June 18, 2020 - 12:32pm
Ball shaped baked loaves
I know most people face an issue with a slack dough, that goes flat in the oven. My problem is quite the opposite.
The loaves puff up like a pita in the oven, and bake like a ball.
I followed the Tartine basic bread recipe with 75% hydration. Final proof was done at RT (no retarding)
I'm really looking for some help on why this might be an issue and how to fix it.!
I would love inputs on this.
thanks
Mayank
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It appears the crust of your dough is browning and therefore setting before the dough is able to enlarge from expanding gas.
Tell us about your oven and steam setup.
By the way, this is a better problem to have than deflated loaves...
I have a small deck oven (16 x 24 inch tray size) with no steam. I use a water spray after loading the oven and keep a small water container in the side of the oven.
I started the bake at 250, and then reduced to 220 after 15 mins, and bake for another 30 mins.
Even while the crust is not set, it forms into a ball and stays that way for the rest of the bake. It forms into this ball within the first 7-10 mins of the bake.
Definitely better than having deflated loaves. :)
What does the inside look like? and what kinda of flour are you using? yeasted or levain?
I am using 90% AP flour, and 10% wholegrain flour and using a levain, no yeast.
uneven degassing prior to shaping
250 C / 482 F may also be too hot. see Dan's video about that: www.youtube.com/watch?v=jCVYIBakGQE
He did a good series on that on his channel: www.youtube.com/channel/UC7mXjnPpTDoVJxRdrG3ZeYw/videos
Starting at the 13th video (as of today) working upwards through the 8th video.
(Dan, maybe put that group of videos in a "playlist" for an easy one-link reference?)