The latest Community Bake featuring Ciabatta has just started. Why do almost all of the formulas call for a pinch or so of CY in the Poolish and then adding much more in the Total Dough mix?
I ask because it seems that using less CY, thus extending the fermentation time, would enhance the flavor of the bread. Is there a reason why a Poolish couldn't be made with a small amount of CY and once matured, be mixed into the Final Dough in the same way a levain would be used? Couldn't the Poolish by itself be active enough to raise the dough without adding any additional CY to the final mix?
Thanks in Advance,
Danny
the poolish is used to enhance the flavor, as well as help establish extensibility, for a CY dough. By adding the pinch of CY, the poolish is assigned ~10-12 hours for the task. The time allows for the flavor characteristics to be established. On the contrary, the poolish would mature within a few short hours if the CY amount was all front loaded into it therefore cheating the finished product of the purpose of the preferment.
I’ve been wondering the same question as Danny’s. In other words, does the small percentage of CY in the preferment grow enough to leaven the total dough? My guess is yes, with the addition of extra CY to the total dough only for the purpose of speeding up the subsequent rise.
if you have enough time. For example the standard Bouabsa dough, given ~ 1hr. BF counter time then resides for something like 20 or more hours in retard. It uses ~ 0.16g of IDY. A standard poolish baguette uses a total of ~0.35g of IDY, between the poolish and the final mix (almost all dedicated to the final mix), twice that of the former.
Perhaps the question is more along the lines of how much time can one or one's mix tolerate prior to considering BF completed?
I think that Dan has an experiment coming us quite soon...