How to make sourdough bread...

[chudzikb]

I have done the overnight deal in the refrigerator when I did not have the time to properly proof. it did change the character of the bread and the taste profile. More tangy. Also did a dark, properly baked loaf this week. Was by mistake, I fell asleep! My kids like it lighter. But, the darker loaf was pretty good, I must say. Had a different taste profile and was crunchy.

[Breadhead]

If you want a hard crust I bake it hotter and longer. If I want a hard crust I bake under the SS mixing bowl at 550°. Then when I remove the bowl I reduce the cooking temp in my BGE to 500°. Then I cook to color looking at the loaf through the top vent hole.

[Breadhead]

Breadhead In addition to my overnight brisket (which was awesome, btw), I also did my first overnight bread. Used Breadhead's recipe with 6g starter and 66% hydration. My wife said it was the BEST thing I've ever made. And I've made her a lot of food!

You're right, it does taste better with the long preferment. MORE BREAD TO COME!!

scottranda

If you want to blow your wife's mind, bread wise. Increase the hydration to 70% or 75%. Do a 16 hour preferment, using 1/2 of the flour in your formula, with an equal weight of water, making your starter 1% of the weight of the flour. Add the other ingredients and mix as normal, then after you final shape it and put it in your banneton put it in the fridge overnight to delay the fermentation, again.👍

If I want to create my absolute best loaf to really impress someone that's what I do. That's the utmost Artisan sourdough loaf.

It takes about 36 hours to make the perfect loaf of sourdough bread. However... it takes almost the exact same amount of "hands on labor" as a same day loaf does using more starter, in the same recipe.

It's like BBQ... it requires little effort but there's lots of waiting for stuff to happen.😘

[Breadhead]

Sourdough Ciabatta bread... 😜

I Prefermented half of the flour for 16 hours and then mixed the remaining ingredients into the preferment. Then I put it in the fridge to delay the fermentation overnight. Then I took it out of the fridge and let it final proof for 3 hours. Then I portioned the dough into 3 pieces, about 728 grams, 364 grams, 364 grams and put in my couche, to final, final proof.

I preheat the BGE to 550° and put the dough in on the pizza stone, after I sprayed it with water, I placed the preheated SS mixing bowl over the dough and cooked at 550° for 12 minutes, then removed the bowl and cooked to color... about another 12/15 minutes.

Formula:

800 grams total flour = 100%
640 grams water = 80%
20 grams olive oil = 2.5%
16 grams salt = 2%

Preferment:
385 grams bread flour
385 grams water
30 grams SD Starter

prefermented for 16 hours and then added the remaining ingredients:

400 grams bread flour
240 grams water
20 grams olive oil (after the autolyse)
16 grams salt (after the autolyse)

I folded the dough 3 times and then did some slap and folds and then put it in a rectangle shaped proofing bucket and put it in the fridge.

i took it out of the fridge and let it double in mass and preheated the BGE to 550°. You bake Ciabatta hot, I didn't turn the heat down after removing the SS bowl like I do for sourdough bread. I wanted a hard crust. I cooked to color not IT temp.

This... is kick ass bread.😋

[RonB]

Breadhead - great looking boules as usual, but please check your ingredients. It looks like you have the 640 g of water marked as flour. Most here probably caught that, but a newby might get confused. Also, when I add the amounts of flour, it totals 15 g less than listed in the formula. The water totals 640 g, but what about the starter? Am I reading this too early in the morning?

[Breadhead]

Breadhead - great looking boules as usual, but please check your ingredients. It looks like you have the 640 g of water marked as flour. Most here probably caught that, but a newby might get confused. Also, when I add the amounts of flour, it totals 15 g less than listed in the formula. The water totals 640 g, but what about the starter? Am I reading this too early in the morning?

Thank you for mentioning the error RonB ...👍 I changed it from flour to water. I was guilty of TWI... typing while inebriated.😎

The difference on the water content is found in the preferment... I count the 30 grams of starter as 1/2 water and 1/2 flour. The preferment equals a total of 800 grams. So the preferment was actually 400 grams water & 400 grams flour. I actually had to correct the water added from 255 grams to 240 grams too. That way the math works properly. Total flour = 800 grams, total water = 640 grams... when you include the starter as half flour and half water.

[Thunder77]

Ok, so I tried this out over the weekend. I did Chef Jacob's basic recipe for 70% loaf. Saturday night 10 pm:
preferment:
100 g ww flour
200 g bread flour
250g starter
275 g water.
Sunday 10 am:
Added
200g bread flour
250 g starter.
after 30 minutes autolyse, added 15 grams salt.
proceeded with slap and folds. Into the banneton at 2:45 pm.
4:15 into the oven. looking good. Then it goes south. I ended up with this.

two things I know were wrong. Not enough steam for oven spring, and I got part of the top of the boule too wet.
I may just stick with 66% dough from now on. 😒



.

[Thunder77]

Also Dr Breadhead, do you still do the bulk fermentation even after doing a preferment? I went straight to proofing basket.

[Breadhead]

Thunder77 ... the window pane test. You stretch your dough until it becomes thin enough to almost see through without it tearing. After you add the remaining ingredients to your prefermented flour you start the entire process over. Mix, autolyse, S&F's, stretch & folds, final shaping and proofing.

[Breadhead]

I find my spray bottle a must have tool for baking 66% to 70% hydration sourdough bread. You don't need to spray 75% hydration dough though. The Dutch oven is more difficult than the SS mixing bowl option. Getting the boule in it and scoring it is much more difficult.

[MBMorgan]

Today's science experiment ... way out on a limb with this one.

75% hydration sourdough honey-wheat preferment ... a completely new formula I've been working on over the past few days ... currently in the bench bucket just about ready to start bulk fermentation:



Let the drum rolls begin ... ...

[Breadhead]

Woohoo... that's looking good so far. How much WW flour do you have in there, as a percentage of the total flour? 75% hydration might not be enough.🤔

[MBMorgan]

Breadhead - "Woohoo... that's looking good so far. How much WW flour do you have in there, as a percentage of the total flour? 75% hydration might not be enough."
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Here's the formula and process:

Flour - BF: 200g
Flour - WW: 250g ==> Total flour 450g = 100%

Water: 210g
Milk: 110g (milk is treated like it's 100% water)
Honey: 50g (honey is treated like it's 18% water)
Molasses: 50g (molasses is treated like it's 18% water) ==> Total water 338g = 75% hydration

Salt: 15g = 3%
Yeast: Total from the Poolish and next-day commercial yeast kicker approximately 7g = 2%
Butter: 70g = 16% (ignoring the minor amount of water butter brings to the party)

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Poolish preferment:

100g starter (Winnie) = 50g water + 25g BF +25g WW flour
add 160g Bread flour + 160g water ==> Total 420g Poolish preferment at room temp for approx 16 hrs.

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Next day add:

Flour - BF: 15g (brings the total BF up to 200g)
Flour - WW: 225g (didn't want the loaf to be too sour so left WW out of the Poolish)
Milk: 110g (scalded and allowed to cool to 105 deg. F)
Honey: 50g (bottle in a hot water bath to thin it)
Molasses: 50g (bottle in a hot water bath to thin it)
Butter: 70g (liquified in microwave .... but not too hot)
Salt: 15g fine sea salt
Yeast: 3/8 tsp commercial powdered as a Forkish-style kickstarter

Mixed the milk, honey, and molasses together in a small measuring cup ... then blended in the melted butter.
Mixed flour, yeast, and salt in the bench bucket then mixed in the liquids.
Folded in the bench container a total of 5 times during the first hour.
Bulk ferment (covered) in the same container ... currently in progress.

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I plan to shape into a boule then proof in a banneton until it passes the poke test.
I'll then bake as usual at 475 deg. F for 30 minutes covered in the DO ... then 15-20 minutes uncovered.

You might be right about the 75% hydration ... but it's a comfortable starting point ... and the dough felt about right when mixing and folding. Very sticky and difficult (but not impossible) to handle ... all in all pretty normal so far.

[Breadhead]

MBMorgan ...

My, my, my... you've come a looooog way in your short bread baking hobby. You are talking like a real Master bread baker. You are a fast learner. Tipping my had to you Sir.

WW bread is notoriously dense just because it soaks up more water than bread flour does. Ken Forkish uses 82% hydration in his 40% WW dough. I'll be interested to see how this comes out at 75% hydration. Keep posting pictures as this loaf develops.👍

I'm sure it's going to taste yummy.😋

[Mr. Bones]

That's the best kind of mess, in my experience. Goodness knows, I've made plenty of them ;-)
Good luck with your experiment, can't wait to see how it goes!

[chudzikb]

Holy mother of God, has this become the longest thread on AR? Hat's off to the experimentation. Still do a bit of that, but, I like what I make so much, that it has trailed off. Find something that works and stick with it, at least till I get bored. You guys GO!

[Breadhead]

chudzikb this thread has been active for over a year thanks to you and Steve Vojek doing such fantastic jobs on your first loaves. That just proved making sourdough bread is pretty easy and motivated others to give it a try.👍

[MBMorgan]

OK ... here is today's sourdough honey-wheat preferment fresh out of the oven. The smell is amazing ... can't wait (but I will) to take a knife to this one:


Baked seam side up so blame the laws of physics for the scoring pattern ... ...

[RonB]

MBMorgan - this one looks really good. If it turns out denser than you'd like, (and that happens occasionally with whole wheat), you can add some vital wheat gluten to get a higher rise that will produce a less dense boule.

[MBMorgan]

OK ... so the crumb is not dense at all. It's light and tender (for lack of a better term). Sweet but not overwhelmingly so ... this one's a keeper.

[Ray]

MBMorgan Looks fantastic! Congrats on another great loaf!

[Breadhead]

Mmmmm... your loaf makes my tongue waggle. I bet it melts in your mouth.👌

[RonB]

Congrats - if you like it,it's a winner.

[Mr. Bones]

Some of the most delectable lookin' bread I have ever laid eyes upon!

Keep up the Great Works!!!

What sorta bread knife you got layin there?

[MBMorgan]

Some of the most delectable lookin' bread I have ever laid eyes upon!

Keep up the Great Works!!!

What sorta bread knife you got layin there?

Thanks! It's a Wusthof classic... probably thirty years old.

[Mr. Bones]

Thanks!
Nothin' beats the classics!!!