60% White SD Biga Loaf
I've made Abel's 90% Biga loaf several times since he published it and in my view it's a TFL classic. However, although I've had great results with the yeasted version, I've never had success with the sourdough one.
However, a recent comment from DanAyo [1] (near the bottom of Abel's thread) made me want to revisit it. Guidance from Michael Wilson (in the same thread) helped me understand that I wasn't using the "right" sourdough for the recipe and that I needed a low acid Lievito Madre type starter to be successful.
So on his advice I repurposed my starter (normally 80% BF/20% rye and 80% hydration) into a pseudo lievito madre one - all white at 50% hydration.
Levain
Day0: build 1 & 2 at 1:2:1 (starter:BF:water) 25C
Day0: build 3 at 1:2:1 18C and stored overnight underwater at 18C
Day1: take starter out of water and drain. Build 1 at 1:1:0.5 28C
Build 2 & 3: repeat build one every 4 hours. Levain should triple
Biga (50% hydration)
300g Marriages BF
300g Marriages Canadian flour
300g water
60g levain
Day 1, e11: mix till no more dry flour. Chop up biga into small pieces and store loosely covered at 16C
Main Dough (67% hydration)
All biga
395g Grandi Molini Tipo 0 flour
5g diastatic malt
377g water
19g salt
Day 2, m10: not much rise on biga, which I think is fine, but warmed up for 1 hour in PB at 28C
Day 2, m11: add water to mixer and then half flour. Mix on slow until smooth and then incorporate chopped up biga
Add rest of flour and mix on slow until smooth.
Mix on high 1 min, add salt and mix for another minute.
Turn out of the mixer into proofing bowl, dough temp 23C
Bulk ferment at 28C for 3hrs 25mins with one coil fold - about 40% volume increase.
Preshape to 2 x 850g batards. BR 20mins
Shape, proof for 70mins at 28C
Score and bake as normal with steam
Thoughts
Do you need a long bulk like I did with a SD biga? Anyone know?
Very difficult to score - I always find this with biga loaves - it must be the long biga ferment degrading the dough
Ears and loft OK, but not great
Super open crumb
Mild flavour - I guess as expected from using the low acidity LM
Photos
Lievito madre in water bath at start:
Lievito madre drained, next morning:
Biga:
Last of the biga just before adding to the mixer:
Baked loaves:
If open crumb offends you, look away now!:
Lance