alfanso's blog

Rarely posting unless there's a change or something new.  I've baked Mr. Hamelman's Vermont SDs as my go-to bread a ton of times, although almost always as baguettes/long batards, I've never made two 750g batards in a single bake before (as far as I can recall).

My levain was last refreshed almost 3 weeks ago after having been gone for 3 weeks, and we are about to embark on another 2 1/2-3 week journey, so I thought that I'd at least get some mileage out of this aging levain before a next refresh when I return.

I almost always bake this formula at 65% hydration, having long ago abandoned the race for high hydration doughs.  These days I'm more after comfort in my bakes vs. experimentation and challenges.

I made several process improvements. Last week's Vermont SD version was to dip my toe in the water giving the couronne a try.

Changes:

• Replaced the Vermont SD with my standard Sesame Semolina dough
• 8 balls @125g each rather than 6 balls at 167g (thanks to Will for referencing the 8 config in his writeup)
• Moistened balls and rolled in bowl of sesame seeds, rather than sprinkled on as was last week's afterthought.
• Placed directly on parchment inside a bottomless springform pan with a round container in the center to give it shape.  Both removed prior to placing the ring back in retard for another several hours.
• Scored consistently at the same level all around

 Baked at the same 460 dF with steam.

Because the balls are constrained by being placed shoulder to shoulder, there isn't a lot of room for internal expansion of the crumb.  But they will still make tasty accompaniments at the dinner table.

The training wheels have been removed.   This was the test to decide whether a third bake will accompany us to a friend's house for dinner next week.  It will.

Don't post much anymore but still breathing & baking.  I was rummaging around the far depths of the kitchen cabinet and came across a Bundt pan.  It was nestled inside of one of those "coffee cake" ring pans, which we may have used twice in a decade or more.  

Several years ago I tried to shape a couronne with just a ring of dough, to somewhat disappointing results.  But yesterday I figured why not try it a more traditional way employing a less than traditional baking pan. 

For my money there is no easier levain dough to make than this one, and if there were to be any missteps I didn't want the composition of the dough to take the blame.

It turns out that this was a fairly easy task to complete using 1000g dough divided into 6 167g balls.  Due to the height of the central tube, adding the center leaf-over dough was not an option.  C'est la vie.

The sesame seeds were an afterthought.  For a first time out of the starting gate, there's not much to complain about, but the next should exhibit more consistent scoring.

Based on a YouTube video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tl4Hfi8ma1c I saw a day or two ago, these little beauties are made with the Hamelman Vermont SD formula.  Scaled at 250g each, just a guess from the visual cues of the video, they were a snap to shape and to score.  It seems that this bakery is in Seoul S Korea.

As is often the case with the VT SDs the low hydration prevents open crumb regardless of the wonderful oven spring these exhibit.

Well, as with last time I was already home, but went big anyway.  Several years ago I posted another of this ilk but today's offering is for ciabatta.  Two days prior I had baked a trio of ciabatta to serve to our afternoon guests, and any remainder went out the door with them when they left.  

It was time for more.  And this time I decided to bake two loaves using the same 1500g mix.  But instead of being fair and equitable by dividing as close to 750g each, I went big at 1000g on one and the puny-looking bread is 500g.  This should put the larger loaf in perspective.

79% overall hydration (76% Water, 3% EVOO), 80% PFF biga at 66% hydration.

The Sunday fare...

Today's Brobdingnagian loaf.  Considering the consistency of ciabatta dough, it was a very minor challenge moving it from couche to peel, hence a bit more misshapen than my usual ciabatta barrel loaf.

We have a relatively new and quite active and quite welcomed TFLer, tpassin, who is providing fine detailed support on the site.  But one comment which I did have an exception to was the other day when "t" said that ciabatta was a flat loaf, or something to that effect.  I'm here to testify that this is not always the case.

I rest my couche case.

The past three months were non-bake months due to travel.  Coming home I had to refresh my 100% AP levain and did so from my healthy 75% hydration mixed flour levain.  3 or 4 builds within 24 hours was all it took to have a hearty levain to work with.

All posted by me before, and I pondered whether to even post these, but what the heck.  Here's what came out of my oven between Sunday and Wednesday.

 Somewhat Deli Rye w/caraway - way easier than a true deli rye and just as tasty.

750g x 2 batards.

Hamelman Vermont SD.

400g x 3 long batards

Hamelman WW SD.

330g x 3 long batards

Clearly several non-truisms here.  No corkscrew, no scissors, no actual knife.  But the reason that I labeled the post as such - I've used the Bouabsa formula to make:

Pullman loaves

Focaccia

Pizza

Ciabatta

Batard

 Of course Baguettes

And yesterday's beastly 80% AP, 10%WW and 10% Rye Baguettes/ Long Batards - my first deviation from the standard formula.

I'm neither implying that there aren't other formulas out there every bit as versatile.  Nor even that this dough rivals other doughs specifically created for the other types of breads. However, this easy as pie IDY dough has become a trusted partner in my kitchen crime wave.

Vito Scoreleone 

My past.  I did post this before, way back in 2016, in the wake of all the chatter on TFL about pane di Altamura.  And just in the past few days Benny and Caroline have been posting semolinas, just about my favorite subject when it comes to bread.  Benny's was his take on the Altamura bread, which, although the original Altamura bread has an odd beauty all of its own, on its best days looks like something Victor Frankenstein might have left aside in a large glass jar.

So my psyche was psyched and I felt somewhat compelled to revisit my corrupted take of David Snyder's take.  Hence the pane di Alfansomura is making a return appearance.  As I now use the Canadian Atta version of semola rimacinata, which does contain some small amount of bran, it isn't as pure as the real thing, but bakes up lovely just the same.

The stats:

• 89% of the flour is durum,
• 11% of the flour is dark rye introduced into the mix as a
• 125% hydration rye levain,
• overall hydration is 1 or 2 clicks north of 70%.  
• total dough weight ran close to 1300g.  
• being ~430g each, these clearly exist in the "long batard" world, and
• baked with steam (13 min.) at 450dF.
• ~26-28 minutes overall.

I was a tad disappointed that the crumb wasn't a little more open, which makes for a chewier bite, but tasty just the same and otherwise makes for a contented bake.

I think I'll be making them again before the month is out.

Still playing around with my new toy, the Pullman pan, I wanted to bake the Hamelman WW levain loaf.  At this point I've baked it many times before but not in the Pullman pan shape.  Post-mix, I made a slightly dopey but not costly error.  I decided to add cinnamon and golden raisins to the loaf.  Not being incorporated into the formula, the percentages were now off, but likely not by much.  

This turned a 1500g mix into a 1700g mix, my plan being to fill the loaf pan with 1000g of dough and then divide the remainder for two baguettes/long batards.  I slathered on the cinnamon and soaked raisins on the first of three letter folds.  After an overnight retard, the dough was divided and shaped, the two baguettes placed on the couche and back into retard until the loaf pan bake was completed.

The inclusions almost always makes for a slightly craggy baguette shaping experience.

The learning continues.  Thanks to receiving a cornucopia of suggestions on my previous bake of the Bouabsa Pullman I moved forth and applied some of those changes, further upgrading my nascent Pullman pan skills.

Previous improvements over the first bake were documented in the linked-to post above.  I decided to move away from the IDY Bouabsa dough to a Levain semolina dough.  Rather than be a traditionalist and use a formula ready-made for a Pullman, I selected the Weekend Bakery Semolina dough.  

I'd made these before as baguettes about two years or so ago.  They differ from my go-to semolina formula with a 37.5% semolina / 62.5% AP flour mix vs. my usual 60/40 mix.  Also comes in at higher hydration of 72% vs. ~67%.

Further changes applies this time:

• Increase the loaf size to 900g
• Butter the pan rather than spray canola oil.
• Allow more time for the in-pan proofing than before.
• Concern for a too dark top, I tented the loaf for the final 10 minutes, probably too many minutes. 
• Steam for ~22 minutes total.  At half way through I removed the loaf from the pan and then steamed the oven again.

One suggestion I did not follow through on was to score the top of the loaf.  The surface was so delicate at bake time that I was concerned about ruining the loaf.  Next time.

The loaf baked for ~33 minutes @ 430dF but still did not come as high as the loaf pan.  One "mistake" that may have been detrimental - I took the dough out of the overnight retarded BF container to cleave off the additional 550g of dough, and then placed the 900g back into the container to warm up.  I imagine this disturbed the dough somewhat.  I should have divided the dough into two separate containers after the countertop BF.  Lesson learned.

Overall I'm pretty happy with this bake and considering that semolina exhibits a relatively tight crumb, at least in my kitchen, I think the finished product came out just fine.  Considering the lower percentage of semolina in the formula, the flavor is a little shy of what I look for in a semolina bread.

Here you can see where the dough decided to score itself.

A view from the End Zone.

These 3 little piggies went to market.

A relatively evenly distributed crumb with an evenly colored bake all around the crust.

 I think toast is almost always sexier than plain bread.