36 Hour Bacon, Baked Potato and Cheese Sourdough

Bacon, Potatoes and Cheese....what else do I need to say?  Throw those golden ingredients together with some flour, water and starter and let it ferment for a couple of days and you have as tasty a loaf as you're going to get.

I hadn't made any bread using the 36 hour technique in a while so I figured it was time to give it a go again.  I used the last of my KAF French style flour mixed with some freshly ground whole wheat and some KAF Durum flour to round it out.

Letting the flour absorb the ice water for 24 hours and adding a 100% starter to the mix with all the other ingredients couldn't be an easier.  You just need to have some patience and the results will be worth it.

I used some Double Gloucester cheese which is similar to a sharp cheddar and baked some potatoes I made on my grill the night before.  I fried up some thick-cut bacon the morning of the final mix.

The only thing I might chance on this one the next go around is cutting the hydration a bit.  I didn't take the water content of the potatoes into account when formulating the original recipe and the final dough was very slack and spread out more than I would have preferred,  All in all this bread came out with a nice moist and open crumb with bits of bacon and cheese spread throughout.  It is definitely worth trying this one if you get a chance.

Here are the Zip files for the above BreadStorm files.

Directions

NOTE: Water content for potatoes is added to final Mix water amount.  Actual water to add to final dough is 600 grams.

Starter
Mix ingredients in a bowl until thoroughly combined.  Cover the bowl and let it sit at room temperature for around 8 hours.  The starter should almost double when ready to proceed.  I actually mixed it up at the same time as the flour and water mixture for the main dough and let it sit overnight.  I used my 66% seed starter and basically converted it to close to a 100% hydration levain.  You need the final levain/starter to be like this so it is easy to mix into the main dough.

Main Dough Procedure
Mix the flours and the ice water together in your mixer or by hand until it just starts to come together, maybe about 1 minute.   Put the dough in a slightly covered oiled bowl and put in the refrigerator for 12 hours.

The next day add your starter,  cheese, bacon, potatoes and salt to the dough and mix by hand or in your mixer on low speed until it is thoroughly mixed and evenly distributed.  Due to the high water content in the 100% hydration starter this dough is very easy to mix by hand and is very silky and smooth.

Bulk rise at room temperature for 2-3 hours until it grows around 1/3 in volume doing stretch and folds every half hour until it has developed the correct amount of strength.

Put the dough back into the refrigerator for around 20-24 hours.  I took it out about 24 hours later.

When you take the dough out of the refrigerator you want it to have almost doubled in volume, but if it doesn’t, don’t worry as it will end up okay anyway.  Let it rise at room temperature for around 2 hours or until the dough has doubled from the night before.

Next, divide the dough and shape as desired and place them in their respective basket(s).  I made a bâtard and a boule and placed both of them into my proofer set at 82 degrees F. for 1.5 hours.

Score the loaves as desired and prepare your oven for baking with steam.

Set your oven for 550 degrees F. at least 45 minutes before ready to bake.  When ready to bake place the loaves into your oven on your oven-stone with steam and let it bake for 5 minutes and then lower the temperature  to 450 degrees.    When the loaf is golden brown and reached an internal temperature of 210 degrees F. you can remove it from the oven.

Let the bread cool down for at least an 3 hours or so before eating as desired.