baguettes

I made Don's Baguettes a l'Ancienne with Cold Retardation. I used fresh yeast and and Sel Gris de Guerande salt. The flavor is excellent! I baked these the same amount of time as other baguettes using Dmsnyder's  Anis Bouabsa's baguettes formula, but didn't get the darker crust -my crust has never been as dark as David's, but still excellent. I was concerned about over baking them, the internal temp was 200+ degrees. I want to thank Don and David for their great recipes. I just started baking recently and your posts have been very informative.

Jonathan

Today I made Hamelman's poolish baguettes.   Which retaught me a lesson I've already learned which is that making baguettes is hard.   A month or two ago, I tried the Bouabsa formula several times, without having any idea that it wasn't reasonable to start one's baguette making career with that, so I backed off to Hamelman which I think is quite delicious in its own right.   But it is still hard for the novice bread baker.  

From this side it doesn't look so bad -

From this side, not so much ...

All I can say is thank god for bagels which are tasty and rewarding -

Recently I have been experimenting with making sourdough multigrain breads.   My first attempt had 50% bread flour, 25% spelt, and 25% rye.   Suffice it to say, I hope our friendly neighborhood coyote didn't break a tooth on it.   Yesterday, I went down to 6% spelt, 6% rye.   This wasn't bad.   Today, I went down even further and made baguettes with 3% rye, 3% spelt.   This was downright tasty.   Here they are with a flag in honor of Patriot's Day.

and with the remnants of the 12%er. 

470 g Bread Flour, 17 g Rye, 15 g Spelt, 250 g white starter around 75% hydration,  312 g water, 1 T salt. 

Start feeding active white wild yeast starter afternoon before, with at least two feedings, maintaining 75% hydration.   Leave on counter overnight.   Mix all ingredients but salt and autolyse for 30 minutes.  Mix in salt.   During bulk ferment, stretch and fold every 45 minutes  twice.   Leave for 45 more minutes.  Cut in three pieces (could have done two, these were short) preshape and let rest for 15 minutes.   Shape.   Final ferment until done (I really don't know the right amount but I did 40 minutes.)   Bake at 475 for 23 minutes.

A few days ago, DonD blogged about some gorgeous baguettes he baked using a combination of unconventional mixing and fermentation techniques adapted from formulas developed by Pierre Gosselin and Anis Bouabsa, both very highly regarded Parisian boulangers. His description can be found here: Baguettes a l'Ancienne with Cold Retardation

Don used both the long autolyse under refrigeration of Gosselin and the cold retarded bulk fermentation of the complete dough employed by Bouabsa. He got such wonderful results, I had to try his hybrid technique.

I had been concerned that the double cold retardation would result in a dough that had so much proteolysis as to be unmanageable. However, Don described his dough as "silky smooth." Well, my dough was sticky slack. It was all extensibility and no elasticity. Fortunately, i have worked often enough with doughs like this to know they can make the most wonderful breads, so I shaped (best I could), proofed, slashed and baked. Voilà!

Since I was already afraid I'd over-fermented the dough, I erred on the side of under-proofing. The baguettes had almost explosive oven-spring. They about doubled in volume during the bake.

The crust was crunchy. The crumb was .... Oh, my!

The flavor was very good, but not as sweet as I recall the "pure" Gosselin Pain à l'Anciènne being.

These baguettes are worth baking again with some adjustments. I would endorse Don's decrease in the amount of yeast. I'll do so next time. And I will try a slightly lower hydration level. These were 73% hydration.

Thanks, Don, for sharing this very interesting twist in baguette techniques.

David

My first post in April of last year was about a side by side comparison of two of my favorite baguette formulations by Philippe Gosselin and Anis Bouabsa that David Snyder had previously published here on TFL. It was a tough choice to decide which one was better. The Gosselin baguette had an unequaled sweetness due to the overnight cold autolyse and the Bouabsa baguette had an incredibly complex taste due to the cold retardation. I was thinking why not have the best of both world so I started to experiment with combining the two formulations. After a couple of tries, I have succeeded in making a baguette that has the best attributes of both.

Yesterday, at the request of my wife, I made a batch of Baguettes a l'Ancienne with Cold Retardation for her monthly Book Club Party. The formulation follows David's transcription of Gosselin's Pain a l'Ancienne with a few slight variations. I have to clarify that this is not the formulation that Peter Reinhart and Daniel Leader had adapted from the original Gosselin technique but the true ice cold overnight autolyse method that David had published. After the overnight autolyse and the incorporation of the reserved water, yeast and salt the next morning, instead of bulk fermenting, shaping and baking the same day, I partially bulk ferment the dough at room temperature for 3 hours then retard it in the refrigerator for 18 hours before shaping and baking. I use a mix of 94% King Arthur Organic Select Artisan Flour (11.3% protein) and 6% Bob's Red Mill Organic Dark Rye Flour with 70% hydration. I also reduce the yeast amount by 2/3 because of the extended fermentation. Here are the results:

The crust has nice caramelization from the extra sugar produced by the long cold autolyse.

The crumb is open and soft with a slight chewiness. The taste is sweet and nutty with a complex aftertaste.

The crumb is medium thin with nice crunchiness and the crumb shows good translucent gelatinilization.

P.S. Following a number of requests, here is the entire formulation.

Formulation:

 Flour Mixture:

• - 470 gms Unbleached AP Flour
• - 30 gms Dark Rye Flour
• - 300 gms Ice Cold Water

 Dough

• - 10 gms Sea Salt
• - 1/2 tsp Instant Yeast
• - 50 gms Cold Water

 1- Mix flour blend and ice water w/ flat beater for 1 min. and refrigerate overnight.

 2- Add yeast and water and mix w/ flat beater for 3 mins or until all water has been incorporated. Add salt and beat for 3 mins or until dough slaps side of bowl.

 3- Let rest 15 mins and do S&F 4 times at 30 mins intervals (1 1/2 hrs total) and 2 more times at 45 mins  intervals (1 1/2 hrs total).

 4- Refrigerate for 24 hours.

 5- Divide dough in 3 and gently pre-shape in torpedo shape. Let rest 1 hr.

 6-Gently shape baguettes and proof on linen couche for 45 mins.

 7- One hour before baking, preheat oven to 490 degrees f w/ baking stone and cast iron skillet filled w/ lava rocks.

 8- Mist sides of oven then slash baguettes 4 times and transfer baguettes to baking stone in oven. Immediately pour 2/3 cup boiling water on lava rocks.

 9- Reduce oven temperature to 460 degrees f and bake 10 mins.Remove cast iron skillet, reduce temperature to 430 degrees F and bake for another 10 mins on convection mode.

 10- Remove baguettes from oven and let cool on wire rack.

Happy Baking!

Don

I wasn't planning to make baguettes in my seven day bread making challenge to myself, but this morning I realized that my refrigerator was being taken over by bread byproducts.   In addition to my whole wheat sour dough starter and rye sour, I had the leftover levain from the pain de compagne I made the other day, as well as the bread equivalent of a chain letter - a white flour starter for Amish Friendship Bread that a friend dropped off the other day.   I had no intention of making the friendship bread.   It has most likely never been cooked in an Amish kitchen, since it calls for a box of instant vanilla pudding in the batter.    But the starter looked fine and healthy and I've been feeding it for a couple of days.   So I decided to mix the levain and the "Amish" starter together, add some salt and make a couple of baguettes.   The thing that has been holding me back from making baguettes is I don't have a couche or a baguette pan, and I am hesitant to run out and buy them until I get a better sense of what type of bread I want to make on a regular basis.   So I just set these baguettes out on a board, and let them flatten out as they would while rising.    So these don't look like much, and I'm sure whole wheat baguettes would be considered an abomination by some, but they are actually quite flavorful, and I'm hoping that I will be able to figure out how to make these (or something like them) again.

Now I'd better take a break for a day or two to give my family a chance to catch up on all the bread!

I have been working on Sam Fromartz's mixed yeast and levain, long ferment method for baguettes. I know Hamelman prefers the poolish preferment method and I have to say I like the aroma that comes off the poolish better than almost anything. So, I decided early this morning to start the poolish and spent the day rereading the chapters on preferment of yeasted breads in Bread.

Along the way, I read over a sentence I had no doubt seen several times in the past, concerning steaming and baking on Page 100. Here in plain common words I discovered something I don't recall ever seeing before that I think is going to change my breads for the better. Hamelman is saying that for the home baker, after the steam period, the door can be propped open with a spoon for the remainder of the bake to help give a crisp crust in the drying phase of the bake. I have turned the oven off and left the bread in the oven at the end of baking to crisp the crust and make it slightly thicker and easier to cut after cool down. But never have I had the door propped open for 18 minutes. Right out of the oven the crust is hard and well colored. Now that it has cooled and been cut, I'm a little surprised that it's more open. The crumb is airy but not the dense crumb with many larger size holes. This is more like foam with a few larger holes. Honestly, I'm not sure why at this point. I'll have to think on it over night as it's already past my bed time. :>) I think I like the flavor better with these over the long refrigerated ferment. I still have another 700g of dough in the fridge I saved to bake Saturday so we'll see how that is after the overnight.
Eric

These were baked for 24 minutes at 470F. They are 350 grams pre bake.

The loaf on the left got 4 slashes and looks a little over proofed at 1-1/2 hours to me.

Not quite as open as I like but good for brochette.

Pat, who has is enduring earthquakes, tsunami warnings and, worst of all, no access to bread baking this week shared with us the thought that having some bread to critique might lift her spirits. What better bread than that made from her own baguette formula?

In anticipation of Pat's need, I baked a couple baguettes this afternoon. For the formula, see Baguette crumb - 65% hydration dough. I used some leftover levain with the G. Rubaud flour mix to seed the levain. The rest of the flour was KAF European Artisan-Style flour. This is a supposedly the same protein content as KAF AP flour, but it always seems to absorb a bit more water than AP. I didn't add any extra water, so the dough was quite dry - not even tacky after a couple stretch and folds in the bowl.

So, Pat, have at it.

The baguettes

Grigne

Crumb

The crust was deliciously crunchy and sweet from the caramelization of a bold bake. The crumb was chewy with a nice, baguette flavor, but the taste of the tiny fraction of whole wheat flour used in the levain was discernible. It seemed a bit "out of place." However, this didn't stop me from consuming half a baguette with dinner.

David

I finally invested in a new baking stone, one that fills an oven shelf with only a couple of inches to spare. Now I can make baguettes that approach 18" to 20" in place of the stubby ones I baked before. Consequently, along with sourdough, sticky buns, foccacia, and getting familiar with spelt, I've been baking my own baguette formula that has borrowed heavily from Anis Bouabsa's formula and especially his process, and, in the most recent batch, Peter Reinhart's pain a' l'ancienne procedures. I've made this formula three times, tweaking a little each time, not the ingredients, the procedures. I've nicknamed them "Overnight Baguettes.

Formula for 1000 g finished dough

              All purpose flour    575g    100%

              Water                   414g      72%

              Salt                        12g        2%

              Instant Yeast         1/4 tsp.   ???

I mix all the dry ingredients together in a wide bowl, and add the water. Using a plastic dough scraper I incorporate the water into the dry mix, cover and rest it for one-half hour.I turn the dough out onto a very lightly dusted board and French fold until dough passes the window pane test. Chill (details follow: I tweaked here.). Remove from chiller. Bring to room temperature (details follow: tweak #2). Preshape, rest, shape, and final proof. Preheat oven to 500°F. Pre-steam oven. Load slashed loaves reduce temperature to 450°F immediately. After ten minutes remove steam source (if you can do it safely), vent oven and finish baking.

I did all my mixing with ingredients at room temperature (low seventies-ish) for the first two batches. For the first batch, ala Bouabsa, I left the dough in the refrigerator 21 hours @ 38°F. For the second batch I placed it in our wine closet @ 55°F for seventeen hours. For both batches I did two stretch-and-folds after the first 50 and 100 minutes. These two S&F's leave the dough very elastic and smooth (I think it feels "silky").

In both cases, after I turned out the chilled dough (again, following Bouabsa) I immediately divided the dough into three equal amounts, preshaped, and let the dough rest for one hour.

The first batch's dough increased about one-and-a-half its original volume in the refrigerator. Despite dividing and resting the dough was still chilled when I final-shaped it, and final proofing took two hours and fifeteen minutes.

The second batch's volume tripled in the wine closet (I worried about losing any chance of oven-spring). The dough was particulary puffy after resting an hour (more oven-spring worry). Final proofing took 90 mins. My worries were dispelled in the first ten minutes in the oven. Both batches exhibited good oven-spring, but the flavor of batch #1 was distinctly more bland then batch #2. The crumb of both batches was open, light, and slighty chewy.

I was generally happy with both batches, but the second batch's flavor won out. Whatever flavoring chemistry goes on in retarded dough appeared to work harder at the wine closet's elevated temperature.

Despite the oven-spring experienced in batch #2, I was still worried I was setting myself up for future failures letting the dough triple in volume during its retarded proof at 55°F. I recently broke down and bought Peter Reinhart's  "The Bread Baker's Apprentice". His anecdote about capturing the hearts and minds of his more reluctant students when they are first introduced to pain a' l'acienne dough pushed me to skip to its formula. I was intrigued by his "shock retardation" using ice water to mix the dough.

I mixed the third batch's dough with ice water, and also placed it in the wine closet during its autolyse rest. I checked the dough a couple of times after performing the two S&F, and was a little worried by almost no apparent action. Encouraged by the few little bubbles I could see through the bottom of the plastic container I went to bed, but set the alarm to remove the dough after fifeteen hours chilling. The dough was just short of doubled when removed.  Following Reinhart's directions I let the dough sit, undivided at room temperature (high sixties-ish) for two hours. When I got out of bed the second time the dough was well doubled and the top of the dough was stretched in a couple of places by large gas bubbles. I liked what I saw, and felt.

I divided the dough, preshaped, and let it rest twenty minutes. Following, I shaped, and final-proofed for ninety minutes (I use a poke test to decide proofing status, but I keep track of time too.) Baking proceeded as described above.

The results:

We are delighted with the flavor, and crumb! This is going to be our "go to" baguettes: no more tweaking. 

David G

So I think I finally figured out how this thing works... well, well enough to put up some pictures and some text around them-- this is how my 66% hydration (3 1/3 cups of bread flour and 2 1/3 cups of water?) came out.

The fork is to show how runny the dough-batter is.  I kneaded for about an hour-- though i could have stopped after 45 minutes, and I think this is what I ended up with (I took the pictures a while ago so I'm not really sure)

Okay now I get it, that was when I started to get tired of kneading.  After an hour, it looked like this:

hmmm... yeah, i'm such a mess, all my pictures are a mess i'm not sure what's from what-- anyway, i'll get to the good part--

so i baked the bread and this came out:

A sad flat little spaceship of a baguette... pitiful, oh pitiful, feel so sorry for me, as aretha would say.  And then:

MY BEST CRUMB EVER!!!!! It's not the best thing I've seen on this site, but it's the best i've managed to do!

and of course

Proving, to me at least, that it's what's on the inside that counts :)