My name is Jonathan and I'm based in the US, Washington DC area. I had watched the series "Cooked" on Netflix by Michael Pollan and one episode of the four was entirely dedicated to bread. After seeing that, and master baker Richard Bourdon in particular, I was inspired to bake artisan bread. Then I found Ken Forkish's FWSY book and started. Since then I've bought or borrowed all the top bread baking books. I've baked the past six consecutive weeks, including with my own sourdough starter. My breads have come out quite good. My biggest failures were around slack, wet or sticky dough which would either not shape well, or would but would then stick to the bannetons (with plenty of flour in them) where they fell into the dutch ovens in such way that knocked out lots of the gas, destroyed their shape and made them much heavier. This has been esp true with my first attempt at making a Tartine style rustic sourdough.
FWSY is a good way to start, for sure! There are a lot of good books out there, and after you've baked your way through them you'll find you want to start experimenting, and then you are doomed. :) That said, there are many, many awesome recipes right on this site so you don't have to go far, and you'll certainly find lots of sympathetic and helpful other addicts to share with.
I think you'll find, if you browse around this site and do a few searches, that lots of people have had trouble with the Tartine recipes and methods and have made their own modifications. I personally have scaled back the hydration level for most of my breads because the dough is too much trouble (and as I usually bake larger batches for customers, I really hate wresting with seven or eight kilos of very wet dough that is trying to ooze off the counter).
One tip many have learned and shared is to flour your bannetons with brown rice flour; not much sticks to that.
FWSY is a great book. I am not so sure it's the best starting point for a new baker, but, since you are there ...
A great many people who live in cities warmer than Portland, OR - and that's most of us - find Forkish's times to result in over-fermentation of the doughs. If you are following his timings, this may be part of your problem with sloppy dough. If your dough has doubled, is full of bubbles and feels pillowy, it's ready to divide and shape. Watch the dough, not the clock!
You will be a happier baker if you learn how to develop good dough strength and to shape tight boules. Those are the key skills for avoiding loaves that ooze and flow out of shape.
LL's tip about using rice flour should be taken.
Here is some advice I just wrote up for another baker regarding transferring dough into a Dutch oven:
I have baked dozens of loaves in cast iron Dutch ovens. I use Lodge "Combo Cookers." I preheat the deep half of the cooker, which becomes the top for baking. I don't pre-heat the shallow part. (Fewer burned hands) I transfer the dough from banneton to cooker by just turning the banneton over and guiding the loaf to its resting place with my other hand. (Banneton in right (dominant) hand. Left hand "catches" the loaf and guides it. Takes half a second, maybe.)
I once did a controlled experiment comparing pre-heated with not pre-heated cast iron Dutch ovens. There was insignificant difference.
Another tip or a few: I sprinkle the top of the loaf with semolina while it is still in the banneton. This decreases bottom crust burning for me. I line the bottom of the cooker (where the loaf sits) with parchment or, better yet, a re-usable, 9 inch diameter round silicone baking pad. This also helps prevent burned bottom crust and keeps the cooker clean.
Hope this helps.
Happy baking!
David
Thanks for the welcome note and advice David. Great stuff. A few questions comments in response.
Thanks in advance for any good advice to a newbie bread baking addict!
Hi!
I think you need to bulk ferment at 70-78dF until the dough is near fully fermented before putting it into the fridge. Remember, what's happening is yeast gobbling sugar and producing alcohol and CO2 which gives your bread lightness and volume, as well as bacteria producing esters, aldehydes and acids that contribute flavor. The critters go to sleep at 40dF.
Now, that is traditional. There are methods that cold retard immediately after mixing and ferment at room temperature later. The ones I know, for example, Philip Gosselin's baguettes, are all yeasted, not sourdough. They do produce delicious breads. I have not tried this with sourdoughs, and wild yeast is less cold-tolerant than commercial yeast. Why don't you give it a try and report back?
I have cold retarded dough in bulk and formed loaves for 8 to 36 hours with different results but all good. Longer times result in more sour breads. The danger of too long fermentation at any temperature is gluten degradation, flat flavor and poor crust browning.
I don't think there is a globally "optimal hydration" for a sourdough bread. I have made sourdoughs from 55% to over 80% hydration. They are different, of course, but none are bad. Especially since you are new to this, I would choose recipes for breads that appeal to you and follow them. You will develop your own favorites which may not be the same as those of another baker.
I dust my bannetons with a 50/50 mix of AP and white rice flour. I have no experience with brown rice flour or with 100% rice flour dusting.
Happy baking!
David
I use brown rice flour for dusting (and for baking too) simply because it is a whole grain, rather than white rice flour which is essentially starch (with the bran polished off the rice grain). Better nutrition. I think it's also a bit more grainy which may or may not improve the 'non-stick' features for dusting baskets.
If I'm using cane bannetons I use them without the liner. If I'm using wicker baskets I usually line them with floured napkins.
You're going to love this site! I know I do!
Lazy Loafer and David Snyder are only two of the many other helpful people here who you DEFINITELY want to read when they post something. You'll quickly bump into the others. Bookmark stuff you find useful (use the button at the bottom of the post) and make the search box your friend.
Don't spend too much time reading, though. Go bake something! :)
Have fun!
Murph
I already do love the site. I've been using it for a while without having formally joining and posting. But I will start actively participating.
Thanks again for your advice.
I made what turned out to be my best bake yet and my second sourdough. I used the Tartine Rustic Sourdough recipe with slightly less hydration so close to 72% vs 75%. I used white rice flour as the non-stick flour and it worked fairly well. I think I need to dust the the top of the loaf (facing the bottom of the banneton) and not just the banneton itself and that should help a lot with non-sticking. Although I had less sticking to the banneton than my Tartine / Forkish sourdough bake, I still had some that affected the shape of the final loaf...from the transfer to the dutch oven.
David - as far as the fridge is concerned, after the final mix for bulk fermentation, I kept the dough out at room temp (72-74F) for about 3 to 3.5 hrs. I folded it 3-4 times in the first 2 hours. Then I put it in the fridge overnight for about 15 hours. Rose a wee bit more while in there. Next day, I let it sit out again for another few hours. Then shaping and proofing - did a 25 min bench rest and then shaped the loaves. I used the Robertson method for shaping. The dough was wet and sticky and hard to deal with, but I think being in the fridge made it a little more manageable plus I used steel bench knife, which helped a bit. Was able to get a great boule shape with one loaf, but the other was not very tight as the dough kept sticking to my hands as I tried to round it...even with rice flour on my hands. Maybe I need to put more rice flour and hit more surface area of the hands. I think that getting good at shaping sticky dough will come with practice and subtle little things.
In the end, both loaves had a very good oven spring, which surprised me. I attribute this partially to spraying the loaves, tops of the dutch ovens and insides of my oven with a water mister just before baking. It really seemed to help with the oven spring.
is to use wet hands. Just get them wet and shape away if ot starts to stick again , just wet your hands and continue on. A simple fix for a simple problem that doesn't affect the dough at all. You can also get the blade of teh dough scraper wet too if you that to shape.
Happy baking
Yes, I do wet my hands when I am folding the dough, but not when the dough is on the bench for shaping and proofing. I guess my thinking when the dough was on the bench, was that I didn't want to add wet hands with all the loose flour used for nonsticking to the bench. Plus, I think I was conditioned by Forkish in FWSY as he always cautions against using too much water when manipulating the dough...so as not to change the recipe too much. But from more studying, it seems more water is better than less for the most part. And the amount added by wetting my hands or the bench knife should not be detrimental to the end product.
Try shaping the loaves as soon as you take the dough out of the fridge, then let them proof at room temperature for 2-3 hours. The proofing will depend a lot on how hot and humid your 'room temperature' is, so keep an eye on them. If your breads have fairly high levels of whole grain flour, bake them when they seem a bit underproofed (i.e. you get a pretty good spring-back from poking with a floured finger). The white loaves can proof a bit longer but still not until the dough turns to soup. :)