alfanso's blog

Well, now he’s done it.  I was fool enough to rise to the absurd challenge of dabrownman the other day.  He can be a bit like that mean childhood cousin from out of town who visits and convinces me to stick a fork into an electrical socket.  Well, I’m past that age, thankfully (I think), but I still fell for the old fork-in-the-socket routine.  Ouch!

The challenge was of the order of txfarmer’s 105% hydration Whole Wheat baguettes using a liquid rye levain.  I don’t know if txfarmer used freshly ground grain or not, and she also added 15% barley flour, neither of which I possess.  Ian (isand66) informed me recently that freshly ground whole grain flours are much thirstier than that packaged stuff that I use.  

I had some pretty good success with PiPs 102% whole wheat sesame seeded batard which I did an admirable job on recently, so I was feeling my oats.  I was up for roughing it.  And rough it was.  

• Making the liquid rye levain was a dream compared to the remainder of the tasks laid out like little bear traps before me.
• The overnight autolyse of ice water and whole wheat flour went off without a hitch, except for the decided goopiness of the mix.
• The 2nd day was the mixing: almost pure soup.  French folds surprisingly went okay for maybe the first 20-30 folds, and then all heck broke loose.  I was trying to corral the droopy stew of a dough with each attempt at a fold.
• I did 5 or 6 letter folds, and with each one, a ray of hope peeked through the dark clouds of this whole wheat soup.  The dough was rising and starting to tighten.
• Into the refrigerator for a 2 hour retard.
• Divide, pre-shape and shape.  A virtual laughathon.
• With a stroke of near genius (or desperation) I placed the “shaped” baguettes on floured parchment paper which itself resided on the couche.  Cradling each baguette between channels of the couche supported parchment, the whole deal was covered and placed into the refrigerator for what became a ~28 hour retard.  There was no way these weren't going to otherwise be permanently attached to the couche.
• I had a vague feeling of hope when the I scored the baguettes.  The parchment went directly into the oven as is.  
• 12 minutes of steam, and then when I went to rotate the baguettes, I found that they had decided to take up permanent residence on the parchment – they were stuck.  And so I continued to bake them just that way.
  

As it turns out, I pulled them way too soon as the inside was still quite moist from all of that hydration about a half hour later.  Now, those of you who have seen my baguettes know that I can make some pretty good stock much of the time, but these were like little devils just waiting with their pitchforks poised just to give me a good comeuppance.  I want challenges that have a potential end game, not the relatively unattainable.  

I’ll never do that again!  Ridiculous.  And hey, dabrownman, don’t try that again, ya hear!!!

The best step in the process - the levain ready to go.

The parchment paper solution, and how they napped overnight...

Steam released, rotated and still holding tight to the parchment

Don't try this at home, kids

Some open crumb, but not really.  They could have used another 5 or more minutes to shed a lot more water.  These are quite heavy due to their water retention.

Oh well.  And just like the 102% hydration WW batards, the smell and flavor is a bit reminiscent of a cross between a farm and a health foods store  ;-) .  Time to get a new levain up to par and prepare to bake something that I can do! 

alan

A break in the action.  I'd been so busy lately with my batard thing that I neglected the simple pleasures of rolling out a few baguettes.  So I took a time-out and decided to go back to the first (and easiest) of my baguettes formulae, the one that kicked off the whole thing for my attempts at achieving a good result - Bouabsa style baguettes.

As I had with my recent successes in batard bakes, I baked these directly out of the refrigerator.  The original formula calls for a bulk retard, then bench warm-up, divide, shape and final proof.  So I was rebelling against all of these steps as my overnight retard was with the already shaped baguettes, and no post-retard warmup.

From an external point of view, the crust is all that I would want it to be - well shaped and scored, baked dark and nice oven spring.  Internally, the crumb is tight!  Nothing like what I had experienced way back when the crumb just about exploded open.

So, quickly paring down the possibilities on why, it seems quite obvious that the lack of a final proof must be the culprit.  For the method that I've been playing with, refrigerator-proofed, insufficient bench bulk rise - 60 minutes with three letter folds, is a likely reason as to why they didn't achieve a better crumb.  

I will give these another go in a few days with a change to something or other - more likely than not I'll go for a more extended bulk rise to see how that experiment comes out.  The original 60 minutes was quite skimpy on the rise time, but for now I will remain stubbornly attached to a pre-shaped retard and direct-from-the-refrigerator bake. (It's that Janet's mother thing I'd mentioned a few months back - do something just a bit different to make it your own.)

Steam released and baguettes rotated.

For comparison here is a pic of the open crumb from an early successful Bouabsa bake in Dec, 2013:

Back to the drawing board...

alan

Almost went for another round of the sesame semolina batards, having promised one to my cousin just the other day.  But suddenly had an itching to bake my take on his Country Blonde.  These are not the same as in FWSY.  

Overall hydration at 78%, scaled at ~475g each.  Very slack and sticky.   And had to add more flour to the couche than I care to.  This is due to the long retard that allows more transfer of moisture to the linen than had it been proofed on the counter.  This bread blisters beautifully.  Still have to improve on my scoring batards when there are multiple scores.  At least it has no "waistline" so I'm sufficiently overlapping the scores.  

Live, learn and practice some more!  But pretty happy overall with this one.

In a recent blog about Lessons in Baking I ended by stating “perhaps that is the most important lesson of the day – that with practice and sticking to plan, one can duplicate over and over again what they create.”

I’m going to get together with the friend and son-in-law again in a few days.  This next time, if the plan pans out, he will be the hands-on person, and I’ll be the observer.  But I thought about a formula a bit simpler than the Sesame Semolina Levain batard that we did last time.  Just plain old F, W, S and Y.  And what comes immediately to mind is the sterling SJSD Levain formula by David Snyder.  My recent take on mostly everything is to use my own version of a stiff levain in place of just about whatever is called for (except rye sours).  Just sprinkle a few additional grams of water into the mix to compensate for the hydration lost with a stiffer levain.

In preparation, I ran a batch of my soSJSD* Batards.  And they came out as anticipated.  With the funny exception of two of them scored and bloomed just a bit off.  Still in all, a good bake with some lovely blistering.  And further evidence that one can indeed duplicate repeatedly what they create.

*son of San Joaquin SourDough

Steam released and rotated

Handsome little devils

And the crumb

alan

So, the Little Woman keeps nagging like a parrot "how about making some ciabatta, how about making some ciabatta"  The only thing missing is the "aawk" squeal at the end.  Sheesh!!!  Okay, okay already.

I haven't made ciabatta in nearly forever with my batard and baguette obsession, er, interest still peaking.  But I'm out of practice, so this is the practice run.  A half dozen rolls and a long loaf.  1000g total dough mix at 83% hydration, this is the only thing that I use the mixer for.  Lost some dough to the workbench, mixing bowls, etc. and the entire thang is down to probably a little more than 900g.

Next time to do:

• Too much flour, but there is that fine line to walk with ciabatta between sticking and releasing
• Better shaping
• More loft on the loaf.  The rolls came out just dandy (shaping excluded).

Biga made yesterday and then retarded overnight, the whole activity cost me a tad more than 5 hours today.

Steam released and rotated.

alan

Phil Agnew – PiPs, is either a baking genius or a mad man.  Or maybe a mad man genius.  Only now am I starting to pay attention to what he had published on TFL a few years ago, prior to my time trapped in this other dimension known as the TFL Zone.  I had long ago noticed and admired the Also on TFL photo and link to his Sesame Whole Wheat Levain Double Hydration batard.  And now, not only being caught up in my own batard frenzy but also with a planned glut of sesame seeds on hand, well, that just nudged me over the edge.  His photography is wonderful, and did indeed capture my attention.  After my recent forays into David Snyder’s Sourdough Italian Bread, and my sister in law’s declaration of a mutual love of sesame seeded breads, I was ripe and ready to give this formula a go.

So here am I on the exact opposite end of the earth trying this formula out.  Well, actually a few thousand miles adrift into the Atlantic according to the antipode map, but what’s a couple of time zones off between friends?  

A few weeks ago, I baked his 100% WW Levain Batard at 88% hydration, due to my noticing it on Also on TFL.  And that was way further than I had gone before in terms of hydration.  But these loaves today hover around the absurd 102% hydration mark and called my name.  Wow!  The man must be a baking genius or and expert at mirrors or...

A few differences:

• scaled down his formula for three 500g batards
• off the shelf whole wheat flour
• the interior sesame seeds are white hulled instead of black unhulled
• bench rest bulk fermentation for 1 hour, with letter folds at 20, 40 and 60 minutes.
• retarded for 1 hour before divide, rest and shaping.
• couched, covered and into the retarder for an overnight snooze and long proof
• couched seam side down
• scored and baked right out of the refrigerator.
• used my standard forever levain starter.  Therefore this isn’t technically a 100% WW  formula, with literarily just a few grams of AP and Rye slipped in  
  

And the results are in, of which I’m generally quite happy about.  Not as much grigne/ear as I was expecting, nor was there significant loft.  Maybe I'll go for an even sharper angled score the next time around.  But the sheer density of the dough was a likely culprit.  The lack of color in the crumb’s sesame seeds translate into being almost transparent to the eye, but they are there.  

I let it bake for the full ~15 minutes of steam followed by ~ 30 minutes of continued bake and then an additional 5 minutes of venting.  A rather long bake for a 500g batard.

After the second hydration the dough was very loose for the majority of the French Folds, but did tighten up a little toward the end.  A one hour retard made for a very easy pre-shape and shaping the batards.  Considering the insane level of hydration - extra flour on the couche, but the dough still stuck a little.  However no damage was done and the loaves were very easy to score.

I’m not so sure that I’ll be revisiting this formula again as the whole wheat flavor is a bit reminiscent of a cross between a farm and a health foods store smell ;-) .   But it surely was fun and a challenge to take on a task such as this.

Left: ready to come off the couche.  Right: scored and ready for the oven

Steam released and The Kids have been rotated.

The triplets

If you look closely you can see the sesame seeds although from this shot they are difficult to discern.

alan

That stands for Alfanso’s Sesame Semolina Levain Batards.

Our friend’s new son-in-law is an amateur baker, much as most of us around these parts are, but with less experience than a great many of us here at the TFL ranch. When he heard that I was a (cough, cough) real baker he was quite interested in hooking up with me for some tips/baking/knowledge/fill-in-the-blank.  So yesterday the crew spent the day here.  And I created a baking lesson using David Snyder’s Sourdough Italian Bread formula.  As I’ve changed around a few things, I’ve rechristened it as above.  Well, at last in my mind...

Now I knew up front that this was more complicated than a simple flour, water salt and IDY formula, but I thought that it would be a good experience to expose him to something a bit more complex.  Although he is relatively new at this game, he was quite familiar with just about any term that I bandied about.

We did things quite out of order so that we could perform everything in one day.  When they arrived, the first order of business was to pop a couche’s worth of the batards into the already steamed oven.  I’d prepped a batch on Saturday so that we could have the full experience, and into the refrigerator for a long cold proof they did go.  

While the batards were under steam I mixed the next batch for “autolyse” and barely had to juggle the baking with that next batch.  (Yes, purists, I know that the autolyse contained the levain, but as you may be witness to, the quotes were around the dang word.).  And so it went until we came pretty much full circle and loaded the day’s now shaped and couched batards into the refrigerator.  During the latter half of that phase I went ahead and demoed a build of my “forever” levain as though it was levain to be used in that mix.

So the three steps to make these batards were performed in reverse order, but it afforded him the opportunity to see it all in one day.  And I packed him and family off for home with the formula sheet and some other supporting documentation about levain maintenance and builds, the two remaining batards that we did not consume, some dried levain flakes for eventual reconstituting, and a little Tupperware of ~100g of my “forever” levain.

And so this morning, as any hungry and fidgety baker would do, I fired up the oven and loaded the three batards from yesterday’s lesson into it.  And although I don’t have any pictures of yesterday’s bake, I did dutifully snap a few from today.  I’ll pass these onto him as well, and also to demonstrate that consistency of product can be achieved with practice.  Can’t prove it without the evidence, but these are just about exact replica’s of yesterday’s bake, and they are just about exacts of my bake from back in early May.  

And in a way, perhaps that is the most important lesson of the day – that with practice and sticking to plan, one can duplicate over and over again what they create. 

Steam released and rotated - say cheese...

The Kids cooling down

alan

Inspiration comes from a few places.  I almost never crack open either of my two bread baking books anymore, as the world of TFL is the best on the market!  My main interests in the next loaf to tackle are usually spurred on by something in the Bread Browser, the Also on TFL or someone’s Recent Blog Entries posting.

For a while I’d been eyeing WoodenSpoon’s Rye Levain batard in the Also column.  Having delved into the world of rye flour dough recently, the time had come.  Especially since I had some still potent stiff rye levain from recent breads I made this past month.  I very much like the Greenstein-Snyder method of gauging the maturity in the rise of a rye sour levain.  Sprinkle some rye flour on top and watch for it to dome and separate into “islands”.  With a very stiff levain build such as used here, that rise is minimal, but the “cracking open” of the loose flour sprinkled on top is a sure-fire indicator that the levain is active and healthy.  

Changes from the original formula:

• adjusted for 1500g, three batards at 500g each
• No milling of my own flours – I use off-the-shelf products
• I wouldn’t know a “rye chop” if it came up and bit me from behind, so that was out
• I took WoodenSpoon’s word as is when he states “Bread Flour”.  Not having any on hand (apparently too lazy to git me sum), I used a combination of AP flour and Vital Wheat Gluten, using my now handy Pearson’s Square to accurately calculate the (somewhere around) 13.3% total protein that using bread flour would provide.
• Bulk ferment for 2 hours with letter folds at 40, 60 and 80 minutes and a final 40 minute bulk bench rest.
• Refrigerate for ~1 hour, then divide and pre-shape, 10 minute rest, and final shape.  
• Onto a couche, then slipped inside plastic bags to preserve moisture and prevent any surface drying.  Retard for ~18 hours.
• Scored directly from the refrigerator and put into the 500dF oven, already under steam, add 2 cups very hot water to the lava rock pan, and pull my face back quickly!
• 15 minutes of steam at 450dF, rotate and continue baking for another 22 minutes with 5 minutes of venting at the end.
  

Retarded overnight, a light shower of raw flour, scored and ready for the oven

Steam released and rotated after 15 minutes

The Kids are Alright

A little denser than I was expecting

alan

I recently came across PiPs’ 100% WW batards and had a go at it, with a lot of success.  Now that I’ve discovered the quality of what PiPs does, I took a gander at some other breads of his. This time I decided on his 40% rye with caraway seeds.

What I notice, also being new to any dough with a significant amount of rye, is that once the dough has proofed, there appears to be very little oven spring after that.  Also that the bread crust itself seems hard pressed to take on dark coloration.  Using standard bread flour and adding 7 grams of IDY to the 1500g mix, there is a lot of formula similarity to David Snyder's version of the Jewish Deli Rye that I baked a few weeks ago – my first foray into rye breads.

The rye was not difficult to handle.  Quite sticky during the initial pinch and fold, but then very manageable during the French Folds.  Divide and shaping was a breeze in terms of the cooperativeness of the dough.  There was also zero sticking to the couche upon transfer to the oven peel.

New for me this time out:

• using a chevron score on dough.
• using a couche for the proof instead of on parchment for rye dough.
• proofing the shaped dough seam side up.
• dropping the oven temp mid bake so precipitously – from 450dF to 400dF per PiPs’ instructions.
  

Corrections for next time:

• give the dough a shower of raw flour just before scoring.  The rustic look, one I typically shy away from, will “hide” some of lack of deep crust color in this bread.
• OR dose the finished batards with that same Jewish Deli Rye cornstarch glaze and then shower the top with more caraway seeds and a sprinkle of sea salt.  Yeah!  That's the ticket!!
• exert more care in shaping the batards – there seems to be little self-correction from the dough itself.  Flaws in the shape will be obvious in the finished product.
• perhaps try to give the dough a deeper score.
  

Changes from the original formula:

• adjusted for 1500g, three batards at 500g each.
• addition of 7g of IDY for a bit of “oomph”.
• a 10 minute rest between pinch and fold and final mixing/French Folds.
• couched instead of using a banneton.
• activity times shortened (as usual) due to my warmer kitchen.
  

Baking underway - steam just released and batards rotated.

 40 minutes total bake time, 5 minutes venting on the baking deck.

alan

Recently I began to try out a rye levain breads, and having leftover rye starter I figured I'd continue on that riff.  I cleave off a bit at a time from the remaining rye starter ball and still have a few bakes left in the slowly diminishing ball.  For the liquid levain, I used a recently refreshed stiff levain stater.

A recent blog entry by David Snyder intrigued me.  I had long ago (if my under 18 months apprenticeship on TFL is long ago!) developed a pattern of being inspired by what I see on TFL and then give it a go.  So off I went to experience a few new things all at once.  Never used two starters in one dough before.  Ditto with any starter >100% hydration.  Also using Bread flour for the first time instead of AP flour (except for the substitution of bread flour for First Clear recently).  I amped the formula up to ~1500g so as to make three 500g batards.

I'd read that the starters take way longer than mine did to mature.  The 125% hydration bread flour starter took 7.5 hours instead of the anticipated 12-14 hours, and the way more viscous rye starter took 9 hours instead of 14-16 hours.  

Following the "make it your own" concept, I went with my standard 300 French Folds, and 2 sets of letter folds at 40 and 80 minutes, with another 40 minutes of bench fermentation time before retarding.  The dough remained retarding for ~3 hours prior to divide (I had things to do...), pre-shape and shape and then back into the refrigerator on their couche.  12 hours total retard time and then score and bake directly from the refrigerator.  13 min - steam, 20 min. - dry heat and 2 min. - vent.

The oven spring was wonderful, and the blisters on the surface almost make me wince in sympathetic pain (au levain!!)

Left: couched and ready for retard.  Right: scored and ready for the oven.

Steam just released and rotated:

The finished product:

The blue ribbon winner:

alan