Another one of my hobbies

[Way2slow]

Sour dough, fresh out of the oven.

 

 

[Deephaven]

Nice loaf. Where is the crumb pic?

[Skunkmaster-k]

That looks delicious 

[Way2slow]

It was still cooling, just cut it a bit ago.  

It wasn't that pretty to take a picture.  I was rushed to get it in the oven so I didn't get it long enough on the second rise, had some dense area in it.  It's was still good though.

 

[soflabasser]

Looks good!

[Deephaven]

Looks great, I love sourdough.  You made me go start a levain so we can have a loaf on Monday.  This one is from last week. 

 

 

[Way2slow]

That's a nice looking loaf.  For some reason, when I bake in house oven, they tend to be light colored.  They look more like yours when I bake in the wood fired oven but I have to preplan to bake in it, this was a spur of the moment deal. 

I listened to others and tried freezing my starter.  Didn't work.  Tried drying and then keeping it in the freezer.  Didn't work.  

I restarted about a month ago feeding a new starter, this is the first loaf I've made from it and did that because I got tired of dumping the leftover in the trash.  Made some pancakes with it the other day.  Figured I would try the bread today.  They say it takes about three months to be actually be ready.  

When I froze it, it was seven years old and lost it, thinking freezing was going to work.

I didn't make any panettoni's last Christmas because you need a very active sour dough starter and then, convert it to a "sweet" starter to make them, didn't have a starter to start from.  Thinking I was going to use that I had frozen. 

Figured I had better get started back because I have almost 200 pounds of wheat berries, red, hard white and soft white, I need to get used up.  

I grind my wheat fresh as I need it so I can have true 100% whole wheat.  

[Deephaven]

I keep my starter in the fridge.  It comes out once a month to get fed and sit on the counter for an hour and back in the fridge.  I take out 5g of it a few days before I want bread and start feeding it.  If I plan right I can get by with no waste other than my monthly feed/dump.

 

That is baked at 475F with lots of stone/iron in the oven and lots of ice for steam.  

[Way2slow]

Wow, once a month.  I have two, a whole wheat I grind and a King Arthur all purpose flour I put in the fridge after 14 days of room temp, and I'm feeding those once a week.  I use several of Peter Reinhart's books for recipes and he says to feed once a week.  That was what I did before.  I'm going to have to try the once a month with a jar and see how it does.

Right now, I wasting a lot of flour doing an experiment.  I have the two jars in the fridge covered, one whole wheat and one all purpose flour, feeding those four ounces once a week. Then I have one jar on the counter with cheese cloth over it and feeding it three ounces of flour every 12 hours.  Then I have another jar of fresh ground red wheat I kept outside with cheese cloth over it for a wild yeast starter.  I just brought it in to the counter a few days ago and feeding it three ounces ever 12 hours.  I've read the wild yeast starter cultivated outside like that is not supposed to be as tangy as sour dough starter cultivated in the house.

So, I'm feeding two jars 3 ounces every 12 hours and two jars in the fridge four ounce every week.

I plan to do this a couple more weeks so when it's about two months old, I want to do a side by side bake off between the four different jars and see if and/or how much difference there is between them.  They claim the ones covered in the fridge are the strongest tasting, the wild yeast is the mildest and the other flour with just cheese cloth is in between.  So, I'm going to see for myself.  

I've always kept one 100% fresh ground wheat and one KA plain flour starter and if once a month feeding works, that will be good.  If the wild yeast starter is what they say, I will keep it in the place of the ground wheat sour dough starter.

 

[jbsoonerfan]

I don't understand any of this, but it sounds like you guys go to great lengths to make bread. I am lucky if I remember to marinate my steaks or chicken breast a few hours before putting them on the grill or smoker.

[TnRiver46]

I grew up eating pieces of bread with nothing on it, loved the stuff. Now if we have a loaf it just molds and we throw it away. I have no idea how or why but we no longer eat bread at home????

 

These photos are making me want some though! 

[Deephaven]

Keith, you don't need to keep two starters, just one.  You can build your levain with whatever flour you want when you pull the mother from the fridge.  I use 5grams of fridge starter, feed it 2x a day for 2 days and am good to go.  That 5g of starter isn't really relevant what flour it is as the overall levain ends up being close to 200g when I am done and the flavor profile of whatever I want to add takes care of it.

 

If you go to 2 months you may end up with lots of alcohol....but even at 2 I haven't killed a starter yet.

 

Reinhardt is a good resource, but "recipes" for sourdough are all pointless IMO.  Technique on the other hand huge.  I mostly make 80-90% hydration loaves although occasionally go wetter if I use meatier grains.  

[bulldog1935]

If you haven't tried it, sourdough makes killer pizza.  

 

once there was a BBQ grill in this chimney pit, now it's a 600-degree pizza oven

[Way2slow]

At first I thought 5 grams was a typo, but I guess you are serious.  I've never heard of using that small of an amount.  I pull off 50 grams into a fresh jar and feed it with 75 grams of bottled water and 75 grams of flour.  I started going to the extra flour because the starter is active enough, it will eat through 50 grams in a few hours.  It always seem most recommended 100 grams, but burning through too much flour for that with this experiment.

I always pull off what I want to keep into a fresh, clean jar, feed it, and throw the other in the trash.  or use that to build enough for a recipe I plan to bake.   Never had a problem with it going long enough to develop alcohol. 

All this stuff I'm doing with all these different starters is just an experiment.  Want to see if how it's cultivated and maintained makes a difference in flavor.  

When I get done, I will go back to one or two.  It was always easier to keep a whole grain and an all purpose flour than converting one to the other when I was doing more baking.  Too many irons in the fire had me slowed down on baking for a while, but getting started back.  

I have not tried any above about 80% hydration.  I use 70% for most of my pizza's doughs.  I usually cook on the hearth and not in pans, even in the oven, I use a large pizza stone and a very heavy steel tray I made to pour water in for steam when the bread goes in.  When the dough gets too slack, I have a hard time working with it.

 

Yes, I have made pizza dough with sour dough, and yes it's good.

Had to do something for the wife before I could finish typing.

I have 36" wood fired refractory oven I built a couple of years ago. I can get it as hot and one could want.  900 - 1,000 degrees is no problem for thin pizza's. I can cook pizza's one evening, close it up and still be hot enough to cook biscuits for breakfast the next morning. 

[CrankFate]

Ooooooooh, you’re killing me here! I love bread. This is killin’ me after being low carb for the last 3 months. I specifically went to the pizzeria around here with the charred smoky crust last night. Love sourdough, too.  Tried my hand at making fresh breads during the lockdown, but decided to leave the bread making to the bakery.

[Way2slow]

Deephaven

If you happen to read this, I just made a couple of loaves of bread using that "Wild Yeast" starter I've been growing, and that stuff made an incredible loaf of bread.  However, it's not your regular sour dough, nothing even like sour dough, absolutely no tangy, sour taste to it, just a nice rich flavor.  One note though, it has to be made in the spring time, before the temps get much into the 80's and it's recommended temps are in the 60's.

This one I made using a piece of cheese cloth over the jar, and fresh ground hard red wheat to start and feed it every time, and let it stay outside for two weeks feeding it every twelve hours after it got active.  I did bring it in a couple of nights when the temps were going down into the low 30's. Then I placed it in the fridge and feed it every 24 hours for another week.  After almost a month, I decided to try a loaf with it. 

My wife and daughter don't like sour dough bread, and they both said that's the best tasting "sour dough" loaf of bread I've made.   It has a very unique flavor.  

Now, it has never gone more than a day without feeding it, so once it goes into the storage mode, only getting fed once a week, or once a month when I try some that way, I don't know what's going to happen.  I'm also going to start feeding a jar of it stored with all purpose flour, eventually converting it to all purpose and see if it keeps the flavor it has or converts to the typical sour dough starter.  I'm hoping it retains it's flavor.  It's going to suck putting all this work into it and it converts to sour dough in the long run.  However, I am keeping one fed regularly with fresh ground wheat, just as a backup if the other converts to sour dough, in an effort to try keeping the flavor it has now.

I also did these in Dutch ovens and not as hearth breads.  

[Jigfishn10]

On 4/10/2021 at 12:16 PM, Deephaven said:

Reinhardt is a good resource, but "recipes" for sourdough are all pointless IMO.  Technique on the other hand huge.  I mostly make 80-90% hydration loaves although occasionally go wetter if I use meatier grains.  

Agree, Reinhardt is a very good resource.

80-90% hydration? Good golly, that's almost a poolish! 

I've gone up to 75ish% for a ciabatta, never ventured into the 80% range. Can't imagine working with something that wet. Might be something to try though. You have my respect for the boules your making.

Good deal Deep.

[Deephaven]

On 4/17/2021 at 1:58 PM, Way2slow said:

Deephaven

If you happen to read this, I just made a couple of loaves of bread using that "Wild Yeast" starter I've been growing, and that stuff made an incredible loaf of bread.  However, it's not your regular sour dough, nothing even like sour dough, absolutely no tangy, sour taste to it, just a nice rich flavor. 

More than "happen" to read this   I've never done that.  Interested for sure.  I have found I can steer the sourness a bit depending on the fermentation.  We like ours in between.  Basically around a 4.5 hour bulk rise with and overnight chill in the fridge.  Today's was just under 95% hydration.  A bit too long of a ferment so it collapsed some, but was still super yummy.  

 

On 4/10/2021 at 11:36 AM, bulldog1935 said:

If you haven't tried it, sourdough makes killer pizza.  

 

once there was a BBQ grill in this chimney pit, now it's a 600-degree pizza oven

It does...but I have a hard time figuring out the fermentation.  I LOVE long fermentation pizza doughs, but my oven isn't hot enough which makes them super chewy versus being the combination of custardy and chewy that I desire.  What oven is that and how do you like it?  Is 600F enough for you?

6 hours ago, Jigfishn10 said:

Agree, Reinhardt is a very good resource.

80-90% hydration? Good golly, that's almost a poolish! 

My whole family digs it.  Takes some effort to get it together, but your hands learn quickly.  

[bulldog1935]

that's actually my buddy's pizza oven - he has - one portable, that one also propane-fired, and a wood-burner.  Sorry, I can't tell you the brand, but love the results when I visit, and also when he brings the smaller oven car camping (or RV).  

And yes, it doesn't travel without the stone.  

[Way2slow]

Deephaven, if you get bored and feel like writing down your process for make those loaves, I would luv to have it.  I've never been able to get those kind of loaves.  I'm lucky if mine get to the smaller size bubbles in them.  I've played with bulk rise times trying to get there, but they seem to go flat when I cut them and have very little oven spring and that's a sure sign I'm going too long.  That was the main reason I quit feeding my starter a couple of years ago and froze it.  I got a little frustrated with the results I was getting, and just went back to making other hearth breads. and pan breads.

I still don't understand how you can get a loaf like that with 90% hydration.  Mine would just pour out and make a big puddle if I tried that.  Are you cooking them in a pan or something to hold their shape?   If I'm not doing sandwich breads in bread pans, I pretty much do hearth breads in the WFO or use Dutch ovens in the kitchen's oven.  I do have a large stone I will sometimes use in the kitchen to cook one when I don't feel like getting the WFO going.

I like Reinhart's books for his specially breads, like his Stollen, luv that stuff.  Another one I like to make is Panettone, but I found an Italian chefs recipe for that, that's by far the best.  For those, you have to be a little nuts, which that I am, because there is a ton of work and effort involved to make them the right way.  Luv those with a cup of my coffee.  Which I happen to roast my own coffee beans also.

 

[Deephaven]

No pan. Just on a pizza stone in my oven.  Lots of steam and some cast below it.  I can write up what I do, but also have a bread proof setting on my oven so mine is based on 80f proofing.  You might have to stretch it.  As for hydration I would generally not recommend trying much above 75 or 80 depending on the flour you have as it gets way harder to handle

 

 

My pc is out away and it is too long to type on my phone so tomorrow 

[Way2slow]

No rush.

Our Bosch oven also has a proof setting, but have never used it.   I have a proofing box I made with a digital temp controller I use.  Most of the time I go for the slower proof at room temp or refrigerator.

 

I also used some 1/2"x 3 1/2" steel to make me a rectangle tray I put in the bottom of the oven for a steamer.  There's enough mass to it, it make loads of steam.   

 

I have three fours I use for breads.  King Arthur Plain and Bread flour or grind my own for whole wheat.   I only use White Lilly for biscuits, pancakes and waffles.  You can't make a good biscuit without White Lilly flour.

[Deephaven]

AM is 7am and PM around 7pm.  I use King Arthur Sir Lancelot bread flour which is a 14.2% protein.  My normal wheat is a Granite Mills Red Fife which is a sprouted organic wheat with the bran included.  Hydration levels are MUCH easier to go higher with a higher wheat percentage.  Below is an 80%...but taming it to 75% would be a good idea first round.  515g of water then.

 

Day 1:

AM: Pull out 5g of starter from the fridge and add 5g of water and flour

PM: Add 15g of water & flour

 

Day 2:

AM: Remove 25g and discard.  Add 20g of water & flour to the remaining 20g

PM: Remove 20g and discard.  Add 40g of water & flour to the remaining 40g

 

Day 3: 

AM: Add 100g of flour and water to the starter

Mix: 685g of flour and 550g of water in a bowl and cover. (80%)

Put both the starter and the autolyse in your proofer.  I run mine at 80F (actually 85f, but when I measure my oven is a hair under 80F at that setting)

Wait for the starter to double at least and be super lively.  Normally around 3-5 hours.

 

Add 185g of starter (27% of flour weight) and 15.75g of salt (2.3% of flour weight).   Mix using the rubaud method, then do slap and fold kneading.  Combined I usually have 15min or so into them.  You MUST keep your hands wet during the process otherwise you will be sticky as all get out.

 

Put the ball in the proofer covered with a damp towel at 80F and repeat that for the rest of these steps:

At 15min intervals - do a coil fold (3 total for 45min)

At 30min intervales - do a coil fold (2 total for 30min)

Let bulk rise for a total of 4-4.5 hours.  Usually 4 is good for me.

Cut the dough in half and do a rough pre-shape.  ie, I just bring the four corners over each other, roll it over and let it sit.  Rest for 20min uncovered.

Do a final shaping (same folds, a bit more stretch and roll with the bread knife), put into a banneton.  Rest 20min  uncovered.

Cover the bannetons with a plastic bag and refridgerate over night.

Preheat the oven, setup like this for at least an hour as hot as she will go. Mine goes to 550F.

When the oven is preheated, remove the banneton from the fridge and turn it over onto a piece of parchment paper.  Ready 4 big cocktail ice cubes.  Slide the parchment paper onto the pizza stone, drop 2 large cubes in each cast iron pan, turn the heat down to 475F and close the oven quickly to maintain steam in the oven.  Cook for 19min and then open the oven to let out the steam, rotate the bread and cook for 4-5 more minutes until the internal temp is 200F or so.  My oven runs hot perhaps so you may need more heat than 475.  The more moisture you have the higher heat the bread seems to take.

 

As for roasting coffee, I don't...but my father does.  I would but since he lives close no reason for 2 Behmor roasters.  This was today's breakfast cup.

 

 

[Way2slow]

Wow, thanks a million, 

I was going to make an Italian bread today, made the starter last night, but got sidelined.  

Had a doctors appointment, and then went to a junkyard and got a hood for the VW.  I was amazed, I actually found one the right color, so it only cost me $80 to repair it.  There was a few hours of other work getting it so it would latch down though.  It drove the latching system back about an inch and down about 1/2", so I spent a few hours making everything fit like it was supposed to, and getting the hood to latch down, but now, you would never know it.

Funny thing, I bought a Livia 90 espresso machine in 2000 so the wife could make her a cappuccino like she enjoyed in Italy.  I didn't even drink coffee then.  She has never brewed the first cup and I'm roasting coffee.  Which, like everything else, I can't keep it simple, I have to have everything very precise and computer controlled.  Which for that, I have to make my own circuit boards and controllers for doing that.  

Through all this, I never got into Latte Art.  

My wife is big into needle work, and she has a stitching group that meets at different members house each week or so.  They say they love coming to her house because they never know what kind of coffee or treats they will be having.  These small town country women don't even know what a latte is but they love for me to fix that coffee with the foam on top.  My wife hits me up to do something special for them each time.

Looking at your oven setup.  It sounds like you have the same Bosch oven we have.  You are using the same pizza stone I have, and until my wife stopped me from using her cast iron pans, I did the same setup.  Finally made some out of 1/2" thick steel that will produce even more steam than the cast iron did.

[Deephaven]

I can use the pans...they are mine and retired to oven mass duty.  Had replaced them years ago with some thick copper restaurant supply pans I bought in Paris.

 

...and you reminded me I forgot to feed the starter tonight.  Would screw my bread making up for tomorrow.  Thanks for bumping the thread