Community Bake - Baguettes by Alfanso

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DanAyo on 15 Jun 2020 at 13:34

This Community Bake will be featuring one of our very own; the "Baguette Baker Extraordinaire", Alan, aka alfanso. He is among a handful of fine baguette bakers on TFL who have spent years concentrating on baguettes, alfanso's favored craft, and his baguettes are consistently outstanding and consistently consistent.. Consistence and repeatability, coupled with breads that visually signify a particular baker are the hallmark of excellence. When viewing an image of any of Alan's baguettes, those that have been around for a while know exactly who baked the bread. We are fortunate to have him on the forum.

We have extracted the bakes of 4 participating bakers and present it in PDF form

Attention New Readers:
Although the Community Bake started some time back, it is still active. New participants are welcomed to join in at any time! It's constantly monitored and help of any kind is still available.

For those that are not familiar with Alan and his baguettes check out his blog.
 
   

    

Since the Covid Pandemic many new bakers have joined the forum. For those that are not familiar with our Community Bakes (CB) see THIS LINK. It should give you an idea of the concept and how things work.

Alan supplied the following information as a guide line to the bake. There are links below with additional resources. Alan's choice of baguette for the CB is Pain au Levain with Whole Wheat, by Jeffrey Hamelman. Jeffrey Hamelman recently retired as Head Baker at the King Arthur Flour Company. His book, "Bread: A Baker's Book of Techniques and Recipes, 2nd Edition" is considered a "must have" by most of the bakers on this forum.

Alan writes:

I’ve attached the formula and some photos of my most recent bake of this bread.  It is another really easy to manipulate bread that has a fantastic taste, but is not too heavy on the whole grain side. 1250g is a nice amount to create 4 "comfortable sized" baguettes.

I’ve simplified the formula a little by converting it from a 60% hydration to a 100% hydration levain.

Mr. Hamelman uses the term “Bread Flour” but in our realm this really means a standard AP flour with a similar protein profile to King Arthur AP flour, 11.7% protein.

This dough can also be mixed mechanically if you have neither developed the skills nor have the desire to mix by hand."

NOTE - for those using home milled flour a tweak may be necessary.  Whole grain (100% extraction) will absorb quite a bit more water than white flour as well as commercial whole wheat flour. Since I used home milled grain, it was necessary to add more water before the dough became extensible enough to slap and fold. I estimate the water added was approximately 28 grams which brought the hydration to ~72%. I should have taken my own advice and measured the additional water, but I didn’t. For those using home milled grains, if would be helpful if you reported the extra water necessary to do the Slap & Folds. See THIS TECHNIQUE.

   Additional Resources

 

Everyone is welcomed. Both expert and novice can learn and improve their baking skills by participating and sharing their experience. Make sure to post your good, bad, and ugly breads. We learn much more from our failures, than we do from our successes.  

Danny 

A late addition -

In Alan’s reply below he reminded us that this is not a competition. The goal of every Community Bake is to learn from one another. There are no losers, only winners. Each and every participant should become a better baguette baker with the help of others.

Long time no see.  For a guy who is out of baking shape, at least on the baguette front, you put up a pretty mean first post here.

Yes, a fair amount of the old timers have ridden off into the sunset. Isand66 is still active as well as dmsnyder and minioven, but dabrownman took to hiding out at the tail end of last year.  He did it once before in 2017, but not for this long. PiPs - boy I wish Phil was posting, and also his photography shots as well.  Golgi Wingnut and Janetcooks had taken an exit stage right quite a while ago.  Ditto for the magnificent txfarmer and siao-ping.  Same for proth, mebake, CAphyllis and a handful of others.  Debra Wink still peeks in on occasion too.  However the B team has stepped up their game and we have a new full squad ready to post some fabulous bakes, just as they've been doing for the past few years..  And now you.

alan

Hey alan! Great to be back.

Thanks for updating me on all the past regulars.  Sad to see many of them gone.  Hey, I came back, so maybe they will too!

Look forward to once again contributing and viewing!

John

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DanAyo on 22 Aug 2020 at 09:47

Still working to dial in the T65. It has been a long journey, but a major breakthrough may be right around the corner. For those that are not “gifted”, perseverance is an absolute necessity.

French flour is very foreign to my previous skill sets. Even though it is a weak flour, it develops gluten quickly. I am under the impression that developing the gluten up-front helps when handling the sticky, slack dough later in the process. BUT, if the dough is worked too much, the precious flavor is compromised. Because of this consideration the next batch will be mixed on slow speed only and for as short a time as possible, while still developing the gluten. It’s a challenge to make a good looking baguette,  but a beast of a job to make a great looking baguette that possesses the texture, chew, and flavor that is expected from a traditional french version. When it comes to food, the French are un-excelled.

BF ~30%. Shaped dough was final proofed using the finger indention and was terminated a little earlier. The dough was then placed in the freezer to finished proofing and stiffen up a bite for slashing. That worked very well. Whereas previous slashing of un-chilled T65 was a “drag fest”, the chilled dough slashed cleanly with moderate effort.

These were baked at 485F. Previous bakes were at 550F initially, then dropped to 485.

I have hopes that I am sneaking up on the crumb. The focus is on terminating the BF @ <30%. The BF temp is also cool (73F) in order to eliminate rise during retard. The present hypothesis is that gassy dough hinders shaping. That the cell structure will form during Final Proof and especially during the initial phase of the bake. Nothing proven, just hypothetical at this point. Benny has set the bar, and a number of us are determined to jump it...

 

 

Bake #27 is in the works. Dough was mixed on speed #1 only. BF rose ~22-25% (will accurately calculate and report when the bake is published) with no rise in fridge. 

 

Your shaping and scoring now is so refined, it really is Dan.  You now have a signature look to your baguettes as well just like Alan, Don, and  Doc.  I must be the only one other than Alan since his room temperature is so high, who bulk ferments at a warm temperature.  I’m very interested to see your next next bake with the greatly reduced BF to 22-25% turns out.  This is the direction I was thinking of with my next bake.  I will still BF at a warm 82ºF so as to not change too many variables especially since I’ll be doing half of a different flour as I am running low and cannot find the same flour again ugh.  Next time as well, I will pre-shape and shape my dough earlier to allow for even longer in the fridge to firm up for scoring as that does seem to be the way to go.  Unfortunately with a side by side my freezer isn’t large enough to put the shaped dough into it.  ’ll also continue to do the scoring leaving a larger dough gap between each score.  

That or you slashed them differently. I see some shackles broken through which some may consider a defect but it provides hope that the crumb is what you are striving for.

Don, the crumb shot was added to the post.

Your comment about the broken bridge got me to thinking... my previous (many) bakes started at 550F. This time I baked at 485F. Wonder if that affects the bridges? Have you tried starting out at 550F?

Was 500 and the my stone got too hot and charred the bottoms and curled the ends up. I am beginning to think my Fibrament is too big front to back I have an inch clearance and two inches on the the sides. I wander if I could trim it with a diamond blade in a grinder. 

You can trim it with a diamond blade. But if you call the company, I  think they will tell you an inch around is good. I believe that is how they cut mine and it works fine in my oven.

Have you tried raising the stone a little? I’ll be raising mine a notch hoping to get more heat on the crust to even out the crumb.

It was getting too hot on the bottom rack and the heating was uneven so it sits on the second rack and that makes steaming from above more of a challenge. I moved it towards the back more and it helped today so I may have found the sweet spot. I may try smooth side up to see if that works. The stone seems to follow the oven temp is why I don't start super hot

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MTloaf on 22 Aug 2020 at 10:21

The baguettes in black background looks like Klingon torpedoes in outer space but that is an explosive crumb they delivered. No denseness on the edges, a lot of uneven sized holes with a nice sheen. Eurika! or By jove I do believe you have done it. Take a bow before we lose you to IG;-) I would imagine the taste and texture are out of this world.

Don, the taste and texture was, as expected good, but it was not as good as it should have been. The dough was oxidized too much and the flavor was affected. This time (not baked yet) the dough was mixed only on speed 1. It seems french flour handles better when the gluten is at least moderately developed initially.

French flour is fickle and requires special handling, IMO.

Me and IG will never be! I see it as a “post pretty pictures place”, with way too little information. Floyd is stuck with me :-)

Is the new mixer that powerful? That it could oxidize that quickly seems unlikely since the crumb was so open but I have never used a mixer for baguette dough. The flour is delicate and tears easily and maybe better suited to hand mixing.

How long was the bulk retard? That is when flavor is developed. Was this the recipe by the guy who wrote Hondo?

Fickle is not how I would describe the Gluten of the Gods

Don, oxidation actually strengthens the gluten. The spiral mixer is extremely gentle and thorough on a dough. But it seems the gluten in french flour develops quickly and it is possible that oxidation occurs likewise. 

With only limited experience and no scientific evidence it seems to me that Le Moulin d'Auguste Traditional Wheat Flour - T65 comes together super quick. It appears to oxidize quickly and when this happens the flavor is adversely affected. Not terrible, but just not as outstanding as it can be. My balancing act is to develop the gluten to build strength and make it more easily handled without pushing it to the point that characteristic flavor is compromised. Further testing may prove this wrong, but for now this is my avenue forward.

NOTE - I purposely described the type of T65 that I am working with. I am under no impression that all or any T65 behaves the same. When flour is described by mineral content and not protein and when some french flour is not milled from french grain but American and Canadian grains the variables are many.

and if that's your goal, it seems to be working.  Where do you go from here?  I'm also surprised how white the crumb is, but that could be lighting and the camera too.  Once more, this bake checks all the boxes: shaping, consistency, scoring, crumb.

Alan, the crumb is light white. I need to go back and check out my first bakes with T65. They were mixed by hand relying largely on Stretch and Folds for gluten development. 

Don, how would you describe the color of your T65 crumb?

Maybe the flavor carotenoids are more fragile in the french flour. I sometimes get a yellowish crumb from minimal hand mixing. Maybe you should have gotten a diving arm mixer ;-) You would know best if the lighting had that effect.

I forgot to ask this question.  On my bake yesterday, I had three baguettes baking on stone about 2 inches apart from each other.  Once sprung, they were more like an inch apart.  I noticed that the bottom side edge crusts of each baguette were still very light coloured and super soft, all along the entire length of the baguettes.  Could this be a result of the crowding, or are there other factors at play here? 

John

It looks like your oven has room for a couple more pieces of tile if you want stretch them out and be a side loader. That is what is currently in vogue here. You obviously have the dexterity for it from playing music.

Yes probably too close together and perhaps not a convection oven.  Convection could help but even then radiation is the primary mechanism for getting the crust to the high temperature that browning requires. When the loaves are close together they see each other more than they see a source of heat and the shape factor become critical which you can only fix by spacing them out.

But late in the bake when browning is possible, you can move the loaves off the tile and directly onto the oven rack which both improves the shape factor and allows free convection to put hot air in direct contact with the lower sides of the loaves. Also pulling the parchment as soon as the bottom has hardened up enough to allow it will provide some addition heat where you need it.  I don't know what the emissivity of hot parchment is, but being thin it gives up its heat almost instantly and probably is a negative factor after 5 minutes.

I’d say they were too close together I’ve had that as well when I tried to bake four baguettes at once. Three is still a bit iffy but better. 

I woke up this morning with an idea in my head, (not really, just figuratively, for effect) what if I treated my baguette dough like I do my pizza dough? That procedure would be to forgo the bulk ferment altogether. I would take the dough straight from the mixer to pre-shape/retard, or even al the way to final shape/retard? Worth the time and energy of giving it a try, or a waste of my time?  

 Baking baguettes is very addicting. I feel kind of off and anxious, because I don't have a bake going. Thanks for reading. (Photo is strictly for attention)

 Kind regards,

Will F. 

 

Enjoying incremental increases... The less aggressive (slow speed) mixing seemed to work out. The flavor was better and the dough (68% hydration) handled well. The ability to shape T65 is getting better. 68% seems a good hydration and developing the gluten early is facilitating better handling.  Calculated the increase in the aliquot jar. 30% at the end of the 73F bulk ferment. The dough in the jar rose to ~50% after retardation (~21hr). Raised the bake temp from 485F (last bake) to 500F. I think I am consistently getting better crumb on the bottom half than the top. Thinking more top heat may help eliminate this. Plan to raise the stone another notch.

Ears are improving... So is the color of the crumb.

Overall - Continual Improvement Process (CIP).

Recently started baking one smaller baguette so that it can be sliced and eaten hot, straight out of the oven.

Appreciation and Thankfulness -
I can vividly recall how much I struggled to produce ears on a baguette. Alan has worked patiently with me over the last two years or so. THANKS for sticking with me...

Danny

Now, if these two possible hurricanes could die before they run over us or our neighbors.

 

Danny it is really remarkable seeing the improvements and refinements you’ve made to your baguette game, truly remarkable.  Your shaping and ears are really consistent now and the crumb keeps getting better.

But thank you, and it makes me feel good nonetheless.  

There's only so much one can provide via text and phone chats.  If you didn't have the aptitude and stick-to-it-ivness no amount of chit chat would bring you so far.  There's nothing wrong with taking a bow for your own successes.  I recommend it - even in some quiet corner of your psyche and, while it might not make you a better person, it is good for the soul and for the recipients of your efforts.

Personally, in retirement, now that poochie is gone, I might go stir crazy without an outlet like baking and being a member of this community.  It's a fine and admirable avocation.  

A friend said to me years ago words that still sometimes ring in my ears.  "Think about this Alan. With your hands you create the most basic food that families place on their dinner tables". 

This is indubitable evidence, that ultra high hydration is unnecessary, and  a substitute for poor procedure and technique, when the goal is an open crumb. Kudos on another great bake Danny! 

Formula tweaks:

Reduced IDY by .25% to 2.5 Grams @ 1000 G AP Flour

Mixing: 5 minutes on Bosch #1, no other gluten building (i.e.: stretch and folds)

Bulk ferment (In leu of an Aliquot jar)

Start height  - 2 1/2 Inches 

60 Minutes - 3 Inches.

 

Timer reset to 15:00 Minutes

75 Minute target - 31/2 inches. Actual reading 3 1/4

Move to pre shape

 Set the timer for a 15:00 relaxing rest. Shaping table at the ready.

 The shaping was remarkably uneventful, it went off without a hitch. Now to put the babies to sleep. 

First cold retard/proof check at 8:00Hrs. (5:00 AM)

The end game. No slip ups today. All is well.

Huge improvement! Baked at 9hrs. retard! So happy! Thanks for not letting me founder around aimlessly, Danny! 

Bake timings:

12 Minutes 500+F Full steam (Silvia's towel & broiling tray)

4 Minutes Purge oven and remove steaming apparatus. (Turn, 90 degrees, and switch racks) 500+F

4 Minutes (Turn 90 degrees, and switch rack) 480 F

4 Minutes (Turn 90 degrees, and switch rack) 480 F

4 Minutes (Turn 90 degrees, and switch rack) 460 F

15 Minute oven off door cracked cool down

 

 

 

Conclusion:

 This is a result I can build on! I will stick with this exact formula, and procedure. Patience, practice, practice and more practice! At this point, after a couple more bakes the only tweak I foresee, is to raise the hydration too 67%.

Note: This is 100% white AP flour (KAF) Get a load of that color!!

Awaiting the bake.

Will, this is far and away your best looking bake so far.  These are true beauties. Perseverance does pay off, along with getting to know what and how to do it.  Really satisfying to see.  Congrats.

I have to tell you, I was getting pretty frustrated and ready to pack it in. Danny, must have sensed as much, when I stopped posting about two weeks ago. He emailed to check on me. Then, after his nudge brought me back for another try, he emailed again with the revelation that, my bread was grossly over proofed. Two bakes later, here we are! 

Smile...

Will, so glad you are seeing dramatic improvements! More often than not, bakers having problems with oven spring,  ears , and crumb are due to over fermentation. The reason I know is because I suffered the ill-affects of over fermentation for years. THIS POST was a major breakthrough for me.

The term “over fermentation” is purposely used because the problem can occur during BF and/or Final Proofing.

IMO, everything about your bread shows improvements.

Will the improvement suddenly is super amazing.  No longer overfermenting you have great oven spring, ears and grigne.  Look at the scoring, you are staying in the middle lane now and without overfermenting they look remarkable.  You must be so pleased.  Never give up.

You can imagine how disheartening it was for me, watching everyone improve by leaps and bounds, yet my bakes remained mediocre at best! Thanks for your encouragement and taking the time to diagram the scoring. The bake just before this one, when I tried to cut the ferment, and it got away from me, could have been a disaster. I was truthfully about to give up, and resign myself to, very consistently poor baguettes! Thank again for the encouragement! 

 

 Kind regards,

 Will F.

Hey all.  I made some adjustments to the baguette formula I used yesterday, to make it yield 2 baguettes instead of 3.  Just wanted to get some advice...changes or additions, if you have them.  It seems to leave out temperature in a few spots where I feel there should be.  Also, do you agree with the procedures, times and temps?

 

French Baguettes

 

 

 

Final Dough

 

 

333g 50/50 organic bread flour/AP flour blend

 

250g water

 

7g salt

 

¼ tsp instant yeast

 

 

 

Instructions

 

The flour and yeast are all mixed together in a large bowl.  A central well is then formed in the flour mixture and 200 g of the water is added to the well. The water is gently stirred with one hand, gradually drawing in all of the flour mixture until a rough dough is formed.  The bowl is then covered with plastic wrap and the dough is allowed to rest for an autolyse period of 30 minutes.

 

After the autolyse, the remaining 50 g of water and the salt is added.  The water and salt is then incorporated into the dough by further hand mixing and squishing the dough between fingers,  Once the dough starts to come together and all the water is absorbed, the dough is placed in a mixer bowl.  Knead mix the dough for 2 minutes on speed 2, then for 10 minutes on speed 4.  The bowl is then once again covered with plastic wrap and the dough is allowed to undergo a 1 hour fermentation at ambient temperature, with 6-8 stretch-and-folds being performed every 20 minutes during the 1 hour period.  After the one hour bulk fermentation, the dough is placed in the refrigerator and allowed to ferment for an additional 21 hours at 40ºF.

 

After the 21 hour fermentation period, the dough is removed from the refrigerator and allowed to warm to ambient temperature for 1 hour.  The dough is then divided into two pieces of equal weight and each piece is pre-shaped into a short cylinder.  The dough pieces are then covered with a plastic sheet and allowed to rest for 15 minutes.  Each piece is then shaped into a baguette laid onto a floured couche and allowed to proof at 78ºF for 45 minutes.  The baguettes are then scored and baked in a 480ºF oven for 20 minutes, the first 10 minutes with steam.

 

Thanks in advance!

John

 

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Geeze, sorry for all the script glitch...what a mess...no idea what happened...i can't even see my post in the EDIT option, so I can't even try to fix it. 

John

John, consider dividing and shaping cold.

” dough is removed from the refrigerator and allowed to warm to ambient temperature for 1 hour” At 75% hydration it will be easier to pre-shape and shape the dough cold. At that hydration and using white flour the dough should be extensible for shaping. Once the dough is shaped and couched it can warm and final proof. This way the gas produced and the cell structure will not be disturbed by handling.

I assume this is what most of us are doing, but not sure. Hopefully other bakers will reply, especially if they disagree.

What are you looking for in your baguettes? Crust, crumb, and texture? The group of bakers here have probably tried most everything.

Hi Dan.  The one problem I noticed when I baked these the other night was that the dough was fighting me during the final shape...mostly during the rolling/extending the cylinder.  It kept pulling back to it's original size.  I had to roll each one for approx. 15-20 rolls, if not more, till it got to the final size I got.  I am surprised I got the cell structure I got after this debacle!  I probably should have waited longer for the dough to come to room temp but I followed the formula to 1 hour.

Overall, I am looking for a chewy but not too chewy baguette with a relatively thin crust.  Less 'american' style french bread, and more 'euro' french bread.  That probably makes no sense.  Basically, at this point, I just want to practice baguettes and hopefully get a nice edible end result!  Eventually I will be on the search for my perfect baguette, but I am not there yet.

John

The elasticity you experienced is due to the gluten being tight, from the pre-shape, and yes cold dough will be more elastic and less extendable. If you would have stopped, and counter rested the dough for another 5-10 minutes, the gluten would have relaxed, and the dough would have been more extendable. That would have made for less manipulation needed to achieve your final shape.

Best, regards.

 Will F.

One thing some of us are doing here when the elasticity is fighting stretching besides a 10-20 mins bench rest after pre-shaping is to pre-shape in a loose cylinder shape that is partway along to the ultimate size of baguette you wish to reach.

Also while doing final shaping, after each fold giving the dough a stretch to continue to get that elongation so after you’ve done the folding that you don’t need to roll and stretch much more at that point.

Regarding the dough, using a lower gluten dough is also helpful to have less elasticity, many of us are using something around 10-11% protein flour.

John, I think you’re in BC if I’m not mistaken.  During the pandemic I’ve spent far too much time shopping for flour.  What I’ve found is that most Canadian AP flour is 13.5% protein, the same as most of our bread flour.  I was quite surprised to find that.  It has been a challenge here in Toronto to find any unbleached flour around 10%.  Most AP on our shelves here is Canadian 13.3% protein.  I’m not sure what AP flour you have, one that I found that is again out of stock is a PC brand all purpose, it is US grain and it is 10% protein.  I actually found that makes a good baguette and my last two bakes were with that flour.  I now don’t have enough for another bake so will have to mix and switch to yet another flour and have to get used to that flour’s characteristics.  

Yes I am in BC.  I typically use a locally milled organic flour, Anita's.

You are correct.  I searched for lower % protein flours but it was very difficult!  I did find Robin Hood's Cake and Pastry flour.  It has 10% protein.  I can attest to it's lower gluten development.  I once made cinnamon buns and accidentaly used this flour. There was no chew or pull to the dough whatsoever.  More like 80% cake, 20% bread in texture.  I'd be afraid to try this flour for bread, but please do let me know if you try it and how it worked out!

I haven’t used their Cake and Pastry flour because I thought it was bromated/bleached so I avoided it.  La Milanese from Quebec has an AP flour I mentioned somewhere along the way that is 10% protein.  I just found a bag of that and will give that I go eventually.  I was hoping that Anita’s would be lower protein but again 13.3%.

I actually like my baguettes to have a bit of a chew to them so I don't mind the higher protein flour. The softer a baguette goes, the closer it gets to Wonderbread for me...and that's not what I am after at all!

Good luck with the QB AP!

John

All good information. I remember reading it all now. We were speaking about this yesterday. It would be great to have a few of our best analytical minds, comb though this thread, and cherry pick the most pertinent information. Then compile a readers digest version. That will become a roadmap/baguette manual for the ages! There is so much knowledge in this C.B., we must preserve it, for future generations of fresh loafers! Little too dramatic? I know, I get carried away...Smile.

John, you will be pleased with Alan’s posted formula in the original post of the CB. It is based n Hamelman’s Pain au Levain. It produces gorgeous baguettes that score beautifully.

One comment of the process: You might want to hold the bassinage water until after the gluten is developed at least part way rather than committing it immediately after the autolyse.

Thanks. Actually, I didn't follow the autolyze part of this formula as I thought it may be a mistake by the writer.  I always knew autolyse as being a step to hold back the addition of salt for a portion of time.  This formula didnt make sense to me to add all the salt and water THEN autolyse.

Thoughts?

John

Technically it wouldn’t be an autolyse if it has the salt.  Theoretically the salt would slow the activity of the amylase during autolyse.  During autolyse you want the flour to be fully hydrated, but you also want the amylase to start breaking down the starches to maltose that the yeast will be able to use.  However, Elsie Lu on this site, did a small study, now it hasn’t yet been repeated but it didn’t show a significant negative effect of the salt on the amylase.  That would suggest that adding salt during autolyse, I call it saltolyse, should really be fine.  I know some bakers who swear that adding salt during autolyse is completely fine.  

I haven't done anything scientific along these lines, but my casual observation was that salt slows down my home-milled flour's absorbption of water during autolyse. So I settled on 60 min without salt. 90 min with salt.   

I suppose the salt competes with the flour for the water.

More than once i have forgotten salt entirely, so I like someone's idea (likely alfanso, doc dough, or Mtloaf) to throw it on top (but mix it in later) so as not to forget.

I agree with you that the rationale for no salt is not clear.  I had been under the opinion that it slowed down the amylase enzyme activity and thus reduced the maltose availability to the yeast when it was introduced, but some recent unpublished work by Elsie_Iu has convinced me that reduced enzyme activity is probably not the case. And while salt is hygroscopic but I am skeptical that the presence of salt substantially impacts water absorption by the starch (though I could be convinced otherwise). 

The one thing that might argue in favor of that theory would be any inhibitory effect that salt might have on the permeability of the coating on whole (un-broken) starch granules.  Would like to hear ideas about how to test the hypothesis that absorption is slower with 2% salt than with none, or at least slow enough to impact the dough.

gluten development requires that energy has to be deposited in the dough and at high hydration’s you just can’t get the dough to accept it because the viscosity is too low and you can’t generate the necessary shear forces without going to a high speed mixer (and even then it takes a very long time). So the guideline I follow is to develop the gluten enough at ~60% hydration that it is showing some strength and then slowly add the remaining water. It works beautifully and you can reach some incredibly high hydration levels without too much trouble. How you handle it after you have mixed it I leave up to you. 

I wanted to give the ecstasy powder the weekend off and see if I could find a reasonable domestic alternative for the french flour. I found some Guistos 00 organic pizza flour that they tout as similar to European flour. I used my normal Bouabsa recipe with the 75% hydration. The dough had a similar feel just not quite as soft and silky. It fermented slower and did not exhibit the same extensibility as it did when used to make pizza. 

I would say it was the second best flour I have used for baguettes. It was better than any AP I have tried and the crust was very crispy but the flavor was lacking compared to the Auguste. The store also had their organic AP and I may give it a try assuming that it is a lower protein flour.

Guistos  Guistos crumb

They baked up ok but didn't grow much during the proof. The crust was really thin and crispy.

crust

Since Benny has been given the open crumb award, the shaping prize is in Dan's pocket and Alfanso has the best ears. I have no chance at the best scoring so I am claiming the thinnest crust award Thank you very much.

Bonus photo Is the backlit baggie like the guy in the video above.

backlit

 

I love how you were able to achieve those long slender elegant tapers Don, those are beautifully shaped and what I’d want my baguettes to grow up to be if I had a larger baking surface.  I quite like the crumb and I would agree, you do get the thinnest crust award, the grigne look so delicate.  The backlit baguette would make a nice nightlight for a guest bedroom or bath.

Is it your oven that is confining you or the size of your steel? Good idea for the baton night light. It would be nice to include a bread in the oven scented version. I am looking for investors to ramp up production ;-)

I have $20 USD I can invest in your innovative product!  

I could order a larger baking stone than the baking steel that I have. I’m just cheap. I’ve only had the baking steel a little more than a year and don’t feel like I’ve gotten my money’s worth from it yet. I really purchased it to get more heat into the bottom of pie crusts so size wasn’t an issue. It is only in the past month where I have been baking better baguettes that the thought of a larger stone has started to enter my mind. 

Good morning, Bennie.

I too, am toying with the idea of a scrap piece of marble. However, the baguette pan has it's advantages, in my old leaky gas oven. I can move the pans around the scorching hot oven with the agility of a gazelle! That old oven is the only thing I will miss about Manhattan! She is an old reliable friend. 

 I have a question for you regarding the aliquot jar method. I remembered my wife always has a specimen jar around in case we need a sample from one of the pets. I acquired it,(smile) and plan on giving it a go next bake. I plan on trying to use the 30 ml line (1 oz.) The graduation marks are 1/4 I will shoot for hitting that 1/4 line. Very small distance. I was wondering why you mark off the dough manually? 

Good morning Will.  I’m still uncertain of whether or not I will upgrade to some sort of larger baking stone.  I think I will hold off and decide later, I’m currently not certain that I will want to bake longer baguettes since they will not fit in the side by side freezer section of my fridge anyhow.

Because I can never predict how high the small dough sectioned off for the aliquot jar will be, and I’m not precise about measuring it, I always measure the height of it once I have it firmly compacted at the bottom of the jar.  I recently have been first placing about 10 mL of water in the jar and then pressing the dough into the bottom of it.  I have found, based on Doc’s suggestion, that having the water in the jar helps reduce air pockets at the bottom of the jar.  Once I have the dough pressed in well, I just pour off the water and then measure the height of the dough.  I then can easily calculate what height 25, 30, 35% rise would be and mark those.  I usually use painter’s tape.  Then it is easy to watch for growth.  It makes adjusting build fermentation more easily from bake to bake rather than guessing at the rise since I don’t use a cambro like many of you do.  

Dan has suggested, since I have two jars, to pour the equivalent amount of water to the height of the dough into the empty jar after taring the jar.  Then you can easily calculate how much water is 25, 30, 35% more and use those higher markings in the aliquot jar.  I may actually use this method next time.

Anyhow, that is why I mark them manually because we’re talking about small differences in height so want to be pretty precise to make this useful.

Benny

I am thinking to just lop off 15 minutes from the bulk. Then gage from there, up or down. All my other variables remain constant. Room temperature has been holding steady at 74F. I keep my flour and water always in the same spot. Granted I will need to adjust from room temperature seasonally. I call this the close enough for Rock & roll method! As I mentioned in another post, I am more a big picture type, and not very detail orientated. (That 25% rise line is really a small change!)

Consider this, Benny. Determine a specific weight for your Aliquot dough. Use your water/dough method to mark the level height of that dough. Calculate your desired increase and mark the jar. 

Once this is done, if you continue to use the same Aliquot dough weight your measurements will remain the same.

NOTE - I bet the results would be the same if you spritzed the Aliquot jar instead of use more water. My concern with water is that it is capable of weakening the outer gluten skin. I’ve experimented with that before. BUT, pouring it off is a good practice that may negate the concern.

Hey Dan, Doc had emailed me about his methods and I believe he is leaving the water in the jar with the dough and measuring the change in rise based on the water meniscus.  His reason for this was that the top edge of the dough becomes rounded and may make measurement more difficult.  He found that he got the results he predicted using this method.  I too had a concern about leaving a lot of water in the aliquot jar with the dough.  I thought that the extra water might also be absorbed by the dough affecting the rise and also increasing the hydration a bit might speed up fermentation of the aliquot dough as well.  Thus my reasoning for pouring off the water.

I used Doc’s water method a couple years back during a time lapse video experiment. The problem was the dough detached from the bottom of the jar and floated up above the water level, the gluten also got slimy, and I though weak.

Doc, what is your current findings with the water coverage idea? It would be ideal IF the problems mentioned above were not an issue.

I am not too particular about exactly how much dough gets into the container, with 30g as the target so long as I know what it weighs.  The density is a little more than 1 g/ml but not much and it quickly goes down from there. I put just a little water on the surface of the polypropylene and press the dough down so that it burps out  the visible trapped air before I add enough water to bring the meniscus up to 40ml.  The tamping down and the manipulation that it takes to massage the air out is enough to keep it stuck to the sides of the jar until late in the process.  That also means that only the upper surface is subject to absorbing water (mostly - since water will go down hill into every available crack but the dough will expand to seal those very soon). To cover the worst case be sure there is enough water to cover the dome that will form - figure that the radius of the dome will be the radius of the container (it won't be but it is worst case). The jar is ~43mm diameter so the radius is ~22 so if you put in 30ml and add 22mm of water which is about another 30ml if you want to be conservative.  I have been filling it to 40ml which takes ~10ml and covers the top of the dough.  And 20% volume expansion for a 30ml initial volume is 6ml so if it starts at 40, it finishes at 46ml and you can judge that well enough.  It will grow a little more while you are getting ready to divide but that is OK

I was draining off the water and putting the 30ml back into the dough when it is divided but that was more trouble than it was worth.  If you are worried a lot about the dough absorbing water you can use vegetable oil instead of water.  I found that it was difficult to read the level because the graduations are on the inside of the jar so I put some blue tape on the outside and mark it before I load the dough. CO2 production and thus volume expansion is exponential with time so once it starts to expand it accelerates quickly.

A flashlight and a leftover heel with instructions. Not the french flour ones though. Or you could go the Alan route with the same money and buy a remnant stone and give your batons what they deserve. A chance to grow up in the world and then be cut in half and frozen.

Hmmm interesting, never thought about the possibility of halving them before freezing.  Let’s see if I can get my shaping where I want it to be before even considering trying to go even longer.

I can see a table top in Cheech and Chong's house.  These are marvelous looking.  The crust has a cross between the attributes of your "older" vs. more recent bakes.  The snail's eye view makes the crust look almost like a flaky pastry.  I think that even a most critical professional baker would be hard pressed to find a thing to complain about with these.

I also find, in my very limited experience of rolling 'em out longer, that they assume a really slender post-bake profile, more so that I would have wanted.  

In the video of Parisian baker Mahmoud M’seddi  he talks up the desire to produce an uneven crumb structure, as you have here.

You came into this CB game with truly top shelf baguettes, and now we need to have another shelf above that for your wares.  Maybe we can keep the lower shelf for the cut flowers and fruit you referred to yesterday.

Has been a fun little arts and craft project and I am growing fond of the burnt ends but I will probably return to the uniform blunts as more practical bread if this CB ever comes to a conclusion. I mostly make them in the winter time to have with soup. It seems almost like eating fruit out of season now.

There must be an equation for the proper circumference and length per specific dough weight. Anybody?

Baguettes 'fruit out of season'??? 

-Summer Bruscetta

-Brie and fig jam

-Sliced thin and toasted to accompany a charcuterie or cheese board

-Duck liver pate with cherry jam

-Sliced thin and toasted to accompany a charcuterie or cheese board

-Bare fisting and gnawing the entire baguette poolside, while the other hand shamelessly grips a block of stilton.

Just saying....?

John

Hah! Just wanted to repeat my personal fave option! 

You really like word plays with my tag name...here's a link to the song I took it from...originally done by Small Faces...

 https://youtu.be/gb9Y9syHW_I

Song Of A Baker

There's wheat in the field
And water in the stream
And salt in the mine
And an aching in me  I can no longer stand and wonder
''cause I'm driven by this hunger
So I'll jug some water
Bake some flour
Store some salt and wait the hour While I'm thinking of love
Love is thinking for me
And the baker will come
And the baker I'll be I am depending on my labour
The texture and the flavour

Ok now back on topic...

John

The original song of the baker was the squealing sound bread makes as it cools right out of the oven. It's not just your tag name, I like word plays in general.

they considered changing the name to Drunk Faces, but settled on dropping the "Small" from their name.

BTW Stewart's first two solo albums are worth their weight in gold, still far and away the best work he ever did.  Now he's the modern-day Vegas Wayne Newton.

Ok now back on topic..

What did Chaim get stuck in his nose ?  How did Dr get it out ? 

Ehm, Benny recently asked about consistency in shaping.  Best results seem to come when you fold and elongate to around 70+% length.  Then really important to not stretch the thing or else you may develop thin sections.  Downward force only and bobs yer uncle ! 

Now I always thought that we wanted more stretching or lateral forces rather than downwards Geremy.  Or is it if you are a good ways toward the length you ultimately want the downward force only.  But if you have a long ways to go to get to that desired length you then also need to apply lateral/outwards forces as well.

Benny, your reply caused me to remember something about my shaping of the last batch. I am an advocate of elongating (spreading)the dough. That may or may not be correct, others are producing better crumb than I.

But, I wanted to mention this while on the subject of shaping. I actually slapped the pre-shaped and shaped dough down. It was patted down quite a bit. In spite of that the crumb turned out fairly open.

Nothing about baguettes will surprise me, ever.  And that doesn’t surprise me either.  When you see the professionals slapping their dough during shaping I wonder, isn’t that going to degas it too much and cause the crumb to be very tight?  Yet they somehow produce good crumb.

And there probably isn’t a right way to shape, there are about as many ways as there are bakers of baguettes.  I guess it boils down to what works for you.  Although with this CB we are distilling some aspects of the art of baguettery down to some pearls, I think.

Benny, you are proof that we don’t need wet dough for baguettes to produce gorgeous open and uniform crumb.

The baguette is one bread that defies lots of rules. That can only be attributed to it’s size.

Doesn't mean your bread has to be. I don't understand the trepidation some bakers have about adding a little more H20. I believe all else being the same the dough with more water will have a more open crumb. As we discussed, our different locations and flours makes the whole thing relative. In the batches we are mixing of 500 gr flour, a teaspoon of water is another percentage point. A squirt from my mister is 2 gr. and wet hands surrender some to the dough. I truly go by feel and I end up between 73 and 78% depending on flour but it is not some unruly blob. I try to get my dough to mimic the same consistency as the ones I admire in the videos I have seen. Does your dough act similar to those at 67%? Then we may be close to the same relative hydration.

Benny I think gets his crumb for the same reason he struggles to produce ears. They are at the limit of fermentation. Doc lost his ears with too much proofing in his recent foray.

Adding more water is probably the last thing a guy under a hurricane wants to hear right now so stay safe and dry Dan.

 

I suspect you’re right Don.  There isn’t anything special that I’m doing, but I have been relatively overproofing my dough compared to what I believe the rest of you have been doing.  As such, the oven spring, ears and grigne suffer a bit as a result.  I have a levain fermenting now for another batch and this time I will only bulk ferment to 25% rise and see what happens.

I also suspect that Don’s higher hydration at least in part, is related to his lower humidity and thus drier flour.  I’m not sure where Doc is located but Louisiana, Florida and Toronto are all super humid this time of year and MT isn’t so humid.

I hope the hurricane doesn’t hit your area Dan, stay safe.

We already know that bulk fermentation pretty much determines the final crumb character, but if you are interested in the extent to which that is true try this:

When you divide the dough, cut a narrow strip off one edge and set it (without any shaping) on the couche.

Then cut another and pre-shape it to full length but do no final shaping

Then cut another and pre-shape, rest, and final shape

Compare the resulting crumb.

When you pat and/or roll the dough, you distort the pressure field in the crumb and probably cause some cell consolidation in the process. Two cells that are separated by a very thin wall may coalesce into a single larger cell.  This further distorts the internal pressure/force distribution.  I don't know what the radius of influence is but it could be larger than you think.  For drilling holes in solid material the general rule is that beyond 3 diameters the stresses are pretty much back to what they are in the unperturbed material. Not sure how that translates to foams.

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These are perfection! Wow...

On the subject of pizza flour...I found this Walmart brand of pizza flour (photos above).  Is it possible that it has 17% protein??? I've never seen a flour with such high protein %.  Also, with all the talk of trying to find a lower protein % flour in Canada, wouldn't a high protein % pizza flour be a negative for baguettes?

 John

That's a mix (mixture) not just flour.  If you look at the ingredients list, there will likely be something extra to boost protein.

Another thing to be aware of... where no decimal places are given on the nutrional label, they round the figure.  "5" grams of protein could in fact be 4.5 grams rounded to 5.  4.5 / 30 = 15%.

Update:  After checking... it has brewer's yeast (look under Nutritional Info), which can be high protein.