jut a quickie. Is it necessary that retarded dough is at room temperature before baking...are we talking about 30 minutes approximately? i dont usually retard but have to tomorrow night abnd was going to retard baguettes for 6 hours after shaping in a 3C fridge and take them out, leave them for 30 minutes or so, score and bake...sound about right?
thanks
Moray
into the oven from the fridge. Mind you, I keep my dough a minimum of 9 hours in the fridge before baking. I also try not to let it go longer than 12. The dough does rise a bit during that time.
After only 6 hours though, I think I would let it warm up a bit before baking if there was no rise at all. Your idea of 30 minutes sounds good to me. If you do have some rise, bake away!
I retard even lower at around 2C and go directly from fridge to peel to oven. At my temp there is no fermentation happening, which is my goal. I usually shape at around dinner time and bake the next morning at 9 ish. I prefer to have a short 30-45 minute final proof before going into the very cold fridge.
Well all went well with the retarded dough - I shaped, left in 3C fridge for 6 hours, let warm up for 40 minutes then into oven. All went perfect so thanks
Baguettes warm up pretty quickly, but with larger loaves, the danger in going to the oven too soon is secondary oven spring. In other words, the outer region of larger loaves might have warmed sufficiently, but the core of the dough is still cold. While baking, the loaf can go through an early and a later oven spring as the center core of the dough finally warms up, causing distortion, odd protrusions, and even cracks to appear. If the crust has begun to form at that point, the crumb can be restricted, retaining too much moisture and may end up tight and dense. In a nutshell, give those boules time to warm up after retarding ?
of course. youre a voice of reason. always the little details...:)