Blog posts

Hydration.  Water.  When I was a kid one summer I fell out on a tennis court in the 100 degree Florida sunshine, my body exhausted by the heat and lack of hydration.  My childhood was spent at the beach--for this family with five children, the free beaches of Florida were a perfect summer solution.  The salt water in that wild Atlantic and its neighbor, the sleepy Gulf of Mexico, always in my imagination housed Hydra--the mythical beast who grew two heads back whenever one was chopped off. 

On Tuesday afternoon a friend popped by, and we, as you do, sat there over tea and cake putting the world to rights while the rain was hammering down outside. Next thing we know it's supper time, with more tea, bread and deli. And then, at the end of the evening, there are only crumbs on the board and half a fruit loaf in the bread bin. So there I was, at eight o'clock at night trying to rectify the situation - just as well I'm something of a night owl... And I felt adventurous to boot. So instead of reaching for a set recipe, I thought I'd try putting something together on the fly.

Earlier this week, Lucy posted her 10 things to think about when trying to make a healthier, better looking and tastier sourdough bread.  We all know that there are dozens and dozens of ways to make breads of all kinds with none being right for everyone.  But, wouldn’t you know it, the virtual ink wasn’t even dry yet and Lucy was out there trying to do something different.  Oh my!

I think, I finally figured out the best method for baking lean breads in my clay pot so it's time to move to "flavor" aspect of the bread. I refrained from putting flavors in the bread because the cooking method is my focus so I want to change that only variable every experiment, that's why for so long we're only eating white lean loaves. For a start, I chose a common ingredient that I have that seems to be a classic flavor/addition to breads; sesame! It's amazing that a little amount of a single ingredient gives the bread an explosion of flavor.

After 3 years of baking a number of breads from sources like Complete Book of Breads and Breadbaker's Apprentice, I stopped pulling the measuring gear, volume or weight, out of the cabinets when I set out to make bread.  I use the same mixing bowl every time so that the visual information I receive is always in the same format, and then I bring together flours at my whim--KA AP, KA B, rye, whole wheat . . .

Its summer in New England and its been a fairly nice summer but lately its been hot and humid.  I know some folks live in this kind of climate all year round or in hot, dry climates but for me, baking in the summer presented a challenge.

This time, I think I got it right.  Rising times are exponentially increased since its at least 20 degrees warmer in the house....with the a/c running....than in the winter time.  It took me a few tries to get good looking loaves.

Previous attempts on sourdough have been ok, but not great.

I decide I would combine more than one process to see if I could increase the sourness and texture of my bread.

Biga overnight:

360g 50/50 starter

440g flour

365g water

per Forkish ratios

after 14hrs I had a nice biga, bubbling along nicely.

Remainder of flour, water, salt added to complete dough (75% hydration) and left for bulk ferment. 

6hrs later, good 3X rise with a decent sour note to the smell. Divide and shaped, then 4hrs refrigerated proofing.

I used my normal Method to make these loaves and it goes like this...

Mother

Currently Im using Dabrownman's method because it is so easy and versatile. You can adept it to any kind of flour and build it up just the way you like to without it affecting the mother. You dont need to feed it every week but it allways pops to double after 4 hours on the 2cond (or 3) feed. Win, win win all the way! What more can you ask for?Mine is at 50% hydration, just to keep the math simple.

Levain

One of my favorite parts of baking bread is the scoring. It gives me a chance to get a bit creative and end up with a great-looking loaf. I am, however, no expert on scoring bread. It occurred to me that a good way to get some control over the way my slashes look would be to attempt some calligraphy. This worked nicely with a sourdough boule, made with a portion of whole wheat flour. I thought Hebrew would be the best language to attempt the slashes in, as the shapes of the letters remind me a lot of bread slashes. So here it is, along with a picture of the crumb.

 I decided to use some of my leftover mashed potatoes along with some of French Style flour from KAF I bought during my recent visit.  I milled some fresh whole wheat flour and instead of using it as is I decided to try sifting out some of the hard bits and ended up with a medium extraction flour.  I have a finer sieve which next time I will use as a second step to get a real high extraction flour.