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One of my thoughts in purchasing a Brød & Taylor Folding Proofer was that I would be able to make Three-Stage Detmolder rye breads with more precise temperature control than I could otherwise achieve. After using this device for fermenting other starters, fermenting doughs and proofing loaves over the past couple of months, I my first rye by the three-stage Detmolder method employing the Folding Proofer this weekend.

My one previous bake of a Detmolder 3-stage rye was almost 3 years ago. (See: http://www.thefreshloaf.com/node/12742/hamelman039s-70-3stage-rye-sourdough) I do recall that bread as having a delicious, sweet, earthy, complex flavor. The bread I baked this weekend was the very similar 80% Three-Stage Rye from Bread. This bread has an hydration of 78%. 37.8% of the flour is pre-fermented.

As described by Jeffrey Hamelman in Bread (pg. 200), this method, developed in Germany, “develops the latent potential of a mature rye culture through a series of builds,” each of which optimizes the development of yeast growth, lactic acid and acetic acid production, respectively. The builds differ in hydration, fermentation temperature and length of fermentation.

Hamelman calls the three stages or builds “Freshening,” “Basic Sour” and “Full Sour.” The first build encourages yeast multiplication in a moist paste fermented at a moderate temperature. The second build is much firmer and is fermented for a long time at a relatively cool temperature to generate acetic acid. The third build is, again, moister, and it is fermented at a warm temperature for a short time. This build is to increase the lactic acid content of the sour. After that, the final dough is mixed.

Ferment 5-6 hours at 77-79º F.

Ferment 15-24 hours at 73-80º F. (Shorter time at higher temperature.)

Ferment 3-4 hours at 85º F.

Procedures

1. Mix all ingredients 4 minutes at Speed 1 then 1-1 1/2 minutes at Speed 2. DDT=82-84º F. (Note: Hamelman's times are for a spiral mixer. If using a KitchenAid, I double these mixing times.)

2. Bulk ferment for 10-20 minutes.

3. Divide into 1.5-2.5 lb pieces and shape round.

4. Proof about 1 hour at 85º F.

5. Dock the loaves. Bake for 10 minutes at 480-490º F with steam for the first 5 minutes, then lower temperature to 410º F and bake 40-45 minutes for a 1.5 lb loaf and about 1 hour for a 2.5 lb loaf.

6. Cool on a rack. When fully cooled, wrap in linen and let rest for at least 24 hours before slicing.

These loaves scaled to 807 g. After baking and cooling, each weighed 700 g.

Crumb and loaf profile

Slices

I sliced the bread after it had sat, wrapped in linen, for 24 hours. The crust was chewy, and the crumb was moist and tender. The flavor was very mellow and balanced. It was not as sweet as I remember the 3-stage 70% rye being, but that was 3 years ago(!). The sourdough tang was present but subdued. A lovely flavor.

I had been planning on leaving the loaves unsliced for another 12 hours, but my wife decided she wanted rye with smoked salmon as an appetizer for dinner. How could I refuse such a tempting proposition?

Delicious!

I also made a couple loaves of Hamelman's Pain au Levain today. As simple and straight-forward as it is, this is one of my favorite breads.

Pain au Levain bâtards

Pain au Levain crust

Pain au Levain crumb

 David

Submitted to YeastSpotting

Sourdough Bread made with Liquid Levain fed twice a day

from the SFBI Artisan II Workshop

Probably the key experience provided in the SFBI Artisan II workshop on sourdough baking was baking a series of breads with liquid versus firm starters, starters fed either once or twice a day and breads with different proportions of starter. Each variation produced breads with noticeably different flavor profiles.

Our instructor made it quite clear that he and his colleagues at the SFBI had a clear consensus that the best-tasting bread was produced using a liquid levain fed twice a day and with the liquid levain constituting 40-50% (baker's percentage) of the final dough. The dough had an overall hydration of 68%.

The characteristics of bread made in this manner were a very mild sourdough tang with a predominance of the “milky” sourness provided by lactic acid but a dominance of sweet, wheaty flavor over acidity.

It has been quite a while since I have made bread using this formula, although I did like it a lot. I made it again this weekend. I have made some minor modifications in the procedures prescribed by the SFBI. Note: Apparent discrepancies in the ingredient weights are due to scaling down from the original formula for a much larger dough batch and rounding.

Note: for the starter feedings, including the levain mix, I actually used my usual starter feeding mix of 70% AP, 20% WW and 10% Rye. So, in the levain, rather than the AP and Rye specified in the SFBI formula, I used 107 g of the above mix.

1. Mix ingredients thoroughly.

2. Ferment 12 hours at room temperature. (Note: Because of my own scheduling needs, I refrigerated the levain overnight before mixing the final dough. This was not the procedure at the SFBI, and it would be expected to make the bread somewhat more sour. If you can, omit this levain retardation.)

Procedures

1. Mix all ingredients except the salt (and the yeast, if you are using it) to a shaggy mass.

2. Let rest, covered, for 20-60 minutes.

3. Add the salt (and yeast, if you are using it) and mix at Speed 2 for 5-6 minutes. Adjust flour or water to achieve a medium consistency. (Note: I did not use added instant yeast.)

4. Ferment for 2-3 hours at 76ºF with 1 or 2 folds, as needed to strengthen the dough. (Note: The fermentation time depends on whether you use the instant yeast and on your fermentation temperature. As usual, “Watch the dough, not the clock.” The dough should end up expanded by about 20% and should be somewhat light and gassy. If you ferment in a transparent container, your should see the dough to be well-populated with tiny bubbles.)

5. Divide the dough into two equal pieces and pre-shape as boules.

6. Let the pieces rest, covered, for 25-30 minutes.

7. Shape as boules or bâtards.

8. Proof for 90-120 minutes at 80ºF.

9. Bake at 450ºF with steam for 25 minutes.

10. Leave in the turned-off oven with the door ajar for another 10 minutes.

11. Cool thoroughly on a rack before slicing.

The crust softened as the bread cooled. I think this was mostly because I adjusted the dough consistency by adding a little water. This made for a more open crumb but a less crunchy crust. The aroma of the cut loaf was very nice with a noticeable acetic acid aroma. However the flavor, while more tangy than this bread is meant to be, was still only mildly sour. Otherwise, it had the delicious sweet-wheaty flavor I remember.

This bread was lovely. I am happy with the results I got, but it merits another bake following the SFBI formula and procedures without my modifications.

 David

Back in October, 2011, I baked a pugliese-type bread I enjoyed a lot. (See Pugliese Capriccioso) I gather from various TFL comments, a few other bakers have baked from my formula with good results. However, I wanted to bake this bread again using a more authentic biga rather than a liquid levain and at a somewhat higher hydration. Today, I did.

1. The day before baking, mix the biga.

2. Ferment for 6 hours at 78ºF.

3. Refrigerate overnight

Note: The biga consists of 67 g flour and 33 g water. Thus, the total flour in the dough is 567 g, and the total water is 433 g. Therefore, the actual final dough hydration is 76%. Likewise, the actual salt percentage is 1.8%.

Method

1. Take the biga out of the refrigerator and let it warm up for about an hour.

2. Mix the water and flours to a shaggy mass, cover and autolyse for 20-60 minutes.

3. Sprinkle the salt over the dough and add the biga in chunks.

4. Mix at Speed 1 for 1-2 minutes until the ingredients are well-mixed.

5. Mix at Speed 2 for about 8 minutes. The dough will be quite slack. It will clean the sides of the bowl and form a ball on the dough hook, but a large portion of the dough will still be on the bottom of the bowl.

6. Transfer the dough to a well-floured board, form into a ball by stretching and folding.

7. Place in a lightly oiled bowl with a tight-fitting cover.

8. Ferment at 78ºF for about 2 hours with a stretch and fold at 50 and 100 minutes.

9. Pre-shape into a ball and let the dough rest for 10 minutes to relax the gluten. (This wasn't much of an issue. The dough was extremely relaxed and extensible.)

10. Shape the dough as a tight boule and place it seam-side down in a floured banneton.

11. Place the banneton in a food-safe plastic bag or cover with a damp towel. Proof the boule at 85ºF until the dough springs back slowly when you poke a finger into it. (About 2 hours)

12. 45 minutes before baking, preheat the oven to 490ºF with a baking stone and steaming apparatus in place.

13. Transfer the loaf to the baking stone, seam-side up, steam the oven and turn the temperature down to 460ºF.

14. After 15 minutes, remove the steaming apparatus. Bake for another 30 minutes or until the loaf is done. The crust should be nicely colored. The internal temperature should be at least 205ºF.

15. Leave the loaf on the baking stone with the oven turned off and the door ajar for another 10 minutes to dry the crust.

16. Transfer the loaf to a cooling rack. Cool completely before slicing.

The dough was even more slack than the last bake, and it spread significantly when transferred to the peel. However, there was very nice oven spring. The boule ended up with about 4 times the height it started with. The folds did not open up like the last bake. This may have been partly due to longer proofing, but I probably sealed them too well in tightening the boule when shaping.

I would describe the crust, crumb and flavor as essentially identical to my first bake of this bread: Crunchy crust, cool, sweet, chewy crumb. Perhaps a subtle nuttiness from the durum flour. Pretty darn delicious! This bread is a strong contender for the list of breads I bake frequently.

David

Sending this to Yeastspotting.

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Chocolate croissants, we all love them. When I saw in a Japanese baking book where they put cocoa in the dough as well, I knew I must make it. These are the bread equivalence of "a dark and mysterious stranger".

At first I thought it would be straightforward to adapt my previous croissant recipe: just add some cocoa powder and wrape in a chocolate baton right? Wrong. Nothing in croissant making has been straightforward for me. Before diving into the gory details of my 3 months struggle, you might want to check out the following two earlier entries for some tips and guildlines:

• Poolish Croissant (includes detailed tips) - http://www.thefreshloaf.com/node/22677/poolish-croissant-pursuit-perfection
• Croissant with Sourdough Starter - http://www.thefreshloaf.com/node/23342/croissant-sourdough-starter-txfarmer-vs-tx-summer

Lesson re-learned #1: Natural cocoa powder is acidic. I knew that before from caking making - you add baking soda to react with acidic cocoa powder to raise cakes, however, I didn't know it was THAT acidic. After adding cocoa powder, the dough was too weak to rise properly, they ended up like sad chocolate pancakes. I changed natural cocoa powder to dutch processed cocoa, immediately saw a difference. For the batch I am showing I used Herseys Special Dark Cocoa (hence the very dark color), which is a blend of dutch processed and natural cocoa, I imagin the volume would even be better if a pure dutch processed cocoa is used.

Lesson re-learned #2: Firm levain gives dough more strength then liquid starter/levain. Knew that one before as well, but the effect is really obvious here. I made a firm levain rather than adding 100% starter directly into the dough, the volume of croissants was further improved.

Lesson re-learned #3: Croissant dough needs to be cold. In my last croissant post, I wrote about how to make croissants in TX summer by rolling quickly and putting dough in fridge frequently. Well, since then, temperature has climed to 110F. Even at night/early morning, my kitchen (especially the counter top by the window) doesn't drop below 85. That's simply too hot, butter is melting into the dough as soon as it hits the counter top. To solve that, this is the setup I am using (a shoutout to my hubby who thought of and implemented the whole thing): frozen ice packs under a big baking tray, and a metal rolling pin which is filled with water then frozen.

The rolling pin and ice packs need to be put back into the freezer between rolling, which is a bit troublesome, but did I mention it's 110F outside?

Lesson re-learned #4: Dark chocolate can lower blood pressure. Knew that one before too, but not until my mother, who usually has high blood pressure, had two croisssants and started getting dizzy - her blood pressure was too low! We then tested with just the valrhona dark chocolate batons used for these croissants, apparently, just one was enough to lower her blood pressure to normal, any more would be too low! This is more effective (and yummier) then medicine!

Double Chocolate Croissant with Natural Starter

Note: makes 12 croissants

-Levain

100% starter, 35g

water, 59g

bread flour, 105g

1. mix and let mature for 12 hours.

-Final Dough

bread flour (KAF), 422g

dutch processed cocoa, 20g

water, 85g

milk, 128g

sugar, 73g

salt, 10g

osmotolerant instant yeast (SAF gold), 4g, 1tsp+1/4tsp

butter, 21g, softened

levain, all

roll-in butter, 287g

1. Mix everything but the roll-in butter, knead until gluten starts to form. In my KA mixer, 3min at first speed, 5 min at 3rd speed.

Then following the procedure illustrated here. Do remebmer to enclose a chocolate baton while shaping, just place it at the bottom of the triangle piece, and roll up as usual.

 Very very very delicious, it takes so much work to make, be sure to use the best chocolate to ge the maximum impact!

For this earlier batch, I rolled the dough out thinner, did more turns while shaping, to create more layers. Well, more layers alright, but I don't think it's airy enough.

Anyway, I am happy my 3 month chocolate croissant battle is near the end, still not perfect, but I think they are quite sexy!