Hello dear tfl friends. I just finished 2 baguettes, made with 50% polish, 10% rye, 40% whole flour, and they came out beautiful, but something went wrong with scoring. Any idea how I could improve that?
Or under proofing? Baguettes are high hydration. The common scoring issue would be they disappeared. Clearly they did not. Perhaps runaway oven spring caused the dough to rise too much and the scoring to tear.
and tales of woe about baguette scoring so wish they had your "problem". These look marvelous. For a slender baguette, as you have here, and to me seem to have just great shaping, I think that you are getting a very nice oven spring.
I'm pretty good at doing, and not necessarily all that great at analyzing, but I'll throw my hat into the ring here. Because I've seen it myself many times with my baguettes, your oven spring is breaking through the scoring lines. It seems that you have quite sufficient room between scores, however this is a potential culprit - a good one to have. If you look at just about every one of the breaches between scores, you will see where "fresh" under colored dough was pushing its way up after the majority of coloration had set in. Good oven spring.
You may also be scoring a little too much on the transversal plane rather than sticking to a more vertical one on each of your scores, but that really is a bit of quibbling in this case.
The first thought I had when I saw your subject line and picture was "first world problem". Congratulations. And if this is very early in your baguette making career, you are on the fast track to making really great baguettes very very shortly!
As far as high hydration goes, although I really respect most of what Lechem writes, I'll digress here due to my own experience. I've made baguettes with hydrations ranging from 63% to ~ 80%, so they can really be anywhere within that range, although I'd guess that most "artisan" bakeries keep theirs somewhere between 68% - 75%. Keep on keeping on!
When I think if baguettes I do think of high hydration but as you point out that ain't necessarily so. I've yet to make any so I only picture the high hydration ones typically bought. Having said that 68-75% hydration for an all white bread might be considered high depending on flour being used. But I think we can agree with no problems scoring here. If I scored a 75% hydration white flour dough my issue would be that the scoring has completely disappeared. I wish I had the posters problem and your scoring skills Alan. As you know by now I've always admired your scoring skills.
For all the great advices. It is the 5th time probably when I am making baguettes! I still have a lot to learn about shaping in particular! One other problem is regarding the texture. Although it is airy and not dense, it is a little chewy because the high percent of whole flour. I made 2 boule and 2 baguettes, and I think now that white flour is more suitable for baguettes. i did not mention that the BP was overnight, in my balcony ( 5 C), and I shaped the cold dough in the morning!
is typically all white flour. And hopefully not that nasty stuff we often find in someone else's supermarket shopping basket either. But as "artisans" (ugh, I have a problem with that term) we are free to experiment away and arrive at any variation on dough concept that we desire. At this stage, I'm rarely ever making a pure AP/Bread flour baguette and will use many different combinations of flour mixes. Just because I do it doesn't make it necessarily right for some one else.
But if you wish to take my advice, start with all or mostly AP/Bread flour, get some confidence in what and how you are doing, and then branch off from there. If you find that the baguette thang is your cup of tea, as it is mine, you can take pretty much any formula/recipe (few exceptions aside) and turn it into baguettes. I have.
And that is part of the fun of being a member of TFL, always something new to learn. And you have an interactive community to communicate with (hmm, both have a common root - as does the word "common"!). Books are valuable as another tool for the toolkit, but are strictly a one way communication street.
cracks through the scores is just a wondrous sight to behold. I think to correct it, like Alan says, go more longitudinal with the scores, Divide the top of the baguette into 3rds and keep the scoring in the middle third only. Then just a bit more proofing should cure this non existent problem:-) With your whole grain mix, the hydration sounds about right. Great work for being so new at it.
for the advice. I suspect I underproof, maybe this is because the first months of baking over proofing gave me headaches. That was because of too much yeast, and overnight proof. Now I am afraid of overnight proof, and I bulk ferment in my fridge overnight and shape in the morning. I am still not sure by pressing the dough when is the right time to bake. Watched a ton of youtube videos, but probably this is something you learn baking!
As with other comments these are great. As alan mentioned a bit more transverse cuts would help but even still its not as though these cuts are excessivly sliced on too much of an angle. The composition of the flour had it been pure white I think would have resulted in what you want. With 40% rye its a bit hard to critique its like apples to oranges - these are great !
Or under proofing? Baguettes are high hydration. The common scoring issue would be they disappeared. Clearly they did not. Perhaps runaway oven spring caused the dough to rise too much and the scoring to tear.
and tales of woe about baguette scoring so wish they had your "problem". These look marvelous. For a slender baguette, as you have here, and to me seem to have just great shaping, I think that you are getting a very nice oven spring.
I'm pretty good at doing, and not necessarily all that great at analyzing, but I'll throw my hat into the ring here. Because I've seen it myself many times with my baguettes, your oven spring is breaking through the scoring lines. It seems that you have quite sufficient room between scores, however this is a potential culprit - a good one to have. If you look at just about every one of the breaches between scores, you will see where "fresh" under colored dough was pushing its way up after the majority of coloration had set in. Good oven spring.
You may also be scoring a little too much on the transversal plane rather than sticking to a more vertical one on each of your scores, but that really is a bit of quibbling in this case.
Take a look at this comment - http://www.thefreshloaf.com/comment/370498#comment-370498
The first thought I had when I saw your subject line and picture was "first world problem". Congratulations. And if this is very early in your baguette making career, you are on the fast track to making really great baguettes very very shortly!
As far as high hydration goes, although I really respect most of what Lechem writes, I'll digress here due to my own experience. I've made baguettes with hydrations ranging from 63% to ~ 80%, so they can really be anywhere within that range, although I'd guess that most "artisan" bakeries keep theirs somewhere between 68% - 75%. Keep on keeping on!
alan
When I think if baguettes I do think of high hydration but as you point out that ain't necessarily so. I've yet to make any so I only picture the high hydration ones typically bought. Having said that 68-75% hydration for an all white bread might be considered high depending on flour being used. But I think we can agree with no problems scoring here. If I scored a 75% hydration white flour dough my issue would be that the scoring has completely disappeared. I wish I had the posters problem and your scoring skills Alan. As you know by now I've always admired your scoring skills.
For all the great advices. It is the 5th time probably when I am making baguettes! I still have a lot to learn about shaping in particular! One other problem is regarding the texture. Although it is airy and not dense, it is a little chewy because the high percent of whole flour. I made 2 boule and 2 baguettes, and I think now that white flour is more suitable for baguettes. i did not mention that the BP was overnight, in my balcony ( 5 C), and I shaped the cold dough in the morning!
is typically all white flour. And hopefully not that nasty stuff we often find in someone else's supermarket shopping basket either. But as "artisans" (ugh, I have a problem with that term) we are free to experiment away and arrive at any variation on dough concept that we desire. At this stage, I'm rarely ever making a pure AP/Bread flour baguette and will use many different combinations of flour mixes. Just because I do it doesn't make it necessarily right for some one else.
But if you wish to take my advice, start with all or mostly AP/Bread flour, get some confidence in what and how you are doing, and then branch off from there. If you find that the baguette thang is your cup of tea, as it is mine, you can take pretty much any formula/recipe (few exceptions aside) and turn it into baguettes. I have.
And that is part of the fun of being a member of TFL, always something new to learn. And you have an interactive community to communicate with (hmm, both have a common root - as does the word "common"!). Books are valuable as another tool for the toolkit, but are strictly a one way communication street.
alan
wow, the dough's got so much vigor that it can't be contained
and I bet the crumb's gorgeous
cracks through the scores is just a wondrous sight to behold. I think to correct it, like Alan says, go more longitudinal with the scores, Divide the top of the baguette into 3rds and keep the scoring in the middle third only. Then just a bit more proofing should cure this non existent problem:-) With your whole grain mix, the hydration sounds about right. Great work for being so new at it.
Well done indeed and happy baguette baking
for the advice. I suspect I underproof, maybe this is because the first months of baking over proofing gave me headaches. That was because of too much yeast, and overnight proof. Now I am afraid of overnight proof, and I bulk ferment in my fridge overnight and shape in the morning. I am still not sure by pressing the dough when is the right time to bake. Watched a ton of youtube videos, but probably this is something you learn baking!
I agree with above who said do your scoring more up and down the loaf rather than across.