The Falzon Filone (Batard)
My execution of Maggie Glazer's flawed formula for the TomCat filone. The Tomcat filone formula found in bread across America has a well know problem with hydration. My reworked formula has given me spectacular results every time I have made it! Todays reddition is no exception.
I present the first Arizona bake of the Falzon filone.
This wild yeast Semolina filone (batard) always takes a lot of nurturing to come to fruition. The end results are always worth the trouble. At 859 grams of raw dough cooked down to 655 grams. (plus some inevitable bowl residue common in an 82% hydration dough.) This is my signature Falzon filone. I feel like if I can't get $15.00 ea. for these I would just as soon eat them myself! What do you think guys worth $15.00 simoleons?
I really do enjoy working with semolina!
Looks great! Funny that the well-known formula hydration problem has so many people continuing to bake bread, referencing the original formula!
I started my bread journey with this (Maggie Glezer's Tom Cat's Filone) formula. Key word in the original description is "gloppy". I struggled with this for a couple of years until I decided to reduce hydration. My bread baking improved alot since then.
Semolina is a great flavored grain and makes a great loaf. Rimacinata is my go-to semolina grade.
This is my go too durum/semolina. In my estimation, the fineness grade is equal to Italian remicinata. Whether G.M. resorts to re-milling or not to achieve this level of fine I don't know. The downside of this product is, it only comes in 50lb bags.
Regarding Ms. Glezer's formula, I went against the grain with my formulation. Most people agree that the issue creeps in early in the process. The poolish does not take into account the 59 g of yeast water resulting in a very liquid 129% hydration poolish. I opted to leave the poolish at the high hydration, then lower the additional water in the final dough to achieve final hydration of 82%. My autolyze used only the final dough water minus 10% to facilitate adding the salt. Then the very liquid poolish is added only as fast as the dough can absorb. A basinage of sorts. That is my dyslexic solution. Smile...
Very handsome loaf and a great crumb with that buttery colour that makes semolina breads so good. Nice bake Will.
Benny