Cooking Cheap

I’m using the King Arthur Bread Flour, see previous posts. 1 oz and 1 oz and bit of starter build, 3 and 3 preferment. 8 to 12 hours. Mix with 10.5 oz KA BF (their bread flour), 5.5 oz of water. Rest for 10 minutes. Add salt and knead for 5 minutes. Rest for 10, knead for 5 minutes. Squish it into a large measuring cup so I kind of know what a double would look like.

The kneaded dough is about 2C of volume, probably less. I started the bulk ferment at 4:30PM. It’s roughly 80F inside, maybe a bit less. At 5:30, it was a little two wet on top so I covered with a towel instead of the plastic. By 6:30, the dough is past the 3C mark. 7:15PM, I shaped and put into the banneton for the final rise. The seam seems to be holding together. 8:15. Rising very nicely but the temperature is dropping.
8:45. The touch test says it’s about ready to bake.

I did the whole steam dance (pan of hot water,) mist every 2 minutes three times. Water glaze. I say this all the time but it is a nice looking loaf of bread. Lots of oven spring, maybe a tiny bit more than I would expect. The goal was a nice skin, some chew back from the insides, irregular crumb. Holes but not tunnels. Chewy crust is a given. With the amount of oven spring there will be holes. I know that just by looking.

I think the gluten strands can be encouraged by slashing to the proper depth and letting it spread for a few minutes and maybe skip the misting. I tend to slash shallow and I did so on this loaf.

I did something I should have done years ago: I measured what 2C and 4C of water look like in my usual bowl. I was letting the bulk ferment triple or quadruple. Looks to me like I could be serious over proofing the first rise. If so, it’s going to be a big change in my technique. 2 prefements, the bulk ferment and fthe inal rise. and bake in 24 hours. The “force” is disturbed.