Community Bake - Ciabatta!!!

So I made the Ponsford ciabatta again from Maggie Glezer's Artisan Breads again, but I did several things differently - not with good results, unfortunately. Except for the following changes, everything was the same as Bake 1:

1. Mixed the biga per the Vito Iacopelli video. It didn't rise much more than it did in Bake 1.

2. Knocked about 30 seconds off the final mix. The gluten was noticeably less developed, which was intentional. I was hoping it would result in fewer ginormous holes.

3. Coil-folded the dough during BF instead of using standard S&Fs.

4. "Aggressively" patted out the bubbles and folded the dough before portioning it, Ciril Hitz-style.

5. Forgot to flip the dough and poke it. This was unintentional and resulted in bigger holes at the top of the loaves.

6. I reduced the bake time to 35 minutes.

These breads were a complete disappointment. Nobody would ever guess these were from the same recipe as Bake 1. The taste is yeasty and bland. The crumb is soft, mostly lacking in random holes, and has no chew whatsoever. A hint of doughiness. Obviously, some of the changes didn't work out, but I can't help but feel that the biggest error was in stopping the mix early. The plan is to mix another biga tomorrow using Mulino Caputo 00 Americana flour that was delivered this afternoon. On Friday, bake day, I plan to revert to the original process from Bake 1, but am, of course, open to suggestions.

I baked Joy Ride Coffee’s Ciabatta formula which uses a 100% hydration levain along with 19% whole wheat (I used Red Fife) and made it at 80% hydration.  As I mentioned earlier I used the mixer to build gluten up very early on.  This had the effect of making the dough the smoothest non sticky dough I’ve worked with.

I ran out of time last night and had to end bulk at 50% rise in the aliquot jar.  This afternoon I took dough out of the fridge and after 1 hour divided into two.  I folded the long ends in about 20% and then folded the dough and floured the seam transferring them into the floured couche.  All seemed to be going well.  After a 2.5 hour bench rest when the oven was heated to 500ºF I attempted to transfer them from the couche to the transfer board.  This is when disaster struck.  I think the dough is somewhat overproofed, not sure why since I only bulked to 50% rise, perhaps the final bench proofing time was excessive for this dough.  Also perhaps the acid load was too high and the dough was getting proteolytic.  So when I attempted to transfer the first ciabatta to the transfer board, it was very very stuck to the couche, this despite my flouring it at least as heavily and probably a fair amount more than I’m use to doing for the baguettes.  It was so stuck that I have to use my fingers to pry the dough off the couche.  It was bad enough that after using my fingers to disconnect the dough from the couche there was still some dough stuck to the couche.  At this point I didn’t have much hope for these ciabattas.

Eventually the ciabattas were on the peel seam side down and baked.  They baked with steam at 480ºF for 13 mins, then 420ºF for 15 mins without steam at which time they were quite dark, but didn’t feel like they were fully baked yet.  I dropped the temperature to 350ºF and gave them another 5 mins to try to get them baked without burning.

Sad looking flat ciabattas, they would make good door stops!

I think when I try ciabatta again I will try with a biga. Beautiful hate giving up on a recipe that others have had good success but I’m not sure will work for me. 

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Catalana's answer to ciabatta.

Checked last year's notes and made some changes.  

• 100% hydration Bread Flour levain.
• Replaced WW with Rye.   
• Autolyse prepared 3-4 hours in advance, taking a page from Brotkraft.  Refrigerated for the final 2 hours.
• Whisked together levain, IDY, sugar and salt.
• Moved to mixer to add autolyse in small chunks, then bassinage and olive oil in phases until the sight and sound signaled to me that the mix was over.
• Folds in BF tub at 0, 30 & 60 minutes.  Volume tripled in 110 minutes.
• Replaced the heavily floured counter with only water for divide and shape.
• Went immediately from divide to oven peel to oven, post haste.
• Preheat 480dF, Steam 460df 13 min, rotate, 13 min 440dF, 3 min vent.

 Unfortunately, these baked about 4-5 minutes too few, and should have been browner with a drier crumb.  The takeaway is that the crust also didn't have time enough to truly dry,  and subsequently it didn't have that "shatter"when cut or bit into.  

However the process felt right to me and the shaping, with the wetted counter and wet hands proceeded smoother and was more predictable.  No matter what, without more skill or some kind of sleeve or tray to place these on, they will aways have that freeform look to them.  Still some merging of the loaves in the oven.

I figure that if I do this another dozen times I should have it down by then!  Probably go for 100% Bread Flour, no rye next time...

This is really very similar to Benny's most recemt bake above, with 28% pre-fermented flour in a 100% hydration levain, the rest of the flour was cold autolysed overnight at 60% hydration and included 0.1% IDY and 1% diastatic malt.  The levain and autolysed flour were combined (making a dough with 70% hydration which is a little wet to quickly develop the gluten and I will move to an 80% hydration levain for the next batch).  After a few minutes of mixing to get the gluten development started, I bassinaged in the remaining water at about 25g/minute which is about as fast as it will absorb it without having the dough break.  It still took a few minutes of additional mixing to get the development I was looking for.

After transfer to the bulk fermentation container it received two sets of folds 20 min apart then three French folds at about the same interval.  When the aliquot jar said that it had reached 45-50% volume increase it was divided and shaped and put on the couche to counter proof for about 2 hrs (aliquot jar = 100% volume increase from end of mix).

Proof could have gone longer as the dough was quite robust and easy to handle - and from the look of the crumb I probably should have let it go longer (kitchen is cool today).

Oven cycle was 500°F for 10 min with steam, 10 min at 400°F with residual steam which means about 40% humidity in the oven, then 5 min at 20% humidity.  I will leave it in the oven for another 5 minutes next time as it didn't sound done when I finally got around to checking (but it was too late to put it back in).

Crust is crispy, crumb is creamy, color is a little light but OK, flavor is great with the kind of sour I like.

This is a mild departure from my baseline with does not use a long cold autolyse, but it still needs work.  I have tried a stiff biga a couple of times with less than stellar satisfaction.  I like using the cold autolyse because I can do almost all the prep and cleanup in the evening, then get up and if the levain is ripe go straight to mixing.

The large bubbles at the top of the loaf could be better distributed so for anybody who has a suggestion about how best to do that I would be an attentive student.

So for next time - a lower hydration levain and more of the water in the bassinage, same BF (50% increase), longer proof, and more time in the oven.

DIving back into ciabatta after not making it for a long time reminded me why I stopped baking them. For such a simple looking pile of dough it was always more difficult than it appears. I always found the distinct smell and taste of well made ciabatta very appealing but difficult to reproduce at home. Thanks to everyones contributions here on the CB at TFL. I now see a path to making an authentic version. My preference is for slippers with large holes versus moon boots that need to be sliced to make a sammy with, so that is what I aim for. To each his own.

I did the Giorilli recipe with CY because like baguettes I prefer to use yeast over SD to get a thinner crust and lighter crumb. I find it more reliable and has a more wheaty taste. The new found way to make a biga(thanks Ilya) was a game changer for me and actually pretty simple to boot. The distinct ciabatta smell I was looking for was in the biga. 

My first attempt that I will not be posting was a disaster. Sorry Dan. I used my Bosch mixer which really works well for the bassinage unless you start with too much water! The biga remained lumpy and the whole mess looked like bad cotton candy in the bowl with no cohesion. Then I put it in the proofing bowl I hadn't oiled it so that was the next mess. The bake was flat and ugly and had me thinking I should stick to baguettes. At the end of it all I did end up with some nice croutons

My second attempt went quite smoothly after making the adjustments of holding back enough water to knead a stiff dough until smooth and then drizzle in the remaining water. It held together really well and I think I could have added even more than the 80% water called for. I should have trusted the rounded 1/4 tsp of IDY in the biga but I added another when mixing and it moved too fast. From mix to the oven in three hours seemed too short also I think these are slightly underproofed and should have had more time during bulk and final proof. Divided into two pieces and did a lateral letter fold and was pleased with the shaping. I may try stitching it next time. Proofed top down on a couche and inverted and dimpled before baking at 450 for 28 minutes. My preference for ciabatta is golden brown but these needed a little more time to dry out.

I was surprised to see them split on the top but the crust was paper thin and very soft.       

This bread had very soft crust and crumb was  pleasant to eat on it's own but even better with a little pesto smeared on. It also made for a good PB&J. I was hoping for bigger hole so I will definitely give these another attempt but without the malt powder because the Wheat Montana AP I used is already malted. Thanks everyone for showing me the way.

An improvement on No.1, but no big holes. The formula was based on the yeasted Giorilli formula, but with 80% PFF, instead of 100%.

Having seen many bakes on here (including my first one) with blotchy mottled surfaces, I decided to do something about it and added 1% sugar and 1% skim milk powder to the final dough, as well as the 1% malt specified in the recipe. This has solved the problem - in my eyes, anyway.

My shaping was pretty "rustic" and has room for improvement! Although the crumb didn't have big holes (perhaps overmixed?) the bread was very light with high specific volume.

Lance

Well, while the oven was on for bake no.2......

This one followed a different recipe. There was an overnight yeasted sponge preferment, ambient for a couple of hours and then in the fridge. This 33% PFF preferment was 50% manitoba and 50% medium rye flour.

The main dough had some milk and sugar and a high yeast rate.

I think these actually had a better shape than my bake no.2, but a bit heavy on the flour as they were sticking to the couche like crazy!

Lance

This batch incorporates the learning from yesterday:

28% PFF in an 80% hydration levain fermented 13 hrs @~27°C, the remaining flour was cold autolysed overnight and included 1% diastatic malt and 0.1% IDY.  The water used to hydrate it was quite warm (110°F) but the mixing time was reduced form 8 minutes to a bit less than 5 min.

The ripe levain and the autolysed flour were combined  for 10 minutes at low speed and made a dough of 65% hydration which was just right for developing the gluten quickly (after two minutes of mixing at high speed the dough was ready to start the bassinage of the last 131g of water).

The bassinage took less than 6 minutes (25 g per minute continues to be a good rule for how fast an 1800g batch of dough will accept additional water), and two more minutes of high speed mixing were enough to finish it.  The dough was smooth and very extensible when transferred to the BF container.  Four-way folds followed by French folds were delivered on 20 min centers until it was strong enough not to flow back into the corners. Dough was bulk fermented to a little over 150% of post-mix volume, then shaped into four ciabatta and proofed for 90 min at a room temperature in the low 70's. Each was inverted when transferring to the pans and two of the four were finger stapled. Oven cycle was 500°F with steam for 10 min, 400°F for 15 min, then 350°F for 10 minutes to get the right sound when tapping the bottom of the loaves.

Images below are all four loaves, three uncut, one cut. Crumb is much improved with uniformly spaced, moderately large holes, a crispy crust and a creamy crumb again though more elastic than yesterday which was slightly under-baked. The additional 5 minutes of oven time at 350°F did not increase the crust thickness detectably though in theory it should have thickened it somewhat.

{Late add: the crumb of the stapled and unstapled loaves was indistinguishable}

This was going to be 33% whole wheat, 80% hydration sourdough ciabatta with 100% prefermented flour in a 50% hydration salt-retarded levain.  After some on-the-fly tweaks, it ended up 37% whole wheat. The remaining flour was all-purpose and I added vital wheat gluten for a 14% protein content.

The story on the salt is that I've been experimenting with salting my starters.  'Cause, I EAT my starters.  Lately I've been salting them full-strength so that the "discard" goes straight into the microwave.  I'm not sure if the bugs are salt-adapted or if it just didn't phase them, because it hasn't slowed them down appreciably.  Even more recently, I've been keeping it progressively stiffer, and I've noticed really good things happening to the flavor of the microwaved sourdough--yeastier and well balanced with a milder tang.  I'm not sure how much is the salt and how much is the hydration.  I think it's both.  Afterwards, I searched TFL and found old posts with information that yeasts are more salt-tolerant than lactic acid bacteria.  Turns out that several years ago, Abe experimented with salting his, without mishap.  It's apparent that as hydration is lowered, the salt concentration (at the same baker's percentage) increases.  I estimate that 2% salt at 80% hydration is akin to 3.2% salt at 50% hydration.  Yeast should be fine at that concentration but it likely impedes the LAB.  So for today's bake the levain was 100% total flour, 55% hydration, and the full 2% baker's percentage of salt.  I built the levain with a 2.2% salted 60% hydration whole wheat starter that was 1 hour at room temperature, 24 hours refrigerated.

I cut the 60% stiff starter into small pieces (10% of formula), added the water for a 50% hydration levain and the 2% total formula salt.  An immersion blender made quick work of dispersing the pieces. 

I poured this over the flours and shook to combine, but 50% hydration was still floury.

I added more water for 55% instead: 

I left it at room temperature 1 hour, then refrigerated 24 hours. I took it out about an hour early to start warming up.  Today I added half of the remaining water (100 deg F) and mixed it pretty easily by hand, squeezing it through a fist.  Then I added the remaining water and 3.8% soybean oil.  Oops, that became too liquid.  I should have bassinaged the rest in more incrementally.  After 6 minutes on the mixer, it didn't look like it was going to come together, so I added another 10% of a 70% hydration, salted, whole wheat starter.  After that, it came right together and 3 minutes mixing later I had a nice cohesive dough which gave a windowpane.  Thus the total formula ended up 37% whole wheat, 79% hydration.  I took an aliquot for the jar and put them both in an oven with the light on.  The dough temperature stayed 78-80 deg F throughout bulk fermentation.

At 30 min, stretch and folds, then 1 or 2 sets of coil folds every 30 minutes for the next 2.5 hours, then still more coil folds 45 minutes apart until the 5th hour of bulk fermentation.  It ended up about 10 sets of coil folds and at 4.5 hours I did a lamin...stretchification.  7 hours into BF I saw 100% rise, so I slightly shaped it into a log and wrapped in a heavily rice-floured towel.  I let it proof 30 min more, getting to 108% rise before I chickened out and baked it 450 deg F 20 min with steam and 10 without. 

Here's the crumb shot: 

The flavor was a mild tang, maybe a bit fruity.  The whole wheat wasn't particularly dominant but noticeable and I found myself missing the 20% sprouted white whole wheat with commercial yeast.  So it was an interesting exercise but I think I'll go back next time.

--Tom

Today was my third and (probably) final fun at the Ponsford ciabatta in Maggie Glezer's book. I did some experimenting with Bake 2 that was not advantageous, so I largely returned to the technique used in Bake 1, which is the method detailed in the book. The only difference was that I changed flours to Caputo Americana.

DanAyo kindly offered some pointers on developing the Caputo Americana flour that I took to heart for today's mix. Everything proceeded according to expectations except that it took much longer to develop the dough this time around. The dough was considerably softer, which Dan told me to expect. However, by the end of the second fold, it was clear that this was a really lovely dough and I expected a great ciabatta. 

Unfortunately, I made a fatal error when I divided the dough. After I turned out the dough onto the counter, I realized my bench knife was in the dishwasher and, looking quickly for a substitute, stupidly decided on a chef's knife. Of course, the dough pieces stuck to the knife and each other like nobody's business. To make a bad situation worse, I then placed those damaged strips of dough on top of the main dough pieces and, after the dough was folded, they were comfortably nestled inside. Why, you may ask, would someone bake damaged dough strips into their ciabattas? Fearing the answer, I've decided not to plumb that existential mystery ;-) Anyway, I could see those miserable little strips right in the center of the baked loaves as soon as I cut into them. 

Six hours later, I'm still shaking my dang head, but realized that the crumb surrounding the thick doughy strips wasn't half bad. If I hadn't assailed it with the knife, these ciabattas probably would have been alright. My conclusions are two-fold: First, mise en place! Second, I've learned what I can from the Ponsford ciabatta and it's time to move on.

This my third attempt the Ciabatta community bake. I changed my approach and formula. I reverted to my regular flour of 11.5% protein and increased the hydration to 76%. 30% of the overall flour was fermented in a 60% hydration biga over 16 hours in the proofer.

The dough was very sticky to work. I don’t have a dough mixer, so I use my Thermomix to incorporate the ingredients and then turn-out onto the bench. I did not want to add any extra flour during the handling, so I mist the bench with water and kept the bench scraper and my hands wet. I folded the dough for 10 minutes before dumping into a bowl for 2-hour bulk fermentation, that includes a fold after 1-hour. I was worried at this stage as there was no discernable rise in the aliquot jar.

The final proof of 1-hour was on a couche supported by a couple of wine bottles. This gave me a flatter profile than the last attempt and more like a slipper. I inverted the dough onto a peel and then immediately into a pre-steamed oven at 238C for 36 minutes. Steam for first 10 minutes of the bake.

I’m disappointed in the crumb as I have some large holes near the top surface at one end. I hope to remedy this next bake by docking the dough before loading into the oven.

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Definitely has a high flavor profile to make up for its misshape!

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Danny, thanks for the instructions on how to opt out.

It looks like you have to post a new comment to get the opt out controls to show up. 

Here's my new comment. :)

Murph

I have never tried to bake ciabatta before but encouraged by this community bake I thought I would spend a morning on YouTube to watch a bundle of videos on the subject to see how it is done. I eventually settled on John Kirkwood's Sourdough Ciabatta Bread  largely because it uses a sourdough poolish which I have often used before.

So with the poolish it became a fairly leisurely process over two days. On day one the poolish was put together late in the evening by mixing 200g each of flour, water and active starter and letting it sit at room temperature overnight. (I used 85% Dove's strong white flour with 15% home milled wheat flour).

Next day mid morning with the poolish bubbling away strongly

The remaining 140g water was stirred in and then 250g flour and 8g salt and machine mixed for 10 minutes. (Well I had to justify the purchase of that shiny new Ankarsrum mixer during lockdown).

"With the dough transferred to a square plastic box bulk ferment lasted     4½ hours  with 4 coil folds in the first 3 hours. Proofing was 1 hour".

I did not have the recommended couche to hold the divided and shaped dough but I had found a clever alternative in a video by Buzzby Bakes who lays a sheet of baking parchment in a roasting tin and after spacing out the divided dough on it pulls up a fold between each piece exactly as you would do with a linen couche. The big advantage of using parchment paper is that at the end of proofing you just stretch out the folds to separate the loaves/rolls which can then be baked in the same roasting tin on the parchment paper and without handling them. I was able to cover the tin closely with a baking sheet to keep the steam in for the first 15 minutes. 

My own feelings are, not bad for a first try. the crumb could more open with a longer bulk ferment but I am anxious now to have a go at ciabatta bake 2.

I did the Giorilli recipe again and committed it to memory because it was good bread the last time and I saw lots of potential for improvements with more familiarity. I really like the James Bond shaken not stirred biga and the simpleness of the yeasted version for it's ease of assembly. The goal this time was a more open crumb and a more slipper like shape. The biga had a half teaspoon of IDY and was used 16 hours later with little to no growth evident and still some dry flour between the shards of dough. I used my Bosch mixer and held back 80 grams of water and fed the biga in a piece at a time until a smooth dough was evident on speed 1 for about 5 minutes. The remaining water was drizzled in at speed 2 for another 5 minutes or more until a strong cohesive dough was achieved. A couple tsps of olive oil was added at the very end. Final hydration was 82%. Fermented for less than 2 hours with 2 coil folds in an oiled bowl. It had more than doubled when it was dumped on a well floured counter and gently stretched it into a rectangle with no folding. I floured the cut line down the middle and pinched it down with the edge of my peel before cutting it with a dough scraper. I did no folds or shaping but gathered it up by both ends and transferred them to the floured couche with a stretch to elongate them. Proofed for an hour before inverting and dimpling then baked at 450 with steam until done, about a half an hour later. I forgot to set a timer and may have removed the steam pan too early because the crust was more substantial than the paper thin crust from the last time.

Being a fan of ciabatta with large holes I was pleased with the crumb and wished I had sliced this one horizontally for sammiches. Strangely the other loaf did not have a crumb as open as this even though it was handled with the same care. The flavor was also less sweet than the first batch so I may add back in a portion of the diastatic malt that was omitted this time.