Sprouted Kamut Sourdough - 75 % Whole Grain

It had been almost 3 years since we did any serious Kamut bread baking.  It was June, 2012 when we did a 100% Whole Kamut at slightly more than 100% hydration.  Perhaps it was a little hopeful but the bread spread set in and it stuck to the basket too making for a really bad looking Fisbee.  Oddly the crumb was very open for a 100% whole grain bread.

This time Lucy thought she would tame it down some to better match herb perception of my current baking talents while getting a load of sprouted Kamut in the mix since it seems that every bread we have baked of late has sprouted grains in it.

This time she shot for 75% whole Kamut, all freshly milled at home and half being sprouted the day before.  The rest of the flour was half LaFama AP and half KA bread flour wit the 2 % salt and totaling 80% hydration.

Sice the sprouted Kamut was naturally tempered, we got a 28% hard but extraction abd since we didn’t temper the whole un-sprouted Kamut we only got an 18% hard bit extraction.  The starter we used was an unusual one in that 5 g of our ryes sour was mixed with 25 g the 2 week old held back starter from the Friday bake 2 weeks ago.  So it was a mix of white and rye .

We added up the sifted out, hard bit extractions for the Kamut sprouted and un-sprouted millings and divided it by 7 which gave us the amount for the first of 3 progressively larger levain feedings.  The un-sprouted hard bits were used first to get the we the longest followed by the larger amounts of the sprouted hard bits.

The levain feeding stages were 2, 3 and 4 hours with the levain doubling after the 3rd feeding.  One the levain had doubled we retarded it Iin the fridge for 24 hours which has now become a standard procedure.

Once the levain came out of the fridge the next day we held back 25 g of it for net weeks bake let the remainder warm upon the counter while we and autolysed the dough flour with the dough water - holding back 20 g of it from the autolyse.  We sprinkled the salt on top and added the remaining water to the bowl after the autolyse was mixed.

This was essentially a double hydration method that gets the salt into the mix easier.  The levain was mixed in and we began the first of 3 slap and fold sessions to develop the gluten.  After 8, 1 and 1 minute of slapping the dough around, we did 3 more sets of 4 slaps each – all on 15 minute intervals.  No stretch and folds this time.

After the gluten development was done we immediately pre-shaped and then shaped the dough into an Altumura shape and placed it into a rice floured basket for a 12 hour retard.  Normally this shape would be for dough of about 65% hydration but, and this is the important part, we don’t care in the leastJ

Sadly, the retard ended up being 15 hours and this dough had to be the most over proofed loaf we have done in some time, Kamut like all durum varieties is very fast and this was likely ready for the oven at the 8 hour mark – Next time!

This is our favorite sprouted bread so far this year.  Even when frozen for 6 weeks it makes a great lunch sandwich - Old School Dark Sprouted Pumpernickel Sourdough – 2 ways

 When the dough came out of the fridge the next morning, we un-molded it and slid it into  a 500 F preheated oven un-slashed and steamed it for 15 minutes at 450 F with Mega Steam - in this case…. 2 lava rock pans.  Once the steam came out we turned the oven down to 425 F – convection to finish the baking.  The bread sprang and bloomed a bit more than a smidgen but browned nicely to that beautiful Durum color you can only get by using a lot of it in the bread mix.

We will have to see how the crumb came out later but don’t expect it to be as open as the 100% hydration 100% whole Kamut variety found here – but you never know…… 100% Hydration, 100% Whole Grain Kamut Flat Boule with YW and SD Combo Starter

The crumb came out fairly open, soft and moist.  it has that Durum yellow color and taste too with more than a hint of tang.  A nice bread for sandwiches for sure.  The crust also stayed nice a crisp and crunchy too - another treat.

With fresh sweet corn in season, it has to go an the salad!