August 21, 2020 - 7:11am
Why so delicate with Super Sprout?
In Peter Reinhart's "Bread Revolution" he has recipes for baking with Lindley Mill's Super Sprout Bread. His procedure seems focused on doing the minimum with the dough.
For example:
- Stir together flour, salt, and yeast. Add water and mix with a spoon. 1 minute. Let rest uncovered for 5 minutes. Knead with dough hook for 1 minute. Dump onto oiled counter. S&F 4 times at 5-20 minute intervals. Cover with mixing bowl between S&F.
- Oil bowl, mist top with PAM, cover with plastic. Ferment until double in size 1.5 to 2 hours. Or refrigerate overnight and shape while cold.
- Mist top with PAM and cover with plastic wrap. Rise at room temp until dough increases in size by 1.5 times. When poked the dough should spring back in a few seconds; if it holds the dimple, it's risen too long.
- 350 convection for 45 minutes. Turn halfway. Internal temp of 190F. Cool in pans for 10 minutes, then cooling rack for 30 minutes.
I find it very hard to get any extensibility out of the dough following this low touch procedure. Shaping is a mess because the dough is so sticky. And the bit about cooling in pans for 10 minutes sounds like he worries that it will fall.
On the other hand, I've read people who treat it like any other flour only using more water.
But Reinhart is a smart guy who knows a ton more than me.
Why is he advocating this technique.
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In at least one video, and in a book somewhere, he uses a wet countertop and wet hands (as opposed to flour) to shape.
Here's a recent blog post by P.R. with his email addy if you want to ask him:
https://www.fornobravo.com/pizzaquest/letter-texas-baker/
Talking about it. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UrL6U8vtt_M
After watching the video I tried a loaf with 2% added vital wheat gluten. Everything was better. The dough became easy to handle after the 3rd stretch and fold. Shaping was easy. Good oven spring. Perfect height. Good strength.