P au L redux, but as Baguettes (updated 15 Aug.)

As this August has unofficially turned into the Hamelman Pain au Levain batard month, I thought that I'd submit one more entry to the mix.  I did a TFL search for hamelman pain au levain baguette after baking my version as a batard.  And in the vast compendium of our website here I could not find a single reference to anyone ever having done his batard as a baguette .  A sinful omission which I have gladly undertaken to correct as part of my quest to "do something different to make it my own" mantra.

Scaled down from the original formula for 4 300g baguettes each, again mixing in a few more grams of water to increase hydration just a tad.  Employing my standard way of long retards of dough already shaped and couched.  From retard to score to bake, in 5 minutes' time.  I bumped the oven temp up from the prior bake's 440dF to 460dF for this bake as I wasn't content with the prior coloration or crumb structure.  I may still have to nudge to oven dial to 475dF or 480dF next time.  As stubby as they may look, they are all between 11" and 12" in length.  

Still would like another shade of dark to these, but that is, sadly, another of my mantras.

steam released and rotated

And, just as I was about to slather on the mustard in prep for my mini salami & pecorino sandwich (yep, that is the size of my sandwich!), I decided to take a crumb shot.  The taste is "wheaty" but not too much so.  "Cereal-like" says my better half.  

The crumb is still a little moist inside, so indeed I will look to bake these at a higher temp. next time.

UPDATED on 8/15/15

I decided to make the same Pain au Levain baguettes, but this time with my own levain instead of that which Mr. Hamelman uses for this bread.  A little less stiff at 75% hydration.  I went against my personal grain here and changed two parameters at the same time.  One is the levain and the second is that I again bumped the temp. up by another 20 degrees to 480dF, rather than the previous bump to 460dF.

The value to using my own always stocked-up-on levain is that it saves me the first step in making this bread.  As I always have it ready to go, I can either scoop out what I need straight from the refrigerator, or just do a quick refresh of a small batch, which takes only ~21/2 hours instead of the formula's 10-12 hour build. 

I wonder if the baguettes set too quickly due to the higher temp or if the different levain played the role in these opening nicely, but not quite as nicely as the earlier version at the top of this entry.  I suppose that more testing (and tasting) is going to be in the works.  Just for the fun of it all, I also threw some raw flour on top of these just before scoring for that rustic look that I don't often do.

Of the four baguettes, one is displaying a really goofy bloom.  At first I thought that it was a pair of scores that had overlapped too closely, but on closer inspection, it doesn't seem to be the culprit.  Maybe I'll just refer to it as a tree burl and leave it at that.

alan