Homemade Bread

[levain]

Originally Posted by slackmeyer

Thanks for the pictorial Jim! I think it's really cool to see that, I'd love to see more bakery pictures.

Do you mix the dough with a rest (autolyse) in the middle? That's something that I still do picked up from where I worked- 5 minutes of mixing, 5 minutes of rest, add the salt, 3 more minutes of mixing, then let it rise.

Some of our doughs use an autolyse, but not this one. It wasn't mixed long enough to bother. I basically mixed it long enough for our stiff levain to incorporate fully and that's it. Around 3 min. on first. That top photo is the final dough mixed.

BTW, keep doing what you're doing if it's working for you, but you're really not getting anything out of a 5 min. rest.

Autolyse should always be a min. of 20 minutes up to around 45 min. Remember to never add any leavening (yeast, pre-ferment). The real purpose of an autolyse is to allow the flour to absorb all the water before any mixing takes place, allowing you to mix less and higher hydrations. That takes time, and why you never add any leavening to an autolyse. You don't want it to start fermenting in the bowl.

I feel like if your hydration is high enough, and you're not doing much mixing anyway an autolyse is pretty useless. If you make the same exact bread you normally do, but extend the autolyse to the normal 20-30min. without any leavening I'd guess you could bump the water up a bit giving better volume/flavor/hole structure. However, one of the coolest things about making bread is that there are 1,000,001 ways to do what we do. If you're happy with the result that's all that matters!

This Genzano sold out at our 3 stores in 90 min. yesterday. Folks were blown away by the depth of flavor dark crust gives. I'm opening eyes slowly but surely in RI!

[Timmy Tucker]

Originally Posted by Jim Williams

[IMG]

That is just plain beautiful. I'm such a hack.



As far as sourdough goes, the starter I have is pretty low maintenance. It's made from instant potato flakes. I feed it every 3-5 days, but have let it go as long as a week w/o feeding. It stays in the fridge in between feedings. I've had this particular batch of starter going for 4 months now.

[huzar]

Decided to go with the "yes-knead" approach on these loaves... Once I had kneaded the dough enough to get a good window, I let it rest for four hours, then cut it in half, formed loaves, and proofed them for another three. Baked them on the pizza stone at 450, and I sprayed the oven down with water from a spray bottle to get some steam in there before I loaded them.

Turned out real nice, but I don't think they're any better than the no-knead ones I've made, and while they only take about 8 hours end to end, I spend more hands-on time with these loaves.

About to go in:


40 minutes later:

[pilot]

Looks good on the outside, how's the inside?

[huzar]

Originally Posted by pilot

Looks good on the outside, how's the inside?

The inside is so so... I think the crumb is a little too compact:

[AngryScot]

yeah but how did they taste?

[huzar]

Originally Posted by AngryScot

yeah but how did they taste?

Delicious... especially with a little bit of good butter and some rose hips jam for breakfast this morning

[LPcreation]

Originally Posted by huzar

The inside is so so... I think the crumb is a little too compact:

I have this problem with a lot of my breads. Any tips on making it less compact?

[AngryScot]

Originally Posted by huzar

Delicious... especially with a little bit of good butter and some rose hips jam for breakfast this morning

crumb structure be damned!

[levain]

Originally Posted by LPcreation

I have this problem with a lot of my breads. Any tips on making it less compact?

Hole structure is related to lots of different things all inter related. The biggie is hydration. If there's not enough water in a dough, you'll never get a good hole structure. Fermentation is huge, and with that proofing. Over proofed bread will lose hole structure even if it was a perfect dough once upon a time. Development and strength in the dough has alot to do with it.

I would recommend upping hydration first. Keep in mind that wetter doughs tend to ferment a little faster.

Ingredients are an important consideration. Any fats will hinder a good hole structure.

[WetCoastRider]

couldn't believe my eyes when i saw this thread, quel chance!

I have been baking bread for a few years now, and the NYTimes article really sparked my interest. The no knead method opened my eyes to the possibilities in baking good bread from home.

Anyhow, for those of you interested you might want to check out these two links

This is a similar method but has returned much more satisfactory results for me. it involves making a sponge which is supposed to sit for more than 2 hours (I have been leaving it for around 12 hrs to develop flavor) and then mixing the dough and using a method of short kneads and 10 min resting periods.

It is very easy and makes excellent bread - I've even upped the wholewheat content considerably with still good results.

give it a try.


This is the page where the blog starts - its an interesting read for the beginner :http://sourdough.com/blog/sourdom/be...-hopefully-not

This is the method I use http://sourdough.com/blog/sourdom/be...ing-and-mixing

And use the Pane Francese (2) - sponge ingredients list from here http://sourdough.com/blog/sourdom/recipes

I have been using my baking stone to bake the bread and pour boiling water into a pan under the stone just before the loaf goes in to make the "oven spring"

I found this works better than the dutch oven method because I always have a hard time getting the relatively soft proofed ball not to crash down into the dutch oven.

Here is a quick image of my latest. sorry for the poor quality



Keep up the good baking

[IDScarecrow]

So my old cheap bread knife went missing. Now I have an excuse to buy a slick new fancy one. My wife wants a Wusthof, I was thinking Shun. Any recommendations?

[LPcreation]

Originally Posted by Jim Williams

Hole structure is related to lots of different things all inter related. The biggie is hydration. If there's not enough water in a dough, you'll never get a good hole structure. Fermentation is huge, and with that proofing. Over proofed bread will lose hole structure even if it was a perfect dough once upon a time. Development and strength in the dough has alot to do with it.

I would recommend upping hydration first. Keep in mind that wetter doughs tend to ferment a little faster.

Ingredients are an important consideration. Any fats will hinder a good hole structure.

Thanks for the info Jim. I guess that explains why my bread I made this weekend was a little on the dense side........buttermilk, 1 1/2 sticks of butter, beer cheese and wild boar meat make for a dense but delicious loaf.

[levain]

Originally Posted by LPcreation

Thanks for the info Jim. I guess that explains why my bread I made this weekend was a little on the dense side........buttermilk, 1 1/2 sticks of butter, beer cheese and wild boar meat make for a dense but delicious loaf.

That'll definitely do it!

[AngryScot]

Made for pasta dinner last night.
The middle was a tad doughy if that is a word? still tasted great with some butter melted on it and used as a pasta scoop

I still need to get my arse out to get a stone. The pot I have been using is good and all, but I want to try some french type breads next