Basic White Variation with San Francisco Starter

I am still using the San Francisco Starter after I brought it out of it’s sleep from my refrigerator. The sour is somewhat more pronounced but not yet up to potential. I think sour sourdoughs like to have an active starter with the refreshment not being a huge amount of the starter. In other words don’t dump out most of your starter and refresh it with a lot of water/flour and expect it to be sour and if you have refrigerated your starter or reconstituted it from a dry state, expect it to take a little while to build up it’s sour producing bacteria.

This batch of dough was a higher hydration than the last one and it was a bit harder to handle. My recipe was a variation of the White Basic:

3 cups starter

3 cups water

2 Tablespoons oil

4 teaspoons salt

1 Tablespoon Malt Syrup

2 Tablespoons cornmeal

1/4 cup Rye flour

9.5 cups Bread flour

The yeast is very vigorous in the starter which was refreshed about 18 hours before using. The bulk fermentation took only 3.5 hours, which is too fast for a good sour.

I divided the dough into three pieces which were all about one ounce shy of being two pounds.

Here they are roughly shaped and resting before their final shaping:

I put them in the refrigerator overnight and gave them 2 hours to proof. Here are all three loaves:

They all came out wonderful with a nice holey crumb.

Here are some closeups:

Here is the crumb:

We will see if the sour is more pronounced as time goes by. I know the Northwest Sourdough would make a nice sour if I used it right now, but it has been active and used for quite a while without being refrigerated like the San Francisco starter.

Super San Francisco Sourdough!!

I took my San Francisco Starter out of the refrigerator a few days ago and have been refreshing it to bring it back up to vigour. Yesterday afternoon, I mixed up a new recipe for Super San Francisco Sourdough.

This is such a nice starter, it proofed wonderfully in four hours.

  I made enough for two large loaves of just over 2lbs each. I also made the dough a lower hydration than I usually work with. The dough felt wonderful, bubbly, alive and smelled great. Here are the two dough boules:

The flecks in the dough are cracked wheat. I waited five minutes and rounded up the boules by using a twisting motion with my two hands and slight pressure. Here is what a twisted boule looked like after you put it in it’s basket:

I refrigerated these boules overnight and for many hours the next day. I didn’t bake them until about 12:30 pm. I wanted a very long cool proofing. Then it took only  1 -1/2 hours to warm them up and get them proofed enough to bake. Here is one of them slashed and ready to bake:

The bread came out absolutely wonderful! Here is the first loaf:

Here is the second loaf:

Both loaves:

Here is a closeup of the blistered crust:

Here are some crumb pictures:

The bread was still slightly warm so I couldn’t tell how sour it was, as the sour comes on after it has completely cooled and set. It was already mildly tangy though. The crust is terrific and I would say it was a very successful baking day!

Diablo Sourdough

I have a funny blog today. I was running out of bread and with Thanksgiving today, I needed some for Turkey sandwiches! So on Tuesday night I made up a Rye sponge with  Starter, water and Rye flour:

I let this set overnight.  Next morning I added the rest of the ingredients to the sponge and bulk fermented the dough for five hours. This was a Rye starter but the majority of the flour added was bread flour.

The dough was sticky from the Rye:

I made up two loaves weighing just shy of 2.5 lbs. and put them into bannetons:

They proofed nicely in two hours and I preheated the oven to 500 degrees. I was trying to compensate for the heat loss when you load the dough and spray  for the first five minutes or so. You would know it…. I loaded both loaves… sprayed and steamed for the first five minutes, then I set my timer and forgot to turn down the oven!!! Boy was I surprised when my timer went off and it was time for me to turn the loaves and they were practically burnt! Diablo Bread! I was certainly shocked. Not that I haven’t made that mistake before, I have, but I had two huge loaves in the oven and they were awesomely dark. I turned them around anyway, and knew that they still needed to bake in the center, so I covered them with foil and turned the oven down to 350 degrees. They came out very dark, but not actually burnt. I guess I could call them specialty Artisan Diablo Loaves! Ha! I got raves on the flavor! Wouldn’t you know! Make a mistake and people rave, do a great job, and no one comments. Here are my Diablo Loaves, the first one :

The second loaf:

Well they will probably dry out sooner than usual, but slathered with mayonnaise and lots of Turkey, they will be gone soon anyway. Here is the crumb:

Anyway, next time you forget to turn down the oven after the initial five minutes, tell everyone they are Diablo Loaves 🙂

Asiago Cracked Pepper Loaf

My new recipe is called Asiago Cracked Pepper Loaf. So far, the raves have been for the outstanding flavor of this sourdough bread. I added cracked cornmeal and some Rye flour to this dough and the bulk proofing was pretty fast at 3.5 hours. So I decided to make it a one day bread, hoping with such fermentation that it would still have a good sour. It does! I could have made two large loaves, but decided to make three smaller loaves instead. The recipe made a smaller amount of dough than my usual recipes. I mixed up the dough and had it bulk fermenting by 1:00 pm. I could tell it was raising fast. I knew it would reach the top of the bowl when it was overproofed so I mixed it down and poured it out:

I kneaded it just a little and rolled it into a ball:

Then I cut it into three pieces:

I got some cracked Black Pepper and Asiago cheese ready:

I saved a small piece of the cheese for grating on top of the finished loaves. I should have bought more cheese though. This was about 6 oz of cheese and I think 12 oz would have made  cheesier loaves. The dough pieces were resting and so I took them and stretched them  into a rectangular shape and pressed in the cheese and pepper.

I then shaped the dough into loaves and put them into bannetons:

I sprinkled some of the coarse cracked cornmeal around the dough. I could see the cheese and pepper peeking through the dough. I let the dough proof for two hours at room temperature and then popped the first loaf into the oven, here it is:

With the second loaf I sprinkled the topping cheese on when it was still in the oven instead of afterwards like I did for the first loaf:

Here is the third loaf:

All three loaves:

The bread sat up high and has a great crust. Here is the crumb:

This bread has an incredibly good flavor, its amazing used for sandwiches and awesome as toast. This recipe will be available in the Special Recipes folder.

Sour Vienna White?

Yesterday I got up early and mixed up a batch of Vienna White bread. It is so terrific tasting especially when you use motherdough in the dough. I added 1/2 cup of Rye flour to the batch, as you by now know my inclination towards using a bit of Rye here and there. I have the recipe for this Vienna White posted on the Recipe section of the forum: http://teresal.proboards84.com/index.cgi?board=recipes&action=display&thread=1156995759 

I have posted a blog about doing up this Vienna White before. Anyway Vienna White is a great loaf to do as a one day sourdough. Here is the dough already bulk fermented and ready to pour out:

I divided the 5 lbs 12 oz of dough amongst four loaves and put them into the couche:

They proofed for two hours and the first two loaves went into the oven. The oven was preheated for over an hour so the stone was pretty hot. However the first two loaves were slightly underproofed and needed more like 2.5 hours to be perfect. They presented a disappointing picture as the dough was mottled colored, the slashes gave way and didn’t become defined, and they were somewhat flattish.

Here they are:

The second two loaves came out great, the color was well developed and the loaves sit up high and the slashes are well defined. The pictures don’t show these attributes too well, the breads look somewhat similar in pictures and the lighting isn’t good. Here are the second two loaves:

The baking time was the same and the temperatures were the same for both sets of bread. I am bringing this to your attention because it has happened often before especially with dough that is all proofed at the same time so that the first two loaves are always proofed less and you can see the difference with the loaves that are proofed correctly compare to those that are even slightly underproofed.

Here are all four loaves, the first baked are on the left:

Vienna White usually comes out with a soft fine crumb and is mild flavored, however, with the added Rye flour, the crumb was chewy, holey and has a pronounced sour tang, even for a one day bread!

Something the Same Something Different

Today I bake up something the same… Basic White Sourdough… and something different…but we will get to that later. I mixed up some Basic White Sourdough yesterday and meant to shape the loaves and put them into the refrigerator. But sometimes things happen! I got too busy and couldn’t get to the shaping, so I put the dough into a large bowl and out on the enclosed cold porch. It was around 50 degrees. I didn’t have enough room in the refrigerator. Next morning the dough was looking nice! :

I made up enough dough for three loaves, however, for Breakfast I decided to do something different. I took one third of the dough and using 3 oz pieces of the dough, I made “Fried Bread”. Now it isn’t really fried bread because you don’t fry it, you griddle it. My husband’s mother would often make this bread from a batch of dough she had proofing. She would pull off pieces of dough, pull and stretch out the dough in irregular sizes and throw them on the griddle. I have been asked several times if I would try to make up some with my sourdough. So I did. Here are the dough pieces cooking on the griddle:

I griddled them at around 375 degrees. I didn’t pay any attention to how long they took as I put them on one by one as I pulled them into flat shapes. I watched them and turned them as they got brown. They smelled wonderful cooking. They are not thin like pancakes, and you don’t roll them out, so they have thin areas, and thick areas. They puff up and cook pretty quickly, it doesn’t take too long. These would be great for camping! Here are some on a plate:

They are crispy in some spots and chewey in other spots. Fry Bread is wonderful with lots of butter, jelly, honey or cream cheese. You ought to try some next time you mix up a batch of Basic White Sourdough! YuMMMMMY! My husband declared that they tasted better than the yeasted ones and that they were lighter and fluffier in texture, with nice sized bubbles.

Oh yea, I almost forgot the “Something Same”…. I baked up the Basic White Bread later in the morning. Here it is:

Sorry about the dark pictures. We have had a lot of rain and storms and not much sun. When I try to take pictures indoors, I have a hard time with the lighting. I probably need a lighting box!

Hawaaiian Pineapple Sourdough Bread

I have something new, a sourdough made with Pineapple, Orange Juice and Coconut for a Hawaaiian flavored bread. I mixed up a batch this morning early. It bulk fermented for six hours:

I rolled the dough into boules:

I let the dough proof in glass bowls and then put a mixture of Pineapple topping with Coconut over the dough:

I baked the dough right in the bowls and here is what came out of the oven:

I turned out the bread and let it cool and here are the loaves of Hawaaiian Pineapple Sourdough :

Next loaf:

Here is the crumb:

The dough is soft and tangy with the flavors of citrus/Pineapple/Coconut. A delightful change of pace!

Today, Sourdough English Muffins

Sorry if you have visited and seen no pictures. Our server has been down after a power outage and we have been setting up a new one and configuring it, so the pictures and web site are down at times. I have uploaded these pictures to photobucket as I cannot access our ftp client right now, so if I peg out my bandwidth with them, you will not see pictures again. Soon we will have all of the bugs worked out!

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Basic White Sourdough with a Rye kick

I mixed up some Basic White Sourdough:

I use a bread mixer and add :

However, instead of just white flour, I used 1/2 cup Rye flour. It does make the dough more sticky and hard to handle. But it also makes the bread sit up and kick! The dough seems more alive and bubbly and the color is great. Adding Rye flour to any bread recipe seems to kickstart the fermentation. I wonder if it is like feeding yeast some coffee? Here are some pictures of the three loaves I baked from the above recipe:

All three loaves:

Here is the crumb:

Delicious, sour, great!! Basic is such a wonderful all around sourdough! It is also one of the easiest of sourdoughs to make. If you want to read more about the method of mixing and baking the Basic White Sourdough Bread you can find it at:

http://www.northwestsourdough.com/recipes.html

Messing Up Molasses Whole Wheat!

Boy did I ever mess up this last batch of bread! I was doublechecking a recipe and so I mixed up some Molasses Whole Wheat bread. I was mixing up the dough when I suddently got called away on an errand to visit someone who is ill. I wasn’t able to mix for the amount of time needed, so I put on the lid and left the dough. When I got back it was quite a bit later and the dough was well into the bulk fermentation so I decided just to leave it alone, wondering how it would do without the needed mixing. After bulk fermentation, it was evening and I poured out the dough to shape it. Much to my dismay, there was embedded chunks of unmixed flour and hardened dough where the flour had only partly mixed in. It looked like maybe 1.5 to 2 cups worth! I never had this happen before and I almost threw the whole thing away! Instead I pulled out all of the unmixed hardened stuff and kneaded the rest of the dough. It felt great and smelled great so I went ahead and shaped it and put in the bannetons. It made three loaves of almost 2 lbs each, so you can see it would have been a large batch. Then, because the dough seemed just a bit slow raising, I decided to leave the shaped loaves out half an hour before putting in the refrigerator. I got interested in a movie someone in the family was watching, forgot all about my dough and 3 hours later when I remembered it, the dough was already proofed and ready to bake! However at 10:00 pm with a cold oven, I was not ready to bake! So I took each loaf and reshaped the dough and put it out in the cold pantry which was at 45 degrees (it’s been cold around here!).

That was my next mistake! By morning the pantry had warmed up to 50 degrees and rising. The dough was already overproofed!

 I tried to slash it, but after one slash it started to deflate immediately! Jeesh!! So,  without much hope of a third rise possible, I reshaped the loaves again!!

Now this would be the third time proofing or the fourth if you count the bulk fermentation! I began to think the dough wouldn’t raise, or the dough would have been so long fermented, it would be ghostly white ….again! However, luck was with me this time, or Whole Wheat and molasses provide plenty of sugars for the yeast to feed on, because…. much to my great surprise, the dough rose very well even though it did take three hours. Here is what I got after all of my mistakes…at every single stage!!

Here is an up close picture of the bread:

Crumb:

The crumb is light as a feather and fine grained, the oven spring  was spectacular ! The taste is very wheaty and has a wonderful tang. This turned out better than the original recipe!  Hurrah for mistakes…..sometimes!!! 🙂