I am entirely new to this. It took forever to get my starter going and I have done two bakes now with the assistance of the Tartine book.
The loaves have been a bit flat, with not much in the way of oven spring, and with large holes in the upper half of the loaf...the rest of the crumb is pretty dense.
many ideas on what I should do differently.
Everything tastes fine as well.
http://www.thefreshloaf.com/node/51716/hole-issues
From your picture your dough is underproofed. There are many different factors that may be contributing to this. Is your starter active enough? Is the temperature that you are doing your bulk fermentation too cool for the time you allow for bulk fermentation? Giving your starter more feedings to get more active before you use it may help as would doing bulk fermentation at a warmer temperature or giving it longer.
Benny
My starter has does rise but it is modest And never dramatic like some of those YouTube videos.
my house is cool. I’ll try for a longer rise next time. Does one keep up with the periodic folds throughout that longer rise?
Try to see if there is a warmer spot in your home for both the levain and for the bread. Sometimes on top of the fridge or in the oven with the door propped open and the light on. If you have a thermometer you can check the temperature but you don’t want to let it get too warm like over 90ºF and it will if you have the oven light on and the door closed. I like to bulk ferment around 80ºF but of course you can go with lower temperatures but you’ll just need to give it much longer to ferment.
During the bulk fermentation you will want to do your stretch and folds or coil folds whichever method you are using to build strength in your dough.
Benny
Well don't be put off, because many of my first ones looked a bit like that too!
OK however don't fret overly about the temperature in the house; you can rise bread even in the fridge, so unless you live in the arctic...
I'd say the most likely culprits here are (1) low starter activity; and (2) poor gluten development / insufficient proof time.
For (1), you really should be able to get a reliable doubling in size from your starter, regardless of the room temp - maybe put about 10-20% wholewheat in your feeds just to introduce a few more nutrients? A problem might be that the flour you are using has a very low mineral ('ash') content, which is not giving you the most vigorous growth.
For (2) make sure that your flour has enough protein in it for making bread (although AP will probably do) and do some extra steps to build gluten... personally I autolyse at low hydration (around 60%) and knead the autolyse a bt before adding the starter and any extra water. Also make sure that you are adding the correct amount of salt - it's not just there for flavour: it also tightens the gluten.
Keep trying and good luck!
My starter has been a concern for awhile. I feed it regularly with organic from a local producer, half all purpose unbleached and half whole wheat. There is usually some expansion but I have yet to have that doubling that people talk about and show on the YouTube videos.
Maybe that is the question that I should be asking. Are there tricks to getting that?