Hello,
i was was baking Field Blend #2 yesterday and had problem shaping final dough into boules - dough was very sticky and would cling to my fingers when I tried to tighten the ball on unflowered counter. I ended up using scraper to fold dough under itself and was pretty sure I degased the dough (though final bread came out real nice). Is this dough suppose to be this tacky or did I not fold it enough? Are there any tricks to shaping such a sticky dough - my scraper trick did not produce a tightly rolled ball.
Thank You!
What's the flour used and the final hydration of the dough?
i think Forkish is around 80%.
He cautions in videos that the most important piece of advice he can provide is to always be working with the floured edge - very quick movements. I am like Kalikan. I find it very difficult to get a well shaped boule because of the stickiness. I've seen a few pics of lovely loaves made by TFL folks and I'd like to hear their tips too. Because I'm not giving up til I feel I've made a loaf I am satisfied with.
I don't like to flour the bench too much as then it's difficult to get the drag when forming the boule while cupping your hands. If floured too much the dough will just slide and the seams dry up so they won't close. So I lightly flour the bench but flour my hands and scraper more so.
If the dough is well formed and you handle it like forkish recommends, it should be ok. So flour the bench (just enough so it doesn't stick but not too much, find a balance), and flour your hands + scraper well. Gently tip the dough onto the floured surface. Gently spread the dough out into a more uniform circle shape by pulling it from the edges. Hold it light with floured hands and it won't stick. Flatten out the big air bubbles but keep the smaller ones in. You might need to flour your hands a few times while shaping so keep some handy. Then taking the edges go round the dough folding so that it just overlaps the middle each time. After forming a rough boule shape, with your floured scraper, turn the dough over on the seam and while cupping your hands drag the dough towards you on a part of the bench with very little or no flour. This will help to tighten the skin. As long as your hands are floured well it should be fine. Then again with your floured scarper scoop the dough up and place in the banneton.
Just looked up his formula up in the book, it's actually 78%, but without the water included in the starter.
I was actually using the remainder of the extra starter I made yesterday to create FWSY Overnight Country Brown, which is also the same hydration dough (I think it's identical with the exception of rye flour and no instant yeast added to the final dough). I found that after forming the dough into the ball and flipping it over, I had to dust it on top allover with flour and then keep dusting sides of the dough every couple of turns as I kept dragging it on my table (and keep my hands well floured as well)...
Too bad I had to step out during bulk fermentation phase and overproofed my dough (when I finally got home, much to my surprise it was almost 4-5x the original size), Dough was full of gas when I was forming boules, but unfortunately it was failing 'finger test' within 20/30min after being formed and there was no oven spring at all so I ended up with a pretty much flatbread (nice, full of holes, structure of the crumb, though a bit gummy and crust stayed on the soft side), Will give it another try this coming weekend.
P.S. On the subject of the overproofed dough. Since this is my first time I experienced something like this. After forming boules and putting them in bennetons, 20-30min later dough felt just as dough during bulk fermentation would. Very relaxed and as I would poke it, it would simply stick to my finger, but would not spring back. That said, dough kept rising and pretty much filled the benneton by the time I got to baking it around 4 hours later. Is this what/how overproofed dough feels/behaves like?
Thank You!
Can you post the recipe and method? Recipe in full and method just the bullet points.
Thanks!
AP - 604g
WW - 276g
Water - 684g
Salt - 22g
Levain (80%) - 216g
Combine flour with water and autolyse for 20-30min. Then mix in salt and levain and combine. Bulk ferment for 12-15 hours or until its almost triple in size (with 3-4 folds thrown in anytime during this time, but he recommends them in the first half and definitely not in the last hour; I do them 20-30min apart after starting bulk fermentation). Shape and proof for approximately 4 hours using finger test to find exact bake time and then bake in covered DO for 30min, followed by another 20-25 (until medium to very dark brown) uncovered.
The one thing where I deviated from his formula is levain. 7-9 hours prior to the bake he says to feed it. I have my own 100% starter, which I fed using his formula (while also adjusting flour mix to align with whatever he had and bringing it to 80%). But then instead of starting working on the bread within 7-9 hours, I started some 32-36 hours later (first 7-8 hours were on the counter, then refrigerated). I figured my levain would be less active then suggested and it might take me a bit extra to triple the dough during bulk fermentation phase (as it turned out, because its warmer in my house, by the 7 hour mark, dough was 4-5x the original size and hence my woes with flatbread I assume).
Hydration of final dough is 78% which isn't overly high.
Interesting that he calls for AP flour and not strong bread flour. Can you check-up on that!?
Autolyse for the full 30min as this helps with gluten formation. Any help is welcome.
Now I highly doubt your dough is increasing by 5x. Might look that way but unless you're measuring you won't know for certain. Shall we say your starter sounds nice and healthy which is good news :)
If it says 12-15 hours and you think your starter is so active that it needs less then stick to 12 hours.
3 - 4 stretch and folds? Go by feel for this one. Incorporate more if you think your dough needs it. You can also give your dough a few minutes in a dough machine if you have one after you have incorporated the salt and levain. You can also give it a good old fashioned knead at this stage to help things along. And of course strong bread flour will help if indeed this is what he asks for.
Final proofing is a difficult one. You have to let your dough dictate to you. No recipe can give you an exact time. Better to slightly underproof then overproof. It is common belief that doubling means it's ready but you can misjudge this and easily go over. try just under at about 90%. If a dough overproofs then one can still knock back and proof again but will be a lot quicker as long as there is food left for the yeast.
I think you might be overproofing if you're getting flatbread. Sounds as if it had eaten up all the food and you had no structure to the dough anymore.
Thanks a lot for your reply!
AP flour - yes, I'm sure he wants AP there. I initially thought it was bread as well, but then remembered he had a small section on flours at the beginning of the book and he does state AP flour there. He says bread flours are generally around 14% protein and that's too high, AP flours, such as KA, at 11.8% are "ideal for European-style hearth breads". Would be interesting to bake AP and bread flour side by side and compare them... one day perhaps...
I insist on 4-5x increase during bulk fermentation;) I was just as amazed that it could grow that big... I kept dough in clear container and had it marked. Don't ask me how it managed to grew that big... But yes, I think it overfermented at that stage and while it still grew some in the banneton, it just didn't held the structure - took the shape of the benneton while it was supporeted, but spread out in the dutch oven,
Btw, here are the pics of the Field Blend #2 breads from the original post. I most likely lost some oven spring due to how I had to shape the boules, but I quiet like the end result and will bake more of this recipe.
Firstly, what lovely loaves. From what you were describing I was expecting a lot worse.
Ok, jokes over. Where's are the real flops?
Secondly, and now I'm really confused, here's a snapshot of field blend #2 from my book...
Sorry, I probably should have been a bit more clear... Topic has been started asking for help shaping Field Blend #2 - dough was too sticky and I had to shape them with the scraper (similar to what is shown in this video) and in the process I lost some of the oven spring. Pictures above are of these loaves.
Now the second part of the saga. When preparing to bake above loaves, I planed to scale down the amount of the levain so that I won't have to throw any away, but got distracted and before I realized, I was half through mixing double then what I really needed. After using half on Field Blend #2, I refrigerated the other half and used it to bake Overnight Country Brown loaves the next day. These are the loaves that were overproofed and ended up baking flat. I don't have their pictures, but can snap a few if there is any interest.
We're talking two separate recipes. The mist clears :)
Bulk Fermention is to give the yeast enough time to inoculate the dough and to develop flavour. One could go straight into final proofing and get an ok bread but will just take longer then a final proof after a bulk fermentation and you'll get a second rate loaf. Point being is that just because the recipe calls for a certain time for bulk fermentation the process which you have to time more correctly is the final proofing. I have an idea which you might wish to try...
Start the bulk fermentation in the morning when you can keep an eye on it so prepare your levain overnight. However long it takes, even if it falls a few hours shorter than the recommended time, wait till the dough doubles (or triples, can't remember the recommended rise), then shape and final proof. Obviously, for whatever reason, your dough is taking quicker. Allow the dough to dictate to you. This doesn't mean you're skipping anything. You'll still be getting the full bulk fermentation for your dough.
Go by feel. Recipe is only a guide. Everyone will have a different timing depending on a number of factors.
These loaves look pretty decent, in my opinion.
I've been reading through Field Blend #2, which I'd like to try. But I'm not sure what Ken Forkish means about pre-shaping. He mentions lightly dusting the tops, then flipping over and folding over and across itself, enclosing the stick interior of the dough. My question is, where is this stick surface supposed to come from? If I've dusted the top, and the counter is dusted from where I initially set my dough, where would there by stickiness? Maybe I'm severely missing something here.
I was thinking of pre-shaping just using my scraper like in the video above, and just hoping I get enough tension. Any recommendations?
I unfroze my second loaf just yesterday and had a couple of slices - this bread is definitely worth doing again! I usually bake only 2 loafs per week and I was planning to do Overnight Country Brown (properly this time around), but now pretty much set on baking FB#2 as well...
Flipping and dusting - dough was very sticky, I don't think you will have much problem preshaping it. As for shaping, Forkish says to form tight balls - I don't think my boules were tight enough after being formed with a scraper, hence not enough spring IMO. Next time I would try shaping boules by hand first (and would keep dusting my hands after every time I touch the dough) and use scraper only if I can't do it again.
Just finished baking another Field Blend #2. Cut bulk fermentation by an hour and retarded bread in the fridge for only 9 hours. Kept dough and my hands dusted and didn't have much problem shaping it. Great oven spring, but now I wonder why bread did not split (I baked it Forkish style, seam side up).