Bulk Fermentation
I am a sourdough newbie and would appreciate some input. After my initial loaves, I have been successful in my practice, nice rise and caramelization, pretty crumb with the traditional holes, and good flavor, for a novice. Today's attempt was sorely lacking. I know I went wrong with bulk fermentation. I normally bulk ferment over a 4-hour period but ran into a scheduling snafu. I did not have time to shape my loaves and get them in the fridge for proofing before I left my house. I had one more stretch and fold to do before shaping but simply ran out of time. I had to leave. So, I left the dough in its' happy place where it threw a major party. By the time I returned, 5-hours later, the dough had risen until it was an almost frothy consistency, major bubbles at the top of the bowl, and tripling in size. The dough was extremely wet and had more of a sour smell than usual. I could not handle the dough, as it was extremely wet and sticky, very shaggy.
In hindsight, I think I should have gone ahead and refrigerated the dough before I left, then brought it to room temperature, did a stretch and fold, allowed it to bench rest, then shaped, and put the dough in bannetons to proof, then baked. However, when I finally returned home, I could not do a normal stretch and fold because the dough was extremely wet and unmanageable. So, instead, I used a slap and pull kneading method I saw on a video online for handling wet dough, using it in an attempt to wrangle the dough. It took 30 minutes to get the dough to a consistency that could be shaped. The dough never rose in the proofing stage but I baked it, anyway. I kept the shaped loaves proofing in the fridge 48-hours but saw no changes. Normally, the loaves would have doubled in size. They rose but barely if I am being optimistic. The loaves are cooling now but I am guessing the loaves will not have the nice bubbles of my other loaves and will be very dense. Was there anything I could do to salvage my loaves or was it a lost cause?
I am not sure, but I think once the food supply in the dough has been exhausted, and the yeast start to die off, there is no amount of shaping that will help. I agree, the next time, put it in the fridge and slow things down while life intervenes.
...you've been blessed with...a learning experience! ?
Two points:
1. The refrigerator is your friend, and, for practical purposes, yeasts' enemy. Their happy place was not yours, in this case. You can shove a fermenting dough in the fridge at essentially any time along the process if unforeseen circumstances intevene. It will change things going forward but will usually rescue you from total disaster, requiring you to follow the baker's maxim of Watch the dough, not the clock especially attentively. Mind you, it depends on the amount of dough involved. Bread dough is a terrific insulator and in the time it would take >2 kg of dough to cool to yeast arrest temp in the fridge, they might have partied a bit too long for your satisfaction. But it's usually effective. Many bakers "retard in bulk", that is, shove their dough in the fridge overnight at the end of bulk fermentation. So you could have pretended to be following one of those procedures.
2. Some bread processes call for prefermenting half the flour in a formula. So you could have treated your ripe dough as big preferment and mixed into it an equal amount of flour, water and salt and gone ahead and made twice as much bread. Of course, limitations of brotform, dutch oven or baking stone real estate might have complicated that solution. But again, your friend the fridge could have sheltered half while you bake the other. This solution would have been a particularly useful learning experience because you'd have been flying blind, baking a seat-of-the-pants recipe where you'd have to judge the readiness of this 50% prefermented dough on the fly by look and feel. Maybe next time.
Your heroic slap-and-fold rescue attempt is commendable but likely fruitless in recovering a satisfying crumb structure. Please don't be shy about reporting here how your rescue attempt turned out, complete with the obligatory crumb shot, embarrassing as it may be. People don't post many rescue scrambles like that and everyone could benefit from others' misadventures ("Could o' been worse, could o' been me").
Hope that helps.
Tom
I uploaded a before and after picture. Thank you for your reply.
That did grow, didn't it? I think I would have panicked. Hats off to you for thinking of doing those SLAFs!
Keep on baking,
Carole
I feel your pain!
Baker Abe has told the tale of two saves: http://www.thefreshloaf.com/node/56475/slap-and-fold-and-save http://www.thefreshloaf.com/node/57296/another-save
Now, his issue in both instances was shaping that went awry, and not necessarily over-fermented dough. What he did advise me to do once, should I ever let the bulk run away from me, was to sprinkle a couple of grams of instant yeast over the soup before undertaking the rescue slaps and folds.
Looking forward to seeing your results, whatever they may be.
Keep on baking,
Carole
I just has a major snafu with a new flour. I did a combination of Kamut, Durum (25% each) and Bread flour. My house is on the chilly side. but usually with enough time, my bulk will be good after 4- 6 hours. It did nothing at all in that time so I popped it in the fridge overnight... I'm satisfied, though not ecstatic about the outcome.
Always pop in fridge when you gotta run.
New flours and scheduling issues really can be a problem with bread. But then again, it's life, so it's fine.
Good luck
hester
Outcome as expected. There's a serious amount of wholegrain in that loaf, it appears, making your rescue even more challenging given the obstacles wholegrains impose on crumb structure to begin with. "Edible but not choice" as the mushroom hunters would say. And thanks for the inset of your uber fermentation. My my. Kudos to you or anyone who tries to rescue such a bubbling blob. I know I'd have been a very unhappy camper had I been greeted with that upon returning to the kitchen. But like you, I could never bring myself to compost it yet doubt I would have fared much better in my rescue than you did. Bread pudding?
I'm curious about Abe's suggestion to dust commercial yeast on such a bloom before plunging into slap and fold yoga. They'd need carbs just as much as the overfed resident bugs that scarfed them up in your absence. This crisis is a shortage of fuel, not mouths. Maybe I'm missing something. Did his suggestion include adding flour or...honey?
Living and learning,
Tom
That was me and not the OP who mentioned Abe's solution. This was brought up following one of my runaway bulk ferments, in a PM which I can't put my hands on. I'm quite sure there was no mention of adding any kind of sugar, though. If I find it, I'll post it. In the meantime, perhaps all would do well to ignore my two cents ?
My "saves" in those posts were due to high hydration, not enough gluten formation which resulted in bad shaping. After a fight with the dough, and losing, I resorted to building up the gluten formation (even at this late stage) with slap and folds then shaping and going into final proofing.
As far as adding in yeast that would be for a sourdough that has "gone wrong" i.e. the starter/levain misbehaving and it doesn't seem to be doing anything. All is not lost. Make a small amount of yeast paste and work it into the dough and carry on as a yeasted loaf.
Thanks Abe. That makes more sense. Peut etre Carole needs to cut back on those happy hour Côtes du Rhône with David Lebovitz before posting...:-)
Tom
I found our PMs, that was Abe helping me through a couple of disastrous YW bakes.
My apologies, Abe, for 'crediting' you with erroneous info!
Sorry if I got anyone's hopes up.
Carole
My starter I call “Al P.” is
4 ounce starter
4 ounces filtered water
4 ounces all-purpose flour
This starter was an experiment changed over from a whole wheat starter.
My leaven is
75g starrter
150g filtered water
75g King Arthur Bread Flour
75g Gold Medal Whole Wheat Flour
The dough is
150g leaven
750g water
500g Gold Medal whole wheat flour
500g King Arthur Bread Flour
20g pink Himalayan salt
This is enough dough to make two nice-size loaves in two 7.5” Brotforms/pannetons and fits my Staub 4-qt Dutch oven nicely.
Thank you, everyone, for your kind replies and encouragement. Your ideas to use my fridge to retard growth before I left the house or treat it/feed it like a starter when I returned home affirmed my initial gut reactions that I squelched. I opted for the easiest thing to do at the time, which was to do nothing. Still, it was a learning experience so all is not lost. I still have toast worthy bread that will make great toast points and croutons.
It feels as if "do nothing" might be reasonable, to avoid upsetting anything. But rising dough is a process in vigorous action, and deciding to be "hands-off" is simply your vote that the action should continue.
It's a bit like supervising a large group of 17-year-olds; if you let things get too out of hand, then you run out of options. And while it's true that 17-year-olds can't be refrigerated, it is possible - if you catch things early enough - to convince them to "chill". Pretty similar, actually. ☺️