Recipes & no-Knead
Gonorio Dineri
sourdough, I decided to give it a whirl. I've also slacked off on
following recipes precisely. Now I'm writing to document the results.
1. Following recipes.
I am inclined to be directed by recipes, but not to follow them precisely
once I've proven the recipe works. I guess I'm a bit of a renegade, and
I like experimenting. But the truth is, as Dick Adams has shown in his
comments and recipes, baking sourdough bread is easy, once you've got the
idea. And as Samartha has shown in his extensive exposition, one can be
fastidious in following time-worn recipes of professionals, and get
consistent professional results.
For a long time, my rule of thumb was to make a sponge by 3x tripling a
small amount of starter with equivalent weights of water and flour for 3
hours, 9 hours, and 9 hours, then by weight knead 3x water, 5x flour, .1x
salt, for 5 minutes, rise slightly for an hour or two, 3x stretch and
fold, rise slightly an hour, 3x stretch and fold, form into loaves, rise
double, and bake at preheated, misted 400 till internal temperature is
190F.
I now consider that method entirely too tedious, and I get great bread
loaves by making a sponge with all the flour, water, and starter for 9 or
10 hours, making dough, refrigerating over night, 1x stretch & fold, form
into loaves, rise double, bake in cold oven at 375 till nice and brown on
top.
Also, I seldom ever make white bread. And I usually bake in pans. Yes,
the boules are pretty and all, but they don't make regular slices, and
pan bread is better for toast and sandwiches. Besides, if you don't eat
the bread right away, all that nice crust goes soft when you bag the
bread to keep it from getting hard. Also, dough consistency needs to be
just right or the boules are too flat. So, what's the point of making
boules just for crust?
As for the flour I use, I use about 40-60 King Arthur bread flour with
other flours, varying ingredients as the whim suites me. Typically, I
mix coarse rye, rolled oats, coarsely ground flax, barley, stone-ground
corn meal, and whole wheat, with an ounce of carraway seeds, tablespoon
of molasses, and sourdough starter, then let them soak as a very slack
mud while the bread-flour sponge is fermenting.
At the end of the sponge ferment time, I basically have two sponges, one
of bread flour and one of the dark flour mix. The coarse grain and seeds
have absorbed all the moisture. I've learned the hard way to add plenty
of water when making the dark sponge, because if I don't make it very
loose, like a porridge, the sponge will be too stiffm and the grain and
seeds a bit too al dente.
My bread dough for this bread is always fairly slack and sticky. If too
stiff, it will not do a final rise well, and the baked loaves will be too
dense for my liking.
2. No-Knead
I normally don't bother kneading dough because it's too much of a bother.
I've found it easier simply to stir the ingredients together to get them
wet, let the mass sit in a bowl covered with a wet dish towel till it has
risen some, then stretch and fold it three times. I repeat this process,
let it rest a bit, then form it into loaves or put it in bread pans.
The exception to this is when I make a big batch of dough. It simply is
too much work to stretch and fold 6 or 8 pounds of dough, so I work it in
my mixer. I seldom make that much dough.
I've found that dough made with Carl's starter gives a good rise, then
depletes its rising power quickly, so I never let it rise twice. I do
only one stretch and fold, let it rest 20 minutes, and form it into
loaves. Dough made with San Francisco starter can handle two rises
because it rises slower than Carl's.
cronzen
no-knead method. I also have Carl's starter and noticed that it rises
well once, maybe twice. I have, until reading your post, continued to
persist in three rise attempts. Next time, I'll try just once, then
shape. And I agree about the boules and batards; great crust, but only
if you consume immediately. For this reason, I have started to make
them into bagels, which might hold the crust a little longer. And the
toaster is your friend. Alas, just succumbing to the loaf pan would
work too. It's just that I recently purchased those nifty steam pans.
:)
wildeny
Chembake
That is funny.<LOL> A bagel with a stiff dough consistency would
not reach the desired dough development by stirring it gently....The
prerequisites of bagel making is a really sturdy mixer ...
Besides....
The chewiness of the bagel is a function of the flour protein
content...And the bagel strructure and its plumpness ( 'boldness ')due
to the proper dough development.
IMO a stirred bagel dough would be like a masochism<grin>.
BTW, I have not heard much about commercial authentic sourdough
bagels in the bakery....
Dick Adams
"Gonorio Dineri" <gon...@dineri.it> wrote in message news:Xns96DD69A751D6...@65.32.5.121...
> [ ... ]
> I've found that dough made with Carl's starter gives a good rise, then
> depletes its rising power quickly, so I never let it rise twice.
It, or most any other starter, will rise dough until the dough poops out.
If you punch it down, it may rise again depending on how much pizazz
it has left. On the other hand, if the dough is sick, punching it down can
finish it for good.
> Dough made with San Francisco starter can handle two rises
> because it rises slower than Carl's.
I am not sure anymore what a San Francisco starter is, or, to be more
specific, how one would know if one's starter had the right mix of
microorganisms to qualify it as The San Francisco Starter. I have
a better idea what Carl's starter is.
Carl's starter can motivate, in white bread, a 5-fold rise. Punch it
down half way through, and you can get two 2-1/2 fold rises. I suppose
you could get five1-fold rises, but I never tried it. Of course, all bets
are off if you kill your dough by rotting a preferment.
--
Dicky
cronzen
bagel chewiness. Then the baking for the nice crust.
Kenneth
<royb...@gmail.com> wrote:
>IMO a stirred bagel dough would be like a masochism<grin>.
Howdy,
Have you tried to do it (that is, a no-knead bagel)?
Thanks,
--
Kenneth
If you email... Please remove the "SPAMLESS."
Kenneth
<truep...@metrocast.net> wrote:
>Yes, relatively. I believe it's the boiling that is responsible for
>bagel chewiness. Then the baking for the nice crust.
Hi again,
Because you have not quoted anything, it is difficult to
know what you are responding to.
When you say "Yes, relatively" does that mean you have tried
to make no-knead bagels?
Thanks again,
Roy
>bagel chewiness. Then the baking for the nice crust.
I doubt about that....Some hobbyist I know have done bagel with all
purpose flour and boiled then baked it but it did not become chewy if
compared to the ones the one made with high gluten flour.
graham
"Roy" <rba...@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:1127829351.3...@g49g2000cwa.googlegroups.com...
Maybe that's an advantage;-) Too often they are heavy and like leather! I
really don't see the attraction unless one is eating them straight out of
the oven.
Graham
cronzen
that post above, I mention that I make bagels using the no-knead
method. This has apparently elicited some surprise from other members
of the list. :)
cronzen
somewhere. It is supposed to be the "trick" behind getting them that
way. Fresh out of the oven is, of course, best. Agreed. But how is
that different from most bread products?
Kenneth
<truep...@metrocast.net> wrote:
Hello again,
As I mentioned earlier, it is difficult to understand the
meaning of your post above because you are not including
anything of the message to which you are responding.
All the best,
graham
"cronzen" <truep...@metrocast.net> wrote in message
news:1127846777.9...@o13g2000cwo.googlegroups.com...
more than about an hour old.
Graham
Mike Avery
How odd. I made sourdough Bagels in our bakery for about a year. And
they stayed nice for days. Without freezing. When frozen, they stayed
nice for a long time.
Key elements in successful sourdough bagels.... a stiff dough (about 50
- 53% hydration) with a high protein flour, let them rise fully, shape
them then retard them overnight, boil in the morning and bake them
thoroughly.
Of course, bagels are an odd bread. First you boil them, then you bake
them, and then - just in case they aren't dead yet - you toast them.
Mike
--
...The irony is that Bill Gates claims to be making a stable operating
system and Linus Torvaldis claims to be trying to take over the world...
Mike Avery mavery at mail dot otherwhen dot com
home baker ICQ 16241692
networking guru AIM mavery81230
wordsmith Yahoo mavery81230
graham
"Mike Avery" <mav...@mail.otherwhen.com> wrote in message
news:mailman.4.1127865307.2...@mail.otherwhen.com...
> graham wrote:
>
>>"cronzen" <truep...@metrocast.net> wrote in message
>>news:1127846777.9...@o13g2000cwo.googlegroups.com...
>>
>>>The bit about boiling causing the chewiness is something I have read
>>>somewhere. It is supposed to be the "trick" behind getting them that
>>>way. Fresh out of the oven is, of course, best. Agreed. But how is
>>>that different from most bread products?
>>>
>>>
>>Because most bread products don't turn into "mini car tyres" when they are
>>more than about an hour old.
>>
> How odd. I made sourdough Bagels in our bakery for about a year. And
> they stayed nice for days. Without freezing. When frozen, they stayed
> nice for a long time.
>
remind myself why I think that they are grossly over-rated (IMNSHO).;-)
Maybe if I tried yours or some of the ones made in Montreal I might be
persuaded to change my mind.
Graham
cronzen
"As I mentioned earlier, it is difficult to understand the
meaning of your post above because you are not including
anything of the message to which you are responding."
Better? I figured it was putting my Reply directly under the
message to which I was responding. Is this not the case?
In any case, I am with Mike Avery regarding bagels, i.e.,
I have not had problems with creating rocks even after
several days. <shrug>
Dave Bell
threads, or subject. If not, they are displayed in the order they were
sent, with no relationship, one to another...
Karen
> I should have used a few smileys, Mike. Once in a while, I eat a bagel to
> remind myself why I think that they are grossly over-rated (IMNSHO).;-)
> Maybe if I tried yours or some of the ones made in Montreal I might be
> persuaded to change my mind.
A properly made bagel is a thing of beauty. Unfortunately, the majority
of commercially made bagels these days are little more than round bread.
Kettling -- the boiling part -- has been dropped for steaming the
so-called bagels prior to baking them. Not the same effect at all. Ah,
but a bagel that has been properly kettled.... <sigh>
Karen R.
Gonorio Dineri
news:hv4_e.83556$qY1...@bgtnsc04-news.ops.worldnet.att.net:
>
> "Gonorio Dineri" <gon...@dineri.it> wrote in message
> news:Xns96DD69A751D6...@65.32.5.121...
>
>
>> Dough made with San Francisco starter can handle two rises
>> because it rises slower than Carl's.
>
> I am not sure anymore what a San Francisco starter is, or, to be more
> specific, how one would know if one's starter had the right mix of
> microorganisms to qualify it as The San Francisco Starter. I have
> a better idea what Carl's starter is.
>
> --
> Dicky
>
>
I got my Acme San Francisco Sourdough Starter from a fellow group
participant. He sent it to me as a blob of sourodough in a plastic bag,
and by the time I received it, the mail man had squashed it flat, and part
of it had leaked onto the envelope. I reconstituted the remains and made
emergency and gift granules which are now in the fridge, and I keep an
active wet starter going all the time, feeding it weekly or more often.
Acme is a bakery in Oakland, across the bay from San Francisco, so Acme
starter qualifies as genuine San Francisco Sourdough Starter. When I make
regular white flour loaves from it, they taste like the sourdough bread I
used to buy when I lived in the San Francisco Bay area (San Leandro,
Fremont, San Jose).
I don't know what micro-organisms are in the starter, and I don't see that
it matters. I am curious, but I'm sure I'll never find out. And I'll
probably never notice if it morphs into something hybridized by the micro-
organisms in the flours I use or whatever is lurking in my kitchen.
I do know that the starter behaves quite differently from Carls. It
develops a definite tangy flavor more readily, it takes much longer to
rise, and it isn't so moody about being punched down the way Carl's is.
Gonorio
Gonorio Dineri
news:1127759514.4...@o13g2000cwo.googlegroups.com:
Would you mind elaborating on the steam pans?
I just slogged a blob of dough into the fridge. I'm getting really lean
and mean in my laziness. I mixed a couple ounces of starter with rye,
whole wheat, KA bread flour, corn meal, carraway seeds, flax seeds,
rolled oatmeal, sliced almonds, and enough water to make a sloppy
porridge, then covered it for 10 hours. Halfway through I had to stir in
water because the seeds, oats, and coarsely ground corn meal and rye had
absorbed the slop. At the end of proofing, I lifted the plastic, sniffed,
and caught a definite, sharp pew. I used Acme San Francisco Sourdough
starter.
I just now added more rye, whole wheat, a bunch of KA bread flour, water,
a pinch of ascorbic acid and tablespoon and a half of salt. The mass
made too much bulk to stir by hand, so I dumped it in my crappy new
Sunbeam Mixmaster (don't ever be dumb enough to buy one of those bouncing
Betties - they suck at kneading dough), and kneaded that hopping
monstrosity till it was thoroughly kneaded. Then I plopped it into an
olive-oiled plastic bag, squeezed out the air, tie-wrapped the top, and
put it in the fridge to cure overnight. Look at the time. Not much
night left. Oh well. The dough is quite loose, so that if I hold the
blob in my hand, it immediately starts overflowing my hand and drooping
toward the floor. I think that is the perfect consistency.
Last time I made this bread (sans almonds), it was so delicious that my
old-lady neighbors devoured the first third of their gift loaves, then
cut the balance in two and froze half for later. They love it and are
hoarding. My wife went apeshit over it. We've blown through two loaves,
and they're making her titties fat (okay, the midriff is beginning to
Rubenesce too), magazine quality. So, I'm baking more of it.
It's funny that the bread had these complex flavors that were hard to
define. The carraway was subtly obvious, but only when I looked for them
could I identify the cornmeal, rye, and flax seed.
The loaves did not come out heavy. They were beautiful pan loaves
(sorry, no pics on this newsgroup, so I'm not posting them elsewhere),
light, good texture but not too chewey, large crumb, no big holes,
perfect for toast. I think bread is perfect for toast when it is just
dense enough to keep peanut butter, honey, or jelly from dripping
immediately through the crumb.
I have screwed up so many loaves of bread in the past with my fastidious
efforts and confusion over what to do and what not to do that it is a
sublime pleasure to crank out perfect bread every time.
Chembake
>develops a definite tangy flavor more readily, it takes much longer to
>rise, and it isn't so moody about being punched down the way Carl's is.
What makes that particular strain stable and not moody is because it
was likely a selected pure culture . Possibly originating from a
microbiological laboratory so that only the most tolerant strain
remains. I know some bakeries get their sourdough starter' seeds'
from such institution in the same way that yeast manufacturers have a
proprietary strain for their product.from their own laboratory.
It can possibly come also from an ancestral robust strain that have
existed for even hundreds of years.
IF such organism proliferates from bakery to bakery is due to the fact
that many of the sourdough bakers carry specimens of their favorite
strain from the place the worked previously and bring it elsewhere(
another work place and even choose to use it instead of the existing
culture of their new employer)..
You are lucky that you were able to get a strain that was maintained by
a reputable bakery and certainly it is robust in comparison to these
so called mail order starter cultures ( designed for hobbyist ,which is
many cases is not a' pure'strain 'but a blend of different
microbes in the same way as the institutionally cultivated sourdough
cultures..
But there are many small artisan bakeries who prepare their own culture
by 'catching it themselves' but mostly is not as consistent as the
industrially cultured specimens.
But there are exceptions.
Some of these bakeries have perpetuated cultures for several
generations from greatgranfather to grandfather to son to grandson etc
and therefore have managed to get a really stable culture.s
But there are some peculiarities, when a particular culture was
transferred to another location say having a different climatic
situation,different flours, different baking methodologies . it does
not behave in the same way if compared to place where it originated.
Some sort of mutation and adaptation can occur as well .
I think it can l(ikely) happen with Carl starter also.
Besides ...
It is a common occurence that not two distant bakers share the same
expereince with the same culture they are using as they are making
bread out of it in a different manner with differnet flours ,water,
other ingredients .they are making their bread with.
Samartha Deva
> What makes that particular strain stable and not moody is because it
> was likely a selected pure culture .
BS! - selected strain pure cultures are not stable and need to be
replenished from pure strains.
Uups! - I just saw that King Roy changed his name.
Well, it's still BS.
Samartha
Chembake
>replenished from pure strains
Samartha.... Tsk.... Tsk... tsk .. that is not what I mean!.....
You are muddling things.....
Selected strains can be further improved in the laboratory to improve
their performance t...
.Not replenished .....
If you compare the performance of the mother culture from the offspring
of many generations ... you will notice some performance variations
.....and the latter is preferred by some artisan bakeries as its more
stable and robust....than the mother culture it originated...
Mutation can be induced in the laboratory for beneficial reasons....