Yesterday, I baked what I thought would be a flavorful and healthful combo: a 50% whole wheat / 50% whole rye bread, with add-ins of grated apple, grated white sweet potato, toasted walnuts, toasted pumpkin seeds and a tiny bit of pale rye malt (activated with 65C water). Total hydration was around 70%, though the grated apple made it much wetter than that.
I didn't follow a specific recipe, but I took inspiration and loose procedures from two bakes posted by Martadella last year: https://www.thefreshloaf.com/node/70504/rye-and-whole-wheat-apples & https://www.thefreshloaf.com/node/70031/easy-and-tasty-whole-rye-and-wheat.
Still, what I pulled from the oven left much to be desired. Essentially, I got spread rather than rise (baking in a loaf pan would surely have helped) and the bread, perhaps overwhelmed by the add-ins, didn't develop much of a crumb structure.
I'm gonna be away from baking for the coming month, but I'd like to think about what I might do differently if I attempt something like this again.
Rob
It could be you didn’t develop the gluten enough. You could have also overproofed the dough before baking. The hydration is not that high even with the apple so it’s probably one of the above. What was you procedure for mixing, bulk etc and how much levain did you use and was it lively?
Thx, Ian. Perhaps I hit the trifecta of problems.
I made a levain with all the rye flour -- 50 g of starter (refreshed two days before and refrigerated after approximately doubling in size), 250 g of flour and 200 g of water, which I fermented on the counter for 12 hours. It was active -- aerated and light -- though not particularly sour smelling. I mixed it with 300 g of whole wheat flour and 225 g of water, including the water I used to activate 10 g of rye malt -- meaning total hydration was 75%. The dough seemed kind-of slack from the get-go and didn't produce long strands of gluten. As I normally use a mix of whole wheat and ap or bread flour, I figured this might be due to the higher bran/germ content of the flour. I figured it would come together more as I folded in the apple, sweet potato, nuts & seeds, but it never did. Bulk fermentation and proof combined lasted about 2.5 hours.
Rob I hope the bread tasted good, the ingredients should have made a tasty loaf. So the prefermented flour was 50% and there was a rye malt. That dough would ferment rapidly. How much rise did you get at the end of bulk? And how much more at the end of final proof? (If you didn’t use an aliquot jar you might not know the rise at end of final proof). With so little gluten it was going to be difficult to get a strong tall loaf unless you really developed the gluten upfront, did you do much gluten development beyond folds?
Benny
Thanks for the pointers and questions, Benny.
The bread does taste good -- though the flavor of the flours doesn't come through as strong as I expected.
I'm sure I didn't develop the gluten enough. I don't have an aliquot jar (I'm rather gadget averse), but eyeballing it, I'd say it almost doubled during bulk and increased a little during the proof. I definitely skimped on the kneading, giving it only 10 minutes at most. I hurried the various folds to mix in all the add-ins exactly because I was afraid of how fast the dough might ferment and lose structure. And shaping was a nightmare. I just rolled and pressed the sticky mass into a vague batard because it had so little tensile structure.
One more thing: I used FarmerGroundFlour, whose rye is fantastic. But their WW is 12% protein, while King Arthur, which used to be my go-to, is between 13% and 14%. Perhaps this might also have contributed to the slack feel and the need for more kneading.
Rob
You’ll need to do much more initial dough development in my opinion if you’re using that much prefermented flour since it will ferment quickly and there is less time for more passive development through folds. The fact that it doubled in size by the end of bulk makes me think it likely was over fermented and probably had a lot of acid which then weakened the gluten even more.
If you were to try this again, I would greatly reduce the prefermented flour down to say 9-10% to slow down fermentation so that you could do more folds to help with dough structure. Also do more initial kneading since the gluten potential of this loaf is lower due to the high percentage of rye in it. FI ally, end bulk at a much lower rise say 40% or so and then give it a bit more time after shaping before baking.
Good luck if you try it again, these types of bakes are very informative and we can all learn so much from them so thanks for sharing Rob.
Benny
Thanks so much, Benny!
I will make it again taking your & Ian's suggestions into account. But, as I'm out of town for the coming month -- and, indeed, will be doing an insane amount of traveling for the remainder of the year (I'm not complaining, mind you) it may take some time for me to circle back to it.
Rob
Enjoy your upcoming travel Rob.
Benny