March 2, 2022 - 11:39am
Sourdough in a cold climate the saga continues
I have been working on my starter with much useful help here not least from Mark Stone. I continue with the Tartine recipe and have watched many of Tom Cucuzza’s videos. I’m doing 1:1:1 feeding sand get doubling in 6-8 hours usually. It’s not consistent yet, my kitchen is at 19C usually. I now find the bread is overproofing, the example here was bulk fermented for 6 hours pre shaped then into fridge for 12 hours. I used an aliquot jar and it rose by 30% in the 6 hours. I am at a loss as to what to do- bulk ferment less? De gas more? Any advice gratefully received
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It's not over-proofing. Don't be fooled by some large holes.
Start by looking at the small crumb: dense, gummy in places. So it needs more time, not less.
Given how cool your kitchen is, maybe you could convert the fridge time to time sitting on the counter doing bulk or proof. A 6 Degrees Celcius difference halves/doubles yeast action if I remember correctly.
fermented. I do see a lot of huge gas pockets. During the bulk rise, a lot of tiny gas cells grow as the yeast and bacteria put out gasses. These cells will expand and travel upward in the dough. If the dough has a high enough hydration or water content, these gas cells will elongate and rise in the dough. Nearby yeasts and bacteria will contribute to these cells throughout fermentation.
Now think about the dough fermenting and rising. Early on in the bulk rise, the dough is shaped and retarded in the fridge (which I find rather funny if the rest of the house is cooler than the kitchen.) If the dough is not folded a few times during the fermenting (to pop large bubbles and colapse elongated cells) the loaf might bake out like the one pictured. The number of folds or preshaping will depend upon how wet or soft the dough feels. A very wet dough will be folded/preshaped maybe three or four times during the bulk rise. A firmer dough perhaps only once or twice. It's something you catch onto over time or by following a recipe that askes for them. By the looks of the bread, a few folds and several preshapes spaced apart during fermentation might help out a lot.
The idea behind the folding and preshaping is to return some body back into the dough and pop any very large gas bubbles forming, breaking them into smaller ones. It also redistributes food to the yeasts and tightens sluggish gluten bands. After folding and preshaping, you start to get a dough that stands a bit higher, has a more even texture and has that baby behind look about it. :)
Sometimes it helps to think about a sourdough rise as one long time line from mixing to baking, a rise with a few interruptions to fold and preshape until it is ready to bake. The bulk and proofing lines with sourdough tend to blur and not as clear cut as with a yeasted dough. It might make it easier to understand how the dough cells are forming, how to control their size and when to set them, baking them to get the sizes you desire.
So the little aliquot jar said 30% rise. Good time for the first folding and for retarding the dough if you plan a retard. Several hours after the dough has cooled down in the fridge (or a cool bedroom or porch) fold and preshape again tucking the corners under to make a nice shape. You can still do it in a large mixer bowl and cover to prevent drying out. This night be a good time to put into a banneton or not depending on the dough feel. You can feel large bubbles forming in the dough. Pop any large ones before baking because they will get bigger in the heat.
Mini
Thank you both. Mini oven, I did 5 stretch and folds at 30-40 minute intervals. But no shaping in the morning after the cold retard and before baking, is that what you would advise? The dough was very loose at that point and just ran to the perimeter of the cloche ( which is another sign that made me think it was overproved) . Confusingly, the taste was very mild and frankly had little to distinguish it from conventionally baked bread. So many contradictory signs!
Next bake, I would let the aliquot get to 70-80% before shaping and doing the overnight retard, or better yet, I would skip the overnight retard if your schedule allows and bake this bread from start to finish. As Mini mentioned, it’s a continuous timeline from mix to bake. Learn how the dough should feel at each stage of development as a continuous process and then add the breaks and retards to further develop flavors. To me, it looks underproofed.
Just my thoughts, but I would keep the same recipe. Just keep bulk going until you hit 70-80% on the aliquot, shape and let the dough final proof at room temperature, and then bake it.
Good luck! You’ll get there!
I think you got some very good suggestions here from some of the experienced bakers here.
It sounds like I was in your shoes not too long ago when I created my SD starter in Oct last year. My SD starter appeared very strong in a jar but it performed insistently in a dough. Long story short, I just tossed it into the trash last week. I would suggest that you set your SD starter aside for now and start with using instant yeast until you get the hang of the whole process of dough development, fermentation, shaping, proofing, baking, etc. Once you know the drills then get back into using a SD starter. In the meantime, find ways to nurture and culture your SD starter to make it strong. If your SD starter is not up to task, then I don't think whatever you do you will never have a good bake with it. I think most of us newbies jump into the sourdough baking bandwagon too quicker without proper knowledge and experience to go with it.....Good luck!
Hi again,
Sounds like you're pretty upbeat about it, which is great. I started to get angry and frustrated, which took away much of the enjoyment.
A few questions that may help narrow it down:
Keep at it, I am convinced that you will get that big puffy loaf. You just have to figure out the combination.
Happy Friday!
I watched those videos too as I was underproofing due to the low temperature. In one of the videos (here) he says that in cold climates you need to wait for a bigger rise to reach the right level of fermentation. A 30% rise might indicate bulk fermentation is done if the temperature is around 27c but if the temperature is significantly lower you should wait for upwards of 75% rise.
After watching this video, and still feeling a bit sceptical about the idea of waiting for my dough to increase by 75% in this climate, I made some focaccia dough one evening and left it to ferment overnight at room temperature (probably about 20-21c though I don't have a thermometer). I thought it might rise by about 50% but it more than doubled, and was still domed on top. After shaping and proofing another couple of hours it came out really nice.
Thank you for you comments and apologies for late reply. I have been away for a few days.
Ming, I have been baking homemade bread for about 40 years, and sourdough for the last 10. I don’t like to be defeated! Mark, thanks for your patience and ongoing support. When my starter is fighting fit I am going to call it Mark in your honour. Fornaina, I have watched the video you linked re longer BF at 21C. Very interesting. At my last bake, the aliquot went into the fridge overnight with the dough. I pulled it out the next day and sort of forgot about it on my worktop, then around 5 pm was surprised to see it had continued to rise and got to about 100%. The bake happened at about 9am so possibly it could have benefitted from continuing BF at room temperature. I left my starter in the fridge for 4 days while I was away, I’m rebuilding it and when it’s ready I’ll try a long BF at room temperature. Photos to follow!
Hi missmoneypenny, all,
Just to give you some encouragement -
My last bread has seen mostly 15.5C and it still worked out well. But there's a few things I had to learn for that:
1. Favouring yeast over acidity.
The lactic acid bacteria continue to work at lower temps than the yeast. Eventually they break down your gluten. At this point your dough is in a quantum state of being both "over-proofed" (because it's breaking down) and "under-proofed" (because it hasn't risen). My favourite method of keeping everything in check is a stiff starter / levain (maybe as far down as 50% hydration instead of 100%). This has stabilized my starter to the point that it never starts to smell bad or decay even in the fridge. You have to re-calculate the hydration of your main dough of course. Also, the look and feel of a stiff starter (feeding is kneading) is different. But whereas all my previous starters eventually soured up, this one is alive and kicking still, mainly due to this intervention.
2. Gluten and free standing bread.
The Netherlands is not just cold for the dough, but also for the grains in the field. So you mainly get soft ("white") wheat with low gluten. We also tend to favor whole wheat. At some point I must stop expecting it to drink and still stand up straight, as they do in France ;-) So, either I buy fancy foreign flour, or I really should want to bake a tin bread. (Or I'm stubborn and bake something flat.)
3. FWIW, using the heat source.
I've told you that my latest bread rose at 15.5C. Well, that's what the house cools down to when the thermostat is at 15.5C (overnight / away) and windows are open (I call it a disgrace, but that's about the influence I have around here). Still, I place the dough on a bread plank on the central heating. And as that thing probably still turns on to maintain the mininum temperature for the thermostat, it may well be heated above 15.5C at intervals.
For this latest bread of mine, the levain only really started to rise when we kicked in the heating in the morning. Then I made the main dough, and someone insisted on 15.5C / windows open again as we left for the afternoon. The bread was mainly French T65 flour for an experiment. It still ended up similarly as my soft flour, ww-heavy free-standing loafs.
So again, as long as you have two out of temperature, good flour and a healthy starter, you should be able to get something not quite instagram-friendly, but certainly edible.
Below quoted statement pretty much describes many of the sourdough related problems we have seen posting here. With that said though, many more experienced bakers know better to keep their doughs at a certain temps and not rely on kitchen temps.
"At this point your dough is in a quantum state of being both "over-proofed" (because it's breaking down) and "under-proofed" (because it hasn't risen)."
4: Time
In these low temperatures, I grow my levain overnight, and as stated, sometimes it may not come to blossom until the heat is turned on in the morning. I tend to be forgiving in terms of expecting it to double, also because it is often a stiff (low hydration) levain; any healthy looking increase I'll take.
My main dough, then, grows during the day and is "ready" by the afternoon. Again meaning the dough feels fluffy, and the sample I take from it (methode a la The Bread Code) looks spongy and, say, at least 1/4 larger. But often enough it is the state of the main dough that tells me "bake it while you still have gluten left" - because a 10-12 hour rise is simply a strain on the dough.
For the same reason, an overnight retard is normally out of the question for a free-standing loaf. I sometimes chill it for an hour or so, hoping that it helps with keeping shape and scoring.
Noticing how the long rise weakens the dough, I often expect the final bread to be quite sour. But it may be surprisingly "yeast like" instead. I sometimes build a regular 100% hydration levain for this reason, but that alone may be enough for the main dough to acidify before being ready. So I try in-betweens for the levain, like 66%, 70%, ... There's probably a sweet spot somewhere I can take to regular use, but I'm not quite sure yet.
Thank you for your insights pflip this is most interesting. Glad you too understand the challenges of sourdough at a low temp. I did feel when I cooked my last batch that is was overproved due to the very loose texture when it went into the cloche, the pale colour and lack of ears. However some other posters here feel it was underproved, I am very tempted to mix up 500g of dough, take 1/2 to a long BF and prove while it rises to 50-75%, and bake the other 1/2 more quickly ie after maybe 6 hours. I will also try maintaining a dryer starter to se if that helps- I take your point re bacteria vs yeasts and trying to inhibit the bacteria somewhat. I will post my results!
I’m considering starting a movement to promote the idea of two-dimensional sourdough proofing, just so that if someone says over or under proofed, we can put on our monocles and go “do you refer to the bacterial or the yeast axis of proof?” :D
Here is an update. I have continued practising the Tartine Loaf and made some modifications which have resulted in a distinct improvement for me. My issues were poor rise and a dense gummy crumb. I made one loaf where the gluten development was so poor the loaf tore in two as I put it in the cloche. Firstly, I made sure to improve my starter, it now doubles in 4-5 hours. I also ensured the temperature is no lower than 21C when preparing the loaf, by putting the dough in the oven which I pre heated to 21-24C during BF. I also did some kneading: 3 minutes each time at autolyse/ fermentolyse and when adding salt. I did 6 folds and rose to 60% as per aliquot jar. No pre shaping before 30 minute bench rest but a fairly tight shaping before overnight retard. I hope these steps might be of help to some, especially those who might be struggling with poor performance in low temperatures . Thanks to all who helped me on this journey, my confidence has increased tremendously.
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Wow, that's a beautiful crumb! You must be very happy. I can almost smell if from here. Thanks for sharing your experience and tips. There is some great info in this thread.
How did you go about strengthening your starter?
Yes I’m very happy. My husband had gone off sourdough because of the dense texture of my previous efforts but he loves this style of loaf. For me, the taste is a little mild and I’d like it more acidic but I can work on it when I have really mastered this recipe. To strengthen the starter I followed Tom Cucuzza’s advice to do peak to peak feeding ( twice a day which my previous self would have thought excessive and wasteful) . It only took a few days to turn things around.
Great news. Glad to you guys are enjoying it. I noticed the same when my starter became stronger, the acidity dropped off significantly. I just finished shaping two basic country loaves for the first time since cold storing my starter. It only took two feedings for it to get back to speed, but I did notice it smells much more acidic than previously, and the taste of the leaven was very acidic. We'll see how it turns out tomorrow.
Hope today’s bake turns out well Mark.
I am missing the acidity of my under fermented, underproved loaves somewhat! I’m thinking of swapping the wholewheat flour in the Tartine loaf for rye, but I’m going to practice the standard recipe a bit more first.
Well, these loaves turned out to be the best tasting loaves I ever baked. There was a more pronounced acidity but also a remarkable depth of flavour. I brought both loaves to my brother’s place and one was supposed to go to my parents but we ended up having both loaves!
What I believe happened is that in the week or so that I put the starter in the fridge, it continued to build the LAB and AEB. When I first took it out of the fridge it smelled quite acidic but also metallic. I did a 1:2:2 then a 1:1:1 and then baked with it. So I guess it was just the right balance of yeast and acids. I hope I am able to replicate this on command. I guess this is where we can use different ratios to fine tune the balance.
That’s great! It certainly seems that cold affects the balance of micro organisms which in turn affects the flavour. At some point I’ll be going on holiday and the starter will have to go in the fridge so that will be an interesting experiment. I’m currently bulk fermenting, so far so good, I got good windowpane by giving some kneading 3 minutes) at fermentolyse and when adding the salt. Will post pics tomorrow.
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Looks delicious if you ask me! The well-distributed crumb combined with less oven spring, to me, would indicate that it went too long during bulk fermentation. It appears to have started collapsing in the lower part, but it's hard to tell from a picture. I've always read that we should be shaping ideally at 30% rise, and no further than 50%. I don't have enough experience to fully understand bulk times, but I have definitely had best results when shaping at ~30%, and straight into the fridge. The fridge retard takes a few hours to slow down fermentation so I presume that by the time it reaches low enough temp to halt yeast activity, the loaf will be perfectly fermented.
Either way, this is how we learn!
I agree with Mark, don’t push fermentation of that dough further, reduce it. It shows some signs, albeit subtly in the crumb that it is over fermented. The profile of the loaf is quite indicative of over fermentation.
In terms of when to end bulk, I kind of think of fermentation in terms of the total fermentation from the time you add the levain until the dough is baked. When you switch from bulk fermentation to final proofing depends on what you want and your skills. So let’s say that a particular dough needs a total of 7 hours of fermentation at 82°F to reach 90% rise and what you would consider good fermentation. You could end bulk at 30%, shape and make up the rest of the rise and fermentation in final proofing. By doing this you are leaving your dough longer after shaping untouched. This has the potential to give you a more open wilder crumb because of the longer time undisturbed. There is some risk to this as well, as the dough may not have had as great a structure because the dough wasn’t as inflated when you shaped it. So it may spread more.
So what if you shaped it later on? Say you shaped at at 60% rise? Then the dough will have degassed more towards the end of fermentation while you shape it so it may have a more even crumb which you may prefer. But the problem at least for me is that dough that is this fermented and expanded is much harder to shape well.
Anyhow, that is all to say that you can alter the crumb and bread based on when you shape.
Also you can do almost no bulk fermentation and bake good bread with only a final proof. So for pan loaves, you can mix and develop gluten all upfront and immediately shape. The dough then does all its fermentation in its final shaped in the pan and then is baked after it has risen fully.
Great info and perspective in this post!
Thanks Mark, you may be correct, the temperature was higher than 21C for most of BF so it may have gone over.
Thank you for taking the time to post Benny. Although I have been baking bread for decades and sourdough for about 10 years I feel like the black belt judokas who go back to practicing the basic moves. The Tartine loaf is a new style for me. I agree that a long final proofing then straight to baking might be a challenge in terms of shaping, one of the reasons I like a fridge retard is it makes it easier to transfer to the oven the next day.
I take your point re the crumb not looking under proved. In fact I confess that I boosted my oven temperature ( where BF took place) too high and it went up to 32C probably for about 20 minutes at the outset, before I realised and took action to lower the temperature , this probably sped things up. I’m working in building my starter as it spent a couple of days in the fridge, I’ll bake later this week and post pics. Thanks again Benny and Mark.
You're welcome both you and Mark.