusts darker (me), some lighter.  Generally speaking, you don't want to produce a dense pancake or brick, or a crust that's too thick and hard (since it's too hard to bite through), or undercooked dough, or a bread that's too sour even for aficionados of sour.

Bread type and the flour used have something to do with it. E.g., using a whole grain flour makes getting an open crumb harder, and using grains without much gluten is challenging.

As for T-65 flour, lower the hydration to start out with.  The dough will probably be softer and more extensible than what you have used so far. Handle it gently when you can.

TomP

Thanks for the words of wisdom Tom!  I get your point regarding different strokes for different folks, but it sure would be nice if there was a bread-version of something akin to an AKC "breed standard" like they use for dogs but for bread!  At least I'd have a better idea of what the consensus is on what to be aiming for before deviating towards my own preference...

I'm in the midst of doing a test I read to use here on the forum, using 100g of the flour in each of five bowls, and adding progressively more water (55g, 60, 65, 70 and 75g) and then doing the "window test".  Time to test is in about 15 min - I'll see what happens!

Thank you!

 

This is a copy of the post text I just made in the original thread (not mine) where I found the hydration test I just used.  If anyone could help interpret my results using the T65 I'd appreciate it very much!

Original post is here:  https://www.thefreshloaf.com/comment/539478#comment-539478

 

Hello!  I'm not the OP but I found this thread, and this test trying to figure out as a beginner how to use the T65 I bought (from lepicerie.com) to make sourdough.

I just did the test as described and I'm uncertain how to interpret my results.  I'm posting my observations of each hydration level and hoping someone can help me understand what to use...  

 

NOTES

55% - The dough feels somewhat dry like PlayDoh, but by handling it very gently I can coax it to stretch enough in small areas to  pass I guess (I can see light through very thin areas).  I DO NOT think I could much more than a few square centimeters of area that thin without breaking.

60% - A touch dry but more pliable and easier to stretch.  I can definitely get it to a point where I can see through areas of it, and I can make larger areas than the 55% version

65% - The dough is a touch sticky but much more pliable than 55% or 60%. It's very easy to get to "see through windows" and they are quite large if I'm careful (i.e. if I move my fingers away from the section that's already see through and work the area just next to it I can make large "panels" or transparent dough).  If I'm less careful it tears. at the thinnest spots.

70% - The dough is quite sticky and harder to work with because of that. I can get it to "see through" but the dough seems to lack the "bounce back" of the 65% (and less) versions. It's a bit runny feeling - like if I let much un-stretched dough hang it might begin to stretch out and fall off of the piece I'm working.

75% - Stickier and runnier than the 70% version.  Very difficult to work with / stretch as a result.

 

So, bottom line is that I can get almost all of them to at least small sections that are transparent, but the two extremes don't seem very viable: the 55% feels very dry and stiff, and the 75% is so sticky and runny that I could barely get it stretched properly.

I hope my descriptions are useful for helping me choose - any suggestions please?

Thanks, and sorry to the OP for jumping into their thread!

Not all T-65 flours are the same.  And there is a knack to handling high-hydration doughs that takes experience. Also, some flours (Including my own T-65 and T-80 bags of imported French flour ) make dough that deteriorates badly over time if the hydration is slightly too high. As in 58% hydration is fine, 61% in marginal, and forget anything higher.

So my advice is to start on the low side and if that succeeds, you can increase the hydration a small amount and see if that works.

58% hydration - including the water and flour in the starter. Even if the dough comes out dry, you've already made drier dough and got a decent loaf. That number is based on several bakes with my flour samples and yours may act differently.  Even so it should be a conservative choice to start with, I think.

As for breed standards, there are some but much less formal.  Usually, people discover some kind of bread in a bread book or on line, and use whatever name the recipe used. They use the pictures from the book or web page as a guide. In the case of baguettes, there is a standard, it's even a legal one in France, and almost everyone has a mental image of a baguette - long and thin with a thin crispy crust, a soft creamy crumb having a range of pore sizes. There's an Italian standard for Altamura bread.  But even then, the standards allow a lot of variation. Stick with the TFL site (or search through its history) and you will find many examples.

For testing flour, one important quality is how well the dough resists deterioration over time. With the sacks of T-65 and T-80 that I have, hydration is critical. If it's even a little too high, the dough loses strength over time and becomes nearly unusable. At a lower hydration, it can make fine bread. Simply being able to pull a window pane won't tell you about the behavior over time. You want to let your samples rest for hours or even overnight and then see how they do.

That's a bummer, because I didn't save them!  The "test" said to check them after 15 min, so that's what I did.  Then I threw them in a discard container to feed to my starter...  And I don't relish the idea of using that much flour to run the test again.  Ugh!

Regardless, thanks for you insight!

Do it right and there is no throw away. Simply - and I'll repeat - start with a little (a few grams) and enough water to make a thick batter - wait (however long it takes) to turn to almost water - repeat till it takes a day. After a few times it's ready - which means it's not a starter yet. That comes later. Enjoy!

I'm not sure I'm following your comment - my post was about a "window pane test" I was doing to try to determine the hydration percentage appropriate for French T65 flour.  You seem to be referring to how to properly prepare a starter?  

Can you elaborate please?

Toast

I used the same ingredients and amounts as the last one, but I changed two elements in the process:

  1. I stirred the starter into the warm water, olive oil and salt for several minutes before adding the flour (the theory being that this would lead to a more uniform distribution of the active stuff (yeasts, bacteria).
  2. I used a pan full of lava rocks and a steel baking plate in the oven instead of the dutch oven

The results are INTERESTING!

  • Overall the loaf feels lighter and it has more "chew" and springiness
  • The crust is less dense and seems to sort of have flakey and somewhat distinct layers.  On the outside you can see a few areas where bubbles formed and caved in while they were dry and crusty.  Again, there's more chewiness to it.
  • The crust did not brown as much, the "slash" area that opens up (I'm not sure what the name for that is) had less variation in depth (it was sort of flatter / smoother I guess) and the ear less pronounced as compared to Loaf #3.

All in all I think most people would say this one is better, but I almost with there was a tiny touch less "chew" to it.  Maybe I'll change my mind, but I sort of felt like it was putting up about 5% more fight than I feel like working through!

 

Looking good.  Remember, there is going to be some variation from one bake to the next.  Until you get familiar with how much there can be, don't be too quick to draw conclusions.

The appearance of the bottom makes me think the dough was on the dry side. The overall roundness of the cross-section looks underproofed to me - I can't tell which side is the bottom and which the top but the bottom should be flatter.

You didn't say how you used the rocks.  I throw 12 oz of water on mine just after the loaf goes into the oven. Be careful not to spill any on the oven door or the glass might crack.

The crust not browning as much is probably just a matter of the oven temperature setting.  A little higher and you would have gotten more browning. You can't expect to get the same oven dynamics with the rocks and steel as you did with the Dutch oven.

TomP

Ok.  I did it!

I baked my first loaf with the T65 flour and it went pretty well!  Here are my notes, explanations and observations...

  • Making the dough was almost a disaster and resulted in a dough that deviates significantly from the recipe / plan.
  • The plan:
    • 300g starter (see below - used 200g because I didn't hAVE 300g and needed to leave some to regenerate my starter)
    • 300g water (see below - I will try 250g next time)
    • 10g salt
    • 20g olive oil
    • 600g T65 flour
  • Long story short, as described above, the dough was immediately soft and runnier/stickier than I felt I could work with so I decided to add some flour, maybe 100g (I was panicing and din't measure.  This became an issue for taking away any possible learning points to tweak the recipe going forward).  100g was too much and things almost immediatley became too DRY.  Ugh.  So, like an idiot, I added water - but TOO MUCH! - so it was runny again!  AAARGH...  I finally settled down and added a tiny bit of flour at a time until it reached a consistency that was in the ballpark of the King Arthur based recipe I've used for the 1st 4 loaves I've made.
    • I realize that since the other ingedients (oil, starter, and salt) did not scale up with the added flour and water mass, the bake will deviate somewhat from any future bake I do assuming I can get the dough "right" by adding just a bit more flour ip front (maybe 25g?).
  • It was a bit stretchier / runnier but not horrible.  I could lift it up to do my stretch/folds and manipulate it as gravity pulled the dough down easily but controllably before I would fold it over.  With the KA flour I noticed the dough would tighten up after three folds, so I would stop there.  With this T65 it took more like six folds before it would tighten up.
  • I went through four sets of stretch and fold spaced 30 min apart.  The dough tightened up bit by bit between sets.  By the fourth set it only took about 4 folds to tighten up, so I put the dough back in the proofing box to sit overnight in the proofing tub (put in fridge around 10:15pm)
  • DAY 2
    • 0945 - Out of proofing bin, shaped (back of boule stretched in circular pattern) and placed in banneton dusted with rice flour with damp cover.  Put back in fridge.
    • Oven grate was moved up one notch from prior bakes (moved up to third notch down form the topmost option - top, second, THIRD) to try to get closer to the coils and get more growing without having to turn up the temp.  Seems like the parchment paper was at its temp limit and was smoldering.
    • 1030 - Did final shaping.  It felt a touch slack & spent - maybe over proofed? - and put in oven with steam at 400 (preheat was at 450).
    • After 10 min increased temp to 415
    • At 20 min mark I released the steam
      • The loaf seems HUGE!  Sure, it has more mass (best guess around 1150g) but it looks like it has risen a TON!  The "slashed" area spread WAY apart!  Maybe NOT over proofed???
    • At 1106 internal temp is 136.  Turned up temp to 425 (crust is starting to brown - expecting another 15-20 min baking to get to 210?)
    • At 1137 internal temp is 204 (at lowest measured point in center of loaf).  
    • Pulled at 209 (~ 1145ish)
    • I think maybe I UNDER proofed?  I base this on the way the loaf went sort of bean-shaped. It seems to have risen so much in the center that the loaf sort of pivoted on the "hinge" line at the center of the bottom of the crust (the spot directly under the point of most rise).  Maybe the last minute tucking I did as I placed it on the tray to go in the oven made the top too tight?  Not sure.  Will suspend judgment until it cools and I can see the crumb I guess...


 

I'll post a cross section pic in a few hours once it has cooled!


 

Welp, I will call this a success!  Obviously I'll need to sort out the shaping & slash pattern stuff to get the loaf to be round as I intended, but I think the crumb looks beautiful (as an amateur opinion at least), and it tasted delicious.  The crust is crispy but light, and the crumb is light and springy.  I suspect it will let go of a touch of that springiness over the course of today (like the last loaf did).  TBD.

All in all, the T65 worked out fine.  I'll need to dial in the starting hydration by being more precise with my starter hydration, and by reducing the initial amount of water a bit, but I'm very, very pleased that it wasn't a disaster - I was very concerned going in to the bake!

That loaf had a lot of oven spring! You handled adjusting the hydration well in the end. No, it wasn't overproofed. The loaf would have risen much less in the oven, and slumped sideways more, it it were. 

What's behind the "bean shape" is two-fold:

  1. T-65 flour makes for softer, more delicate dough than you are used to;
  2. The score pattern causes a sideways opening, which in this case got exaggerated.  A diagonal set of scores across the top will favor upward rather than sideward expansion.  You can even combine both.

Thanks for the explanation!  I had not intended for the loaf to be oblong - I thought it would be round.  I wonder if I tucked harder/more at a point (or points opposite-ish each other) and ended up with more tension in the middle/waist?  Or perhaps it's just as you said - it's all the score pattern I used...  

A few questions:

  • What should I do differently to accommodate the more delicate T65 flour dough?
  • So, you're suggesting two slashes sort of equidistant off of the centerline as opposed to one large one ON the centerline(ish)?

I will try your suggestions next time and see what happens!  Thanks!

You did fine handling the T-65, except that you don't know the final hydration.  Keep it on the low side (60% or slightly less) until you know you have some margin to increase it. If the dough never strengthens as you stretch it, or if it does at first but later acts more and more like taffy (just pulling out without developing elasticity), the hydration is too high.

An asymmetrical score pattern will produce an asymmetrical loaf, no surprise there, especially with a lot of oven spring like you got this time. Create a symmetrical pattern to get a symmetrical loaf. You can use a cross on the top, arcs around the pole but not too close to it (you want longish scores so that there will be more length to open), a tic-tac-toe like pattern centered on the pole, or something else you can come up with.

From left to right are the remnants of the first five loaves of sourdough I've baked, the process of learning to make them having been documented (mostly) above!  They go from first attempt at far left, through the T65 loaf I baked this morning at far right (#3 was popular!)...

Thanks for all the help and words of wisdom!

So I'm in progress on another T65 loaf and decided to push things a little farther than I have on the "hydration" front compared to  previous bakes, just to see what happens and to see if I could get my dough anywhere close to the looser versions I've seen in so many tutorial videos.  I also hoped that somehow using higher hydration dough might tamp down a bit on my MASSIVE oven spring issies I've had.

 

Ingredients & process (so far) are as follows:

  • 350g water (use 325g last time with no issues)
  • 600g T65 flour
  • 10g salt
  • 100g starter (fed with 1/2 cup T65 and about .375 cups of water each time - not sure where that gets me in terms of hydration, but I've been feeding it this way consistently for the last week+)

 

PROCESS

  • I mixed the flour & water and let it autolyse for an hour
  • I did 4 sets of stretch and folds with the proofing tub in the proofing box @77 degrees between S&F sets..  
    • On the first it started MUCH looser than in my past bakes.  Much closer to videos I've seen.
    • By the second & third set is seemed much like previous bakes
    • I've generally done ok with 3 "sets" of S&F in the past, but the dough felt a bit looser than previous times each time I started a new "set" so I decided to go ahead and do a fourth
  • After the last S&F it went back in the proofer for several hours...  This is where it gets interesting(ish)

The dough normally starts to rise fairly slowly then takes off over the last hour or so in the proofer.  This time it rose quite slowly and never really "took off" at all.  Even after being in the proofer for about an hour longer than I've ever done it before, it had only really risen to maybe 1.5x the starting height.  Normally it would have been at 1.75x (or perhaps more) by earlier in the rise.  I went ahead and put it in the fridge...

Later that night (maybe 2-3 hours after it went in the fridge) I decided to check it to see if it had risen any more (it usually does).  It didn't look like it had risen any more, but HOLY MOLY the consistency of the dough seemed WEIRD!  It had softened up to the point where it was on the verge of being "liquidy" - even moreso than at the very first S&F!  When I tipped the proofing tub to the side you could watch the dough slowly smoosh its way over toward the edge due to the pull of gravity!

I thought for sure it was ruined, but I decided to let it be for the night and to check again this morning - no harm in letting it ride a while...  

Well, by this morning it seems normal again I think!  It's firmed back up again and has the look and feel of silly putty (more or less).  SO WEIRD!  So my plan is to let it retard a while longer and either bake it this afternoon, which would be about 8 hours longer than I have previously (~20 hours total in the fridge) or tomorrow morning (~32 hours total).  Maybe it'll be a disaster - who knows! - but holy moly it's wild that just 25g more of water has created such a big difference!

I'll follow up with the final results once I complete the bake!

 

It sounds like you are right on the hairy edge of too much water. Remember how I said that with my sack of flour just a few percent makes all the difference? Good luck.  If you can't make a loaf that holds together you can always bake it in a loaf pan.

TomP

I do remember, and I've been thinking of that the whole time!  I agree with your assessment - at best I'm right on the edge, but this may be a disaster unfolding...  lol.  No biggie if it does - I'm learning every time!

Thanks for all of your help Tom...

Well, none of the changes changed the KABLOOEY factor all that much, but doing two cuts does seem to make things look a bit more like "I meant to do that" as opposed to "This loaf is not my child...".  That said, I find the two slashes sort of fascinating: they were each made equally (as far as my ability/intent) and spanned the length of the batard on either side.  The intent was to hopefully get sort of equally diameter-ed slashes and strips of un-cut crust.  It surprises me that one opened a TON and the other basically not at all (except on the surface).  I assume one or both of two things happened: 1. one side "ruptured" first and it was easier for all the rise growth to just keep going there, or 2. I made one cut deeper than the other...

Anyhow, it seems "presentable" but not nearly so pretty as some of my first loaves I made with organic KA bread flour.