Help with baguettes | The Fresh Loaf

Hello,

This is my third attempt at making baguettes. While my first two tries were pretty disastrous, my latest attempt confirms that I am at least making progress. I'm using the baguette recipe from Chad Robertson's Tartine. I've scaled his recipe to make dough for 3 400 gr baguettes. My BF was 4 hours at 76F and my dough roughly doubled in size. After shaping them and placing them in a couche, I proofed them at room temperature (76F) for 1 hour before retarding them in the fridge overnight. I cooked them on a baking stone (Fibrament) with a metal pan placed upside down on it to create a moist environment. I cooked them covered for 15 minutes and the cooked them an additional 12 minutes. Two of them were placed a little too close together leading to some uneven cooking. That said, I'm a little underwhelmed by the oven-spring and my lack of grigne. Any suggestions to better my technique? Sorry, no crumb shot yet.

Martin

Sadly I can't offer any advice, my baguettes are still very rough... Think it's sheer practise again, research and bake bake bake. However I'd be glad to fire one in me :-)

Can't over emphasize the need to heat. It took 27 minutes for these to bake which means your oven is not hot enough. The grignes should be completely developed in 5 minutes and they don't rise quick enough you end up with stretched out scores. Also note that thinner your loaf the harder it is to get a bloom on the scores due to the lack of volume in thin loaves. There is a slight advantage that there's less volume to heat up but still, the thinner the loaf the less the expansion so that's why baguettes are a challenge to coax into springing up and bursting. It might also help to go a bit shorter and fatter as this will provide you with some extra body, then, if it bursts progressively make thinner and longer loaves. Knowing your oven is almost as important as shaping fermenting etc but as you know every step matters and only a matter of time before they start doing what you expect. Just takes repetition to the nth degree but for third attempt it looks like you are going really strong - Good luck and onwards with the quest !

I didn't pre-heat the pan I'm using to create a closed baking environment. I'll definitely try that next time and keep my oven at 500F.

Do what Kendalm said and then remember what he/she said...... you will get better results with repetition. I make damn good breads, but, if I quit for a few weeks and restart...well, the first one just doesn't turn out quite right. You will be making perfect breads in no time.

I'd have to see the formula before making a qualified comment but from what I have seen so far there are a couple of problems.

I make my baguettes with a levain and a poolish, and the total yeast is 0.6%. I just checked a Hamelman formula and his yeast totals 0.75%. Even with those relatively low quantities the time from final mix to the oven is usually no longer than 2.5 hours for me. Even then I find that I over-proof more than I should and should probably shave about 15 - 20 minutes off of the 2.5 hours now that summer is upon us.

I have put some effort into cold fermenting baguettes and have had some success with overnight bulk retarding. When I have tried to cold proof shaped baguettes the results looked pretty much like your pictures above.

My go-to process is to build my levain and poolish the night before, do a final mix in the morning, wait an hour then do a stretch and fold, wait 30 minutes, divide, wait 20 minutes, shape and place in couche folds, proof 30 minutes then into a 500 F oven with steam for 8 minutes, then another 12 minutes without steam.

Jim