Fresh Garden Pepper and Cheddar Sourdough

I love Autumn in the UP...  Not only the colors that start popping on the maples, but Autumn means the tomatoes and peppers are ready to harvest!

Jalapenos

Fresno Chilis

Lots of good peppers this year, so the perfect opportunity to make a garden pepper and sharp cheddar sourdough.  This loaf uses a Country Blonde as a base bread with 10% peppers and 20% cheddar as add-ins.  The pre-fermented flour was 15% (includes flour in SD starter).  I was in the process of doing a starter refresh, so the levain was made with a 1:1:1 refresh. I usually don't include the starter flour in the PFF calculations, but I did in this case because it is such a high percentage of the levain.

Levain
40g   Bread Flour
40g   Water
40g   Sourdough Starter (100% bread flour)

1)   Combine all ingredients and ferment at 70 deg F for 8-9 hours.  Don't use levain until it has peaked and started to recede a bit.  Mine peaked in about 6 hours. 

Final Dough
210g   AP Flour
80g    Bread Flour
16g    Whole Wheat Flour
16g    Semolina Rimacinata
8g      Whole Rye Flour
8g      Barley Flour
60g    Blueberry Yeast Water
148g  Water
8g      Pink Salt
40g    Diced Garden Peppers (Jalapeno, Fresno Chili, and Garden Salsa)
80g    Sharp Cheddar (Crystal Farms) (Block cheese shredded - NOT pre shredded)

1)   Combine Final Dough flours, BBYW, and water and autolyse for 20 minutes.
2)   Add levain to autolyse dough and mix with dimpling/pinching/squeezing.  Rest for 10 minutes
3)   Add peppers, cheese, and salt with dimpling/pinching/squeezing.  Rest for 10 minutes
4)   One set of bowl kneading (24-28 folds).  Assure add ins are well distributed during these folds. Rest for 10 minutes
5)   Two sets of bowl kneading (10-12 folds).  10 minute rest between sets.
6)   Bulk ferment at 76 deg F with bowl S&F every 45 minutes until dough is starting to get "puffy"
7)   Pre-shape when dough volume has increased 75-80%.  Dough should have some jiggle to it. (3.5 hours)
8)   Final proof at 76 deg F (2 hours).
9) Preheat oven to 465 deg F with Fibrament stone.  Presteam oven with roughly 1/4-1/3 cup boiling water 2-3 minutes before loading dough.  Add 2/3-3/4 cup boiling water immediately after loading dough.
10)  Bake 465 deg F (1 minute), 400 deg F (19 minutes); vent oven; 425 deg F (10-15 minutes).  Remove when you have hollow thump.

Crust turned out really nice on this one and the aroma from the fresh peppers really came through!  The cheese that was near the surface caramelized nicely and gave the loaf a mottled look.  Ironically, the jalapenos have almost no heat to them but the Fresno Chilis and Garden Salsas have a pretty good bite.  Not sure how spicy this one will be, but it smells really good!  First slice will be toasted with some butter.

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