Enzyme attack & salting your starter?
My SD loaves generally come out somewhat ok (I'm not quite happy but not quite at the point where I want to quit:)). The main issue I have is the lack of an open crumb & lack of oven spring - mine looks fairly tight/dense no matter what and somewhat flat. It isn't a total failure by any means, just too tight a crumb and lacking in oven spring (*) and that precious "ear". Bread tastes great, though. I bake using either Hamelman's book or Tartine book or a set of formulas from SFBI (from a course) for the base formula.
On to question. Yesterday I made a yeasted whole wheat preferment, not SD. I forgot to salt the preferment! I used it to make a golden raisin+fennel loaf. The loaf looks like the attached picture - it totally feels like a textbook enzyme attack situation with dense crumb and an underbaked feel (despite inside temp hitting 204 or so for a 66% hydration dough). I am remaking the exact same formula today but salting the sponge to verify this theory is right.
My SD loaves look *way* better than this. However, this got me thinking - could my dense/flat SD loaves be because of my starter maintenance and enzyme issues!? I do a 1 Starter: 4 Water: 6 flour maintenance, with 5% rye and 5% whole wheat and 90% white flour. I feed it at-least twice a week, and when I feed I leave it out for an hour and then refrigerate. The night before the bake I develop the levain build using the starter and then bake. The levain build rises well, it feels healthy & it has good flavor too when mature. However, is it possible that I'm causing strange enzyme activity and that's why my loaves turn out with tight crumb & lack oven spring? (I guess the answer is "who knows" - the number of factors that go into good oven spring and open crumb seem unbelievably complex with so many variables!:))
I dug thru TFL for an hour this morning, there's many suggestions on refrigerating starters. I have to say I can't figure out what works reliably. Then I found Debra Wink's post on "stretchy" starter and feeding it for 10-11 days to "fix" it. I don't have that problem (I think). But now I'm wondering, connecting it back to my unsalted yeasted whole wheat preferment: what if we salt the starter at 0.2% (or maybe 1%) and then refrigerate? Would that solve all these potential enzyme complications? Maybe the scientific minds here can comment?
Also, is there an "authoritative" way to refrigerate starters with somewhat irregular feeding cycles (like twice a week)?
(*) JFYI: I got my steaming right - use a turkey roaster with a pre-heated ceramic plate. It took me forever to figure this one out without springing for a dutch oven:) I am somewhat sure my proof check is right too. My shaping is definitely something that is not good enough, I think I don't have a light enough touch and I'm degassing too much. This is something I am working on. In general, I spike my SD loaves with a little yeast, something I learned at SFBI to get more consistency in home baking.
The key is not to go overboard - 0.2% of the total flour weight in the starter is a safer starting point than jumping straight to 1%. Try starting small and see how it goes. If you need to feed your starter less often, refrigerating it is a great solution!
I've done the salting with various salt concentrations, and at least with a normal starter 1% doesn't seem to affect it except to slow down fermentation. I had to go to 4% to see some other effect, and 6% slowly drove down the lactic acid contribution to flavor over many refreshes.
So much to take in! But
I'm probably missing some stuff - the post is really too long and the more clarity the more info comes. Enjoy!
If the preferment wasn't salted then the overall dough would have been under-salted. Both would ferment more quickly than usual, especially the preferment. The dough (and especially the preferment) would not have tightened up as much if there had been more salt. This would have made the dough seem more extensible and less elastic, somewhat as if it had a higher hydration than it did.
In my experience, salting the starter can lead to a reduction in the part of the flavor contributed by the LAB, and even at 6% salt only after several weeks of refreshes. Dough made with this starter rose well except a little slower because of the extra salt. But with 6% salt the bread had almost no flavor. At 1% salt there have been no long-term problems after many months.
204 deg/ F is too low, in my experience, at least at sea level. If you are not baking an enriched sandwich loaf bread, you want 208 or higher for the internal temperature. And if the crumb is tight, the bread might want to be further dried out at a lower setting (375) or even the turned-off oven. You'd have to try to see how long but I usually find that 5 - 8 minutes does the trick.
At an internal temperature that is too low, the bread could seem a little under-baked or a little gummy. Letting the loaf sit for many hours in the open before slicing can help.
Of course, raising the final temperature won't help with the dense crumb or low overall height. You can often get more oomph in the bake if you use a shorter bulk ferment. By the time the dough has started to visibly rise a little it will be generating gas as fast as it ever will. I say that based on dough volume measurements I've made where once the rate of increase has been established the dough continues to rise at a fairly constant rate.
Stirring (for a starter), or stretching or kneading (for a dough) will increase the rate of rise, sometimes quite a lot after it's been rising for some time. Presumably handling the dough during shaping will have the same effect, which probably explains why the shaped loafs proof more quickly than the bulk ferment. Shaping after a short bulk will also avoid potential enzyme problems if there are going to be any.
So try shaping your loaf after the bulk dough has risen say 20% - the exact amount doesn't matter - and let the shaped loaf ferment until the loaf has expanded well. Let it proof longer than you think it should, if you like. It's been working for me.
In the last several weeks I have made bread with the same recipe with both a very short and a very long bulk ferment. The short-bulk bread had a more open crumb. The long-bulk had a slightly better flavor, as you might expect from the longer fermentation. The crumb difference wasn't like night-and-day but it was real. I don't have a photo of the long-bulk crumb but I do of the short-bulk loaf:
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This loaf has about 68% hydration, 20% stone-ground whole wheat, 80% Gold Medal All Purpose Unbleached, and 30% of that 1% salted starter. I should say that this was a relatively small loaf - 300g flour.
If you still have problems it could be something about your water supply. Try filtering it with a filtering pitcher, or getting some bottled drinking water. If the bottled water, some people have reported poor results with some brands so you may need to try several.
Good luck!
TomP
Clarifying: I did not undersalt the bread. I adjusted the salt in the final dough to account for not salting preferment. Dough was at 2% salt pretty much as always. (I have tried unsalted bread once, and once was good enough for me:)).
Good advice above. Based on this I will (1) salt the starter at 0.2-0.5% and see how it goes (2) the point by TomP on shortening the bulk very likely applies to me! This makes sense, I think I've been going too long on the bulk. (3) I'll bake it to a higher internal temp as well.
Will report back. I'm making the same bread today with salted preferment. I will also bake it to a higher temp and shorten the bulk a little bit and report back.
Bread: the bane of my existence, the joy of my existence:)