The Fresh Loaf

A Community of Amateur Bakers and Artisan Bread Enthusiasts.

Having trouble with baguettes

jennaleighlegge's picture
jennaleighlegge

Having trouble with baguettes

Hi everybody! I just made an account after lurking around here for a while. You guys seem to be really helpful and I could really use some help. 

I work at a restaurant as the night time bread baker, and I was hired to bake bread and change the recipes (a lot of them are no good). I've done my job so far, but the one thing that's giving me trouble are the baguettes. 

My bosses recipe wasnt very good - but I at least managed to get the baguettes to look somewhat nice and really got my scoring down. They simply just did not taste good, and the crumb was awful. It was dense and chewy and the crust not crispy. 

ive been using this recipe now: https://www.weekendbakery.com/posts/recipe-for-80-hydration-baguette/comment-page-4/#comment-647983

and the crumb is BEAUTIFUL. It's airy, holey and has tons of flavor. But they look terrible. for some reason, no matter how long or short I proof them at the final proof, they bulk up in the oven and get almost fat and not uniform. And, scoring is a nightmare because the dough is so wet. 

if I want to get any type of scoring I have to score VERY deep and repeat the slashing a few times to actually get a deep score, and even then, the scoring looks awful and the crust is still dull.

I set my oven to 550 and place a sheet pan on the bottom rack to preheat, and once in the oven I add either hot water or ice cubes. I still don't get the oven spring I want. I'm also using a very nice convection oven, fairly new.

when shaping the baguettes the dough has a lot of air bubbles and you have to be very gentle as to not pop many. Im just at a loss here. I want them to look nice and I made some last night and they looked TERRIBLE. 

does anyone have any idea why they are turning out bulky, fat and under scored? 

or does anyone have a bakery friendly baguette recipe they would like to share?

(the picture is of the best batch I have gotten so far, and i am not happy with how they look)

alfanso's picture
alfanso

Hi Jenna,

The 80% hydration baguettes from the Weekend Bakery are a challenge for many home bakers.  I don't believe that they are a good choice for a commercial enterprise.  I doubt if they were ever designed by the authors for a large scale production environment.  Too difficult and too much work, with too high a chance for failure.

Take a gander at this post that just by coincidence I posted this week for another person having trouble with baguettes. http://www.thefreshloaf.com/comment/352488#comment-352488 .  There are three baguette formulae: one with commercial yeast and two with levain.  But they are all "easy" and yield great results.  Although I've only done these at home, I can easily imagine scaling these up to a larger run for commercial use.

There's a lot more, and once you become a "baguette person", most of them are not particularly hard to execute.  They generally fall into the old "wash, rinse, repeat" category of executability.  The hard part may be getting to be that "baguette person".  If you like the idea of these and have any thoughts on what types of baguettes (if that is your go-to thing to bake) I have other suggestions as well.  Here is one using durum flour for example  http://www.thefreshloaf.com/node/45239/pugliese-capriccioso-oh-yeah .  Plenty more too, just based on the composition of the dough which you desire, and if the type of restaurant that you bake for has a vision of what is an acceptable bread to place on a table for that cuisine.  The singular caveat is that I'd suggest avoiding a very high hydration dough, like the ones you posted. At least for right now.

For an assorted basket of breads, all of these can be done as batards as well.  I'm now long retired, but I gotta tell ya, I really wish that I was in a situation like yours.  One where I could have relatively free reign over the selection and creation of baked goods for a restaurant.  It would be heaven on earth for me.  All except for that going back to work thang ;-)

Good luck, and now that you've graduated to the member/poster stage, do post results of what you create.

alan 

MichaelLily's picture
MichaelLily

I make 80% hydration bread ALL the time (lots of it, every day), and you never get actual uniformity in shape.  My baguettes are about 64% water and they are usually very straightforward to shape.  I don't think baguettes are meant to be made out of such a wet dough.

jennaleighlegge's picture
jennaleighlegge

for your very helpful response. I will give your post a read tonight - and I agree, I certainly picked a difficult recipe. While the crumb is great, they're just a pain to deal with (especially since I'm making 15-20 baguettes at a time)!

I really want to become a baguette person, but as you can tell I've been discouraged as of late. I am also very lucky to have free reign on developing new breads and new recipes. One of the main reasons for this is my boss's recipes aren't the best - and since he's allowing me to, I am trying to improve the bread we serve at the restaurant.

Basically what I am searching for in a baguette is: a light, airy & open crumb. A crisp crust, and I would prefer to be able to retard the dough overnight because it is easiest for my hours there, and I also love the micro bubbles and texture you get from an long overnight fermentation.

The scoring has always been an issue - I believe I am scoring the correct way, but I think it's the oven that's preventing oven spring. It's a heavy duty, double decker convection oven. My boss just ordered two large baking stones for me, in hopes it will help the baguettes crust as well as improve oven spring. The oven has a super hard time holding in any type of steam. ;( 

thank you again for your very detailed response. I promise once I get a baguette to my standard, I will post a few photos!

as of now I am using this recipe: https://akitchenblog.wordpress.com/2013/02/09/from-flour-to-baguette/

It has worked better than the 80% hydration recipe. im getting a crisper crust as well as the micro bubbles. The only problem, yet again, is the oven spring for my scoring. 

 

jennaleighlegge's picture
jennaleighlegge

for your very helpful response. I will give your post a read tonight - and I agree, I certainly picked a difficult recipe. While the crumb is great, they're just a pain to deal with (especially since I'm making 15-20 baguettes at a time)!

I really want to become a baguette person, but as you can tell I've been discouraged as of late. I am also very lucky to have free reign on developing new breads and new recipes. One of the main reasons for this is my boss's recipes aren't the best - and since he's allowing me to, I am trying to improve the bread we serve at the restaurant.

Basically what I am searching for in a baguette is: a light, airy & open crumb. A crisp crust, and I would prefer to be able to retard the dough overnight because it is easiest for my hours there, and I also love the micro bubbles and texture you get from an long overnight fermentation.

The scoring has always been an issue - I believe I am scoring the correct way, but I think it's the oven that's preventing oven spring. It's a heavy duty, double decker convection oven. My boss just ordered two large baking stones for me, in hopes it will help the baguettes crust as well as improve oven spring. The oven has a super hard time holding in any type of steam. ;( 

thank you again for your very detailed response. I promise once I get a baguette to my standard, I will post a few photos!

as of now I am using this recipe: https://akitchenblog.wordpress.com/2013/02/09/from-flour-to-baguette/

It has worked better than the 80% hydration recipe. im getting a crisper crust as well as the micro bubbles. The only problem, yet again, is the oven spring for my scoring. 

 

alfanso's picture
alfanso

Jenna,

I see that you have latched onto the Bouabsa baguette as a prototype.  And it is a great and easy one.  But there is something that I'd like for you to consider.  On island TFL getting high hydration and/or very open crumb is kind of like  a badge of honor or the Palme d'Or, it is really not much more than bragging rights for a bunch of us, mostly home bakers, to achieve.

My limited understanding is that in Europe, for example, they don't like their levain (sourdough) breads sour, and they don't particularly care for breads that have holes large enough for a mouse to nestle in.  I'm not saying that you are in Europe or that your clientele is European.  I don't know.  I'm just making this statement because...

Diners in restaurants may not be all that interested in seeing their table bread come with a 50% reduction in the crumb once cut into.  It may be something that we here like to achieve because of the above stated goals.  But I'll venture a guess that diners just want good bread to go with their butter, jam, soup or salad.  They probably aren't too interested in seeing big empty spaces in the crumb.  Their focus is different than a baker's focus and interest.  And commercial bakers bake for their clientele.

Now, I'm not saying that you don't already know your clientele and know that this is what they crave.  Perhaps you do and you are trying to give them what you know they want.  But if you are looking for the sweet spot, that place where really tasty, crispy crackly crust meets tender honeycombed crumb, I am not sold that delivering to them a very open crumb will be as suitable.  If you can swing it, then maybe add some open crumb ciabatta to the table.  At least diners know what to expect when they see that in the bread basket.

As far as oven spring, you will pretty much have to have sufficient steam introduced into the oven that doesn't immediately vent away.  There are plenty of examples here.  Just search for Sylvia's steaming towels and lava rocks.  

Scoring baguettes just comes with time, diligence and good learned technique.  And after the 10,000th it starts to get easier ;-)

alan 

jpjhooper's picture
jpjhooper

10,000th? New to bread making I was going to make baguettes my bread of choice to conquer. I see a whole lot of try and try again in my future.

tgrayson's picture
tgrayson

You did note that he's using scissors to cut the loaves, rather than a blade, right?

Still, I agree with the others that attempting an 80% baguette is a self-inflicted wound.You really don't need such a wet dough or such a complex procedure to get an airy crumb.

jennaleighlegge's picture
jennaleighlegge

for your response. That's exactly what I needed to hear - I just really want the open crumb and a crisp crust!

tgrayson's picture
tgrayson

One thing you might consider is to treat the dough more as ciabatta, rather than a baguette. In one of my books, the author calls for cutting the dough into strips approximating short baguettes, but he does no other shaping. After proofing, he gives the dough a few twists before baking. Slashing is superfluous with such a wet dough, so no cuts. The twisted dough bakes up into a beautiful loaf, with the flour pattern highlighting the unusual twists in the loaf.