Slow Dough

[slowcoach]

I just read another one concerning what to do if you haven't used the starter for a week.

Take 1/3 of the starter, add the same amount of water and of flour as the 1/3 saved to make the replenished starter, discard the other 2/3 of the old starter.

[slowcoach]

Nov 26, 2019 0:37:53 GMT 2 wikki said:

... not sure about the lag phase.

If you add enough starter to the dough the starter is not shocked into a lag phase by an abrupt change in environment. This is essentially what the stages I tried to miss out did. Expand from a small starter to the full dough in easy stages so as not to reenter the lag phase.

[shrjeff]

we have had the starter in the fridge for months without using it... as you know, yeasts manufacture alcohol as part of the process and with an extended period it accumulates as a liquid on top of the flour mixture... this alcoholic liquid is called hooch and was enjoyed by the old sourdoughs (gold prospectors) in alaska... hooch has since become a slang term for booze... when i had the starter, and hadn't used if for a particularly long period, i would just pour the hooch off (though I suppose it could be drunk if one didn't want to waste it) and freshened the starter with water and flour... the only concern is to only use water as the liquid as milk could spoil...

[slowcoach]

Cheers shrjeff,

that is something I wouldn't have learned otherwise. The web is a bit of an echo chamber on things sourdough, just the same old, same old, same and again.

FWIW here the equivalent bread is made from a masa madre, and is popular enough to be sold in some supermarkets, and is still home baked by devotees.

[slowcoach]

I have made three more batches using the revised method:

the first dough was too tight (didn't rise during proving but expanded when baked but at the expense of serious side tearing).

the second dough was too slack (rose during proving but not during baking and in general was over proved).

after some more tweaks he third was wondrous.

Firm but light, and mouthwatering.

Best loaf I have made since I left the UK.

[slowcoach]

I froze a couple of loaves from two batches a couple of days back. I got one out a couple of hours ago and left it on the chopping board.

Sliced an end crust off the still rather cold loaf and it was fine. Were it not for its being rather peculiarly cold I would not have known.

I expect it freezes well because it has a much lower moisture content than most breads, 20-25% as opposed to 35-45%, it is as dry as many a biscuit.

It is a relief to know that I can lay down an emergency supply as soon as I can increase production.

[slowcoach]

I am having a go at culturing the yeast and I am anticipating some batches having a mixed fermentation. So far so good. Today's batch will be the third generation and hopefully a success.

[sophie]

Yeah for experiencing success, slow! A perfect loaf is a wonderful thing. I sometimes think about making bread (or sour dough) but it seems so much effort, especially since my husband doesn’t eat bread. I am content buying good quality bread once in a while from an artisan baker.

[kuskiwi]

I love sourdough bread toasted. Occasionally I buy a good loaf and slice then freeze. Perfect for the too tired to cook much nights with a poached egg or baked beans.

[slowcoach]

It finally seems that bread-making is on a bit of a roll, if you can excuse the bun.

I made some high bran content loaves and they are delicious, albeit a bit overpowering.

Still trying to get supply ahead of demand so that I can freeze an emergency supply.

[slowcoach]

I am rubbish at hand kneading!

Compared to a home bread-making machine, I take longer and produce an inferior result particularly with sticky doughs.

So I have fashioned a tool out of stiff wire (~3mm diameter) to act like a handheld dough hook, it is an improvement, but heavy going to use.

We don't have a mixer, but I do have a Atlas COPCO hammer drill, which is an accident waiting to happen. 

[slowcoach]

It gets hot here in Summer which poses a bit of a problem with using an oven, particularly for baking at high temperatures. When it's 40C outside opening a window to vent hot air out of a hot kitchen is not a useful option.

So I bake bread without pre-heating the oven. The bread proofs in its bread tins in the cold oven. When the time comes I turn the oven on full and after a certain period of time turn the oven off and leave the bread to finish cooking. I also tend to fiddle with the selector turning the oven from "bread" (top and bottom elements on) to "pizza" (just the bottom heating element on), or vice versa. The oven is only "on" for about 15-30 minutes, which is less time than it takes just to pre-heat this oven.

N.B. It is common here to have a low amperage electric supply e.g. 12A (3kW) as you pay a heavy levy based on the total supply capacity. Ovens, hobs, and water heaters are produced and supplied in low power versions to match. The upshot is that it can take an age to get an oven up to baking temperatures.

Doing it this way is a bit sensitive to timing, a few minutes more heating means an oven that is hotter and stays hot for longer. Burning the bread is a real hazard.

I tend to leave well alone until the oven is cool enough to handle the bread tins without a cloth at which point I tip the bread out and leave in the oven to continue cooling and for the bottom of the loaf to dry out.

It is a bit unorthodox but it is a lot better than having a very hot oven heating an already rather warm kitchen.

[kerouac2]

In terms of dough, I only buy the supermarket ready made dough (flaky, pie or pizza). While it is morally reprehensible, I just cannot imagine making my own dough when these other items cost less than one euro.

I can't imagine making my own bread, living in a country with acceptable bread. And I must admit that I am not a bread eater. Can you imagine that I go into a boulangerie only about once a month?

[slowcoach]

Some weeks back, when I was having a bread fail interlude, I abandoned a promising starter that was just getting going.

Last week I found it alive and well and living in the back of the fridge. It only took about 12-24 hours to rejuvenate it from what was a rather uninspiring, pretty disgusting looking, mess.

[wikki]

My starter is a very happy little pile of slime. it takes just a few hours to start bubbeling when I take it out of the fridge.
Two little loafs are prooving in the oven right now.

[auntieannie]

Not a specialist here at all, but I heard a snippet of conversation between a guy who sells gorgeous sourdough bread at the market and of of his customers.

He said something about the temperature needing to be 28c for the sourdough to proof correctly and that he uses a proofer to achieve it. then he bakes his bread in an old fashioned oven, heated by a fire, outside.

[wikki]

nope, it doesn't need to proof at 28° except you are in a hurry and you don't like the sour taste.
I think the fermention comes almost to a stop at 8°character. There are enough breads that are left in the fridge over night for proofing.

[shrjeff]

the ethiopians make injera, a thick pancake-like bread, with teff which has almost no gluten so they use wild yeast and let it proof for days, VERY sour to the point of being an acquired taste...

[OnlyMark]

"...an acquired taste..."
To say the least. It was often the only bread I could get in Ethiopia and it always reminded me of sick.

[slowcoach]

Progressively decreasing the amounts of difficult to get ingredients, e.g. strong and wholemeal flour.

The last batch had no strong white flour and only about 20% wholemeal (80% plain white flour).

So far, so good, tasty but then I am still adding wheat bran as I have good stocks of this compared to the flours.

[wikki]

I finally got a around the differences in flour and equipment!
Yesterday, the bread was made with cheese and rosemary. very tasty.
next one will be with nettles and wild garlic.

[Baz Faz]

My intention was to make bread this morning so it would be lovely for lunch. However I had to go to the supermarket. Then it was recording the Talking Newspaper for the Blind. It is too late now to get the bread baked.

[auntieannie]

Look at this mash report from the UK! (from 17 minutes for topical)

[slowcoach]

Bizarre but amusing, thanks AA.

I would watch the lot but I think it would wind me up just a little too much.

[slowcoach]

Brown not Wholemeal

At one time in my youth the local bakery delivered both white sliced and so called brown sliced loaves, as well as other breads.

I am currently reducing the amount of wholemeal flour in my loaves faster than the amount of wheat bran added.

Close inspection of their brown bread revealed that it was simply the white bread with bran added.

So I guess I'm on a collision course with brown bread.

[auntieannie]

haha! it's English humour, slow! hahaha!

[slowcoach]

Slow humour at least.

This last batch of dough's sponge stage was a bit explosive, it is much more difficult to get wholemeal to rise and the slow drift towards white bread has meant the sponge and the final loaf rising more profoundly. Anyway the sponge was up and out of the container it is always made in. I guess I will just have to make lighter loaves, e.g. less water hence less flour (I work that way round, as opposed to adding water to fit the amount of flour).

[slowcoach]

Sometime in November will mark two years of baking all of my own bread.

We are now, more or less, returned to being able to buy the grades of flour, particularly wholemeal flour that went missing during the COVID-19 blighted shopping experience following the national state of alarm.

[sophie]

Good for you and glad supply chain is back to par. I am trying to make all our bread.. and I have been using the extra sourdough goop for biscuits and banana bread. So last night I baked the banana bread, today the biscuits and tomorrow two loaves of bread.

[slowcoach]

Good for you too!