Hi all! I've been baking sourdough for about 5 months now. I absolutely love the flavor, but I just can't seem to get height from my boules no matter what I do. My tallest boule has only ever been about 3 inches, most are closer to 2inches. I would be so grateful for any advice... I'm getting so desperate I'm thinking about mixing commercial yeast or baking soda in my next batch. Here's what I'm doing:
40 g ripe starter (passes the float test)
80 g WW flour, fresh-milled
60 g Rye, fresh-milled
260 g KA Bread Flour
300 g luke warm water (around 90 degrees)
21 g honey
10 g salt
Autolyzed for 2.5 hours. Hand knead in salt & honey.
Transfered dough to clear straight bowl to monitor the ferment at room temp. The dough was just over 2 inches high.
Series of 4 stretch & folds, spaced every 30 mins. Dough remained between 76-77 F entire rise. After 5 hours warm counter time, the dough had risen to 3.25 inches and I retarded it to fridge overnight and into the morning. Total bulk fermentation time was 24hours. At the end of bulk, the dough has almost completely-doubled.
Shaped it, rested it a few mins, shaped again, and then straight into the fridge for a 24 hr cold proof.
Removed from fridge and let it warm up for 15 mins while oven pre-heated, during which time I scored.
Baked 30 mins at 500 degrees in dutch oven with lid on, then removed lid and baked at 450 for an additional 15 mins.
Help? Thoughts? Is it just because I'm pushing fermentation times so long? (But that's why I love the flavor so much...). Also the rye & WW flour (prairie gold) are home-milled right before baking.
A simple prescription: double the innoculation and put it into the fridge 30 minutes earlier. It's what I would try.
At 100% hydration, 40g of starter has 20g of flour in it. 20+80+60+260 = 420. 20/420 is less than 5% innoculation. It seems low, and maybe a bit hard to predict the outcome. Doubling or tripling the innoculation might give you more control.
Assuming you do this and also stick with the 5 hours at 76-77 degrees part, here are some other thoughts:
The 24 hour cold proof could be pushing you past the endurance of the organisms. If it were me, I'd eliminate that step.
If you do double the innoculation, you will probably want to bring the fridge time back to around 8 hours. Or put into the fridge to complete fermentation 30 minutes sooner.
If you triple it, then I'd expect to have to put it in the fridge an hour earlier.
From my experience, fermenting in warm temperatures means you have to be more attentive to the gluten, and the fermentation can go over the edge quicker than you expect. At 77F, it might be done at 5 hours, and you should be putting it into the oven instead of the refrigerator. Cool fermenation gives you freedom from kneading and even the stretch-folds, and gives you better time margins to work with.
That's just my opinion. There are as many techniques and systems and opinions as there are posters on this site.
Thank you for that advice. And yes, I should have specified, but you were correct in assuming that my starter was as 100% hydration. I was planning to add a gram of insurance yeast this go-round, but I think I'll try raising the % of ripe starter instead, as you suggest. I am also going to move the bulk to the fridge much sooner (thinking no more than 2 hrs of counter time... just enough for me to get in several nice rounds of stretch & folds), and no more than 12 hrs of fridge for bulk or proofing. I'll post back with updates.
You can get great results, and more satisfaction without the insurance yeast. :)
Your pictures remind me of my earliest attempts. The bread tasted nice, but it was not pretty and had no shelf life.
You didn't mention the 24 hour cold proof... you might try skipping that in favor of an hour or so at room temperature while the oven warms up.
Thank you for the advice! I love the flavors my long fermentation & proofing time give, but I’m obviously just pushing it too far. With your personal bakes, do you notice a difference in flavor between a long/cold ferment vs a traditional warm, 1-2 hrs?
Well, this is the first thing you can try anyway. I'm interested to see if the next attempt is closer to what you're after.
I switched from warm to cold ferments on a previous starter, very early in my learning process, and never compared a good loaf from one process to a good one from the other. I get way different flavors from the starter I'm using now, and have only done cool ferments with it (58-60F for 16 hours). The taste is actually amazing to me. I could eat a whole loaf of it. I almost did tonight, but we also had other things made for dinner my wife would have been upset if I didn't leave room for.
FYI, after shaping I proof for 1 hour at room temperature. Stretch and folds do nothing for it, so I tend to skip them. Also I've seen zero difference with autolysing, so I don't.
Another factor in the flavor of mine is that the flour is 25% whole rye, 25% home milled hard red, and 50% King Arthur bread flour. I believe the proportion of whole grains is the reason my crumb is denser than most here strive for, but it's also quite soft. Also I don't know the hydration level of my starter, because I mix it based on the consistency. I use half all purpose flour and half whole rye to feed it.
I'd also say I'm always trying to improve and think mine could get better. I've been having problems with it lately that I also attribute to over-fermentation, but think I'm close to having them worked out.