100% Whole Wheat

After my success with Hamelman’s 50% whole-wheat (Hello and thankyou everyone for your contributions) I tried adapting his procedure to use 100% whole-wheat, which has always been my favourite. I used 78% hydration to get a nice shaggy dough and found that using a hand whisk followed by manual kneading was much better than using my Kenwood Chef with the dough hook. Hamelman’s primary ferment is 2 hours with a stretch and fold half way through; on changing to hand mixing I added two more S&Fs, so now I stretch and fold every half hour.

The final proofing seems sluggish, but maybe I’m being impatient with this and hoping for too much from a 100% wholewheat dough. Dough temperature at the end of the bulk ferment is typically about 23ᵒC (73.5ᵒF) and I proof in the airing cupboard at 27ᵒC (81ᵒF), although since I bag the loaf tins for the proof they probably gain little heat from the environment. After 1½ - 2 hours proving the dough is just above the top of the tins (ca. 730g of dough in a 6½ x 4 x 4 inch tin, measured volume = 1.1.L). This looks a bit less than the proverbial doubled-in-size, but it’s hard to judge. More to the point I get the feeling that the dough is becoming exhausted and is close to collapse at the end of the proof. The poke test says its ready to bake, but the dough feels fragile and the finger-hole springs back slowly.

When I added the extra stretch and folds the dough seemed more alive at the 90 minute S&F than it did during shaping at the end of the bulk ferment, so I thought maybe I was over fermenting. I cut down the primary ferment to 90minutes and the loaves seemed a bit stronger after proofing, but still rather fragile.

Whatever, even if I am pushing this too close to the edge it’s consistently giving me nice loaves. The dough is good to handle, but I’ve not worked with dough this wet before and I have yet to get the feel for gluten development. I don’t know if I’m overworking the dough and damaging the gluten or under-working it so the gluten doesn’t develop properly... maybe I’m getting it just right?

Procedure
Pre-ferment: Disperse instant yeast (0.13g) in water (149g) and evenly mix in whole wheat flour (200g) and salt (4.0g). Cover with cling film and leave overnight at 21ᵒC (70ᵒF).

Final dough: Blend together whole wheat flour (600g), instant yeast (2.80g) and salt (12.0g). Dissolve honey (24.0g) in water (475g) tempered to aim for a final dough temp of 24ᵒC (75ᵒF). Add the flour/yeast/salt blend to the honey solution, whisk to wet nearly all the flour and then knead in the pre-ferment to give an even dough - continue kneading until the dough just starts to become elastic (this mix & knead takes about 5mins). Bulk ferment for 90 minutes with S&Fs after 30 minutes & 60 minutes. Divide into two loaves, pre-shape, relax 15 minutes then shape and proof. Bake in a fan oven at about 230ᵒC (measured, about 450ᵒF) with steam until the internal loaf temperature reaches 88ᵒC (190ᵒF).