Baby Steps … to Bread

How to gain back your dignity after a failed summer bake!

Recipe

• 400 Grams of Central Milling High Protein Organic Bread Flour
• 70 Grams of Central Milling Organic Old World Wheat Flour
• 100 Grams of Central Milling Organic Type 70 Wheat Flour
• 95 Grams of a Stiff Sourdough Starter (60% Mix)
• 20 Grams of Lemon Juice
• 50 Grams of Honey
• 1 Tablespoon of Diastatic Malt Powder
• 325 Grams of Bottled Water (Water 1)
• 10 Grams of Bottled Water (Water 2)
• 10 Grams of Redmond’s Salt

Process

• Mix together 95 Grams of Sourdough Starter and 325 Grams of Bottled Water
• Add Flour and mix to a shaggy combination
• Cover…write down start of Fermentolyse Time and let sit for 30 minutes
• Integrate 10 Grams of Water (Water 2) & 10 Grams of Salt
• Execute one set of Pinch & Folds. Then carry out one set of Rubaud Mixing. After that, finish one set of Slap & Folds. Each step should be spaced 5 minutes apart and each set of mixing should go on for three minutes
• Add in Honey, Lemon Juice and Lemon Paste
• Mix well by hand. End with Bowl Slap & Folds
• Let sit for 30 minutes and then finish three sets of stretch and folds spaced thirty to sixty minutes apart. Include the blueberries during the 2nd stretch and fold.

Oh my! I overslept and over-proofed!

Well, so much for this loaf.. I usually wake up almost every night around 2am. Then I’d walk out to the kitchen. I’d pre-shape, shape, and move the dough to a Banneton. Last night, I slept through the night and woke up to a greatly overproofed dough! It proofed from 7pm to 7am.

Recovery

Here’s the bubbly mess:

Using lots of flour I was able to laminate and then shape the dough:

I then shaped and rolled into a Batard:

And then…into the extra-long USA Pullman Pan. I placed the lid on and placed in the fridge overnight:

At this point it started to look like it would come out okay. I removed the loaf pan from the fridge the next morning and allowed the loaf to warm up and rise. I let it rise until even with the top of the pan.

I didn’t have a similar pan to place over the top as I normally do. So, I fashioned a tin-foil tent over the top of the pan. This was to contain the generated steam. I baked at 400 degrees for the first 30 minutes. Then, I reduced the temperature to 350. After removing the tin-foil, I continued the last part of the bake. I baked until the internal temperature was 205 and the crust color looked good.

I was extremely happy with how this came out. As a bonus, I could clearly taste the lemon juice and zest. Usually those flavors get lost among all the other components of sourdough. I even liked the crumb. Altogether, over-proofing wasn’t a big deal like I thought it would be. Here’s one last picture of the crumb. Enjoy!