Hi all, pretty new to bread making, I've been following the tartine recipe and attempting to use Great River Milling AP flour, which is really a whole wheat with I think something like 80% of the bran removed? Anyways, two loafs have now turned out dense and flat. I'm bulk fermenting at about 80-82 degrees for 3-3.5 hours, then final proof at about 79 degrees for about 3 hours. During the bulk ferment it seems to be getting nice and soft and billowy, but during the final proof it doesn't really seem to be rising, and it's just getting a little oozy and sticking to the liner of the proofing basket. That makes me think it's possibly already overproofed by that point and the dough is breaking down? Thoughts?
I bake a Tartinish loaf about once a week. I used to have a lot of dense flat loaves.
Now I usually retard over night after two hours of room temp bulk ferment with the stretch & folds. 4 hours of proofing even at 70 degrees with cool dough from the was too long. I start heating my dutch oven at 2 hours and put it in when a poke test says it's good. This gives nice loaves.
During my last bake I forgot about it during the bulk ferment so it stayed on the counter for an additional 2 hours making 4 hours total. It had increased in volume a good bit. Since it did not need anymore fermentation I shaped it and put it in the fridge. Baked the next morning. It worked as well.
I do not normally let my starter go all night. More 4 to 6 hours.
Do you do any of the finaly proof at room temp, and do you bake straight from the fridge?
I normally proof at room temp after overnight bulk ferment.
When I proofed in the fridge I baked it direct from the friddge.
Bulk ferment is more forgiving than proof. In the winter at 70 degrees I forget about it for over 6 hours and the loaf was still good.
I've been baking Tartine variations for probably 5 years now and still have poor loaves 1 in 10. I work at home and sometimes get caught up and forget about the loaf.Where I live my failures are better than anything we can buy. Panera is as good as it gets.
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How much salt did you add? Did you add any?
The symptom remindes me of that time when i forgot to add salt. I got something like pudding. Gross.
Never forget about salt ever again.
Yes 10 g
I have made many Tartine loaves and I have found the times/temperatures given in the book are extremely aggressive and can result in an irrecoverably overproofed loaf very quickly. I often cut back the amount of levain to 80% of the recommended amount, and proof at no higher than 72˚F. The times in most books are suggestions (in my opinion). The mantra on this site is watch the dough and not the clock, and it is especially true for the Tartine and Forkish formulas. These types of doughs are challenging to master, so keep at it!
-Brad
How do I gauge when the dough is done bulk fermenting? Just as soon as it stretches easily?
Noel,
It is a skill that comes with lots of practice. One thing to look for is puffiness in the dough. Yeah, that's vague, but you'll soon see it. With Tartine and other high hydration doughs, I also look for a jello-like consistency when it is shaken gently in the bowl. If you are the scientific type, you can test the pH of the dough with indicator paper or an inexpensive probe (I have no first hand experience with the probe). My doughs generally finish at around pH 4.2. I will shape them and proof at room temperature for 30-60 minutes then retard overnight - I've retarded up to 20 hours but 12-15 hrs. is more typical. I will bake directly from the refrigerator.
-Brad
If you haven't had enough experience with lower hydrations to produce consistently good loaves, you might want to consider working your way up to tartine-like recipes. You can make good bread at 60-65% hydration, and the doughs will be considerably easier to handle, which will make it easier to work your way along the hydration learning curve a few percent at a time.
I felt comfortable handling the dough, as in shaping and such, but it's true that I dont yet have a feel for dough readiness during fermentation and proofing. Will a wet dough ferment faster than a lower hydration one?
70%, 75%, even 80% doughs aren't uncomfortably hard to handle. That said, with all else being equal, lower %s are easier / more forgiving. In part, this means the higher the hydration, the more it becomes important to handle the doughs gently.
The most likely cause of your flat bricks is over-proofing. To some extent, unless you want to measure how much every loaf you bake expands during proofing, this is a matter of learning through experience so that over time, you get better at knowing by eye and by touch when a loaf is ready to bake, and in a home setting, at estimating things like how much longer or shorter the proof time will be because your room temp. is a few degrees higher or lower than last time.
It's also not necessarily a single-factor situation. For instance, depending how over-proofed a dough is, not being gentle enough can be the difference between a sub-optimal loaf that's still edible and one that goes straight into the compost bin.