Baking from "Flour, Water, Salt, Yeast: The Fundamentals of Artisan Bread and Pizza"

[Chris Amirault]

Chris,

I have also improved my oven spring but by taking much more time and attention to detail when "tightening" my boules. Three Dutch ovens would be great. How did you cobble them together?

 

Good point about tightening the boules. I've been pretty devout about that, too. 

 

As for the dutch ovens, the three I have are shown here: 

 

 

The blue is a Le Creuset 2 quart; the red is a LC 2.5 quart cocotte; the yellow is a Descoware 2 quart. I think that the blue LC is significantly smaller than the other two, perhaps because of the height of the Descoware lid. So I use about 25% of the dough for that, and split the rest between the Descoware and the cocotte. 

Edited March 22, 2014 by Chris Amirault (log)

[Anna N]

Good point about tightening the boules. I've been pretty devout about that, too. 

 

As for the dutch ovens, the three I have are shown here: 

 

3 dutch ovens.jpg

 

The blue is a Le Creuset 2 quart; the red is a LC 2.5 quart cocotte; the yellow is a Descoware 2 quart. I think that the blue LC is significantly smaller than the other two, perhaps because of the height of the Descoware lid. So I use about 25% of the dough for that, and split the rest between the Descoware and the cocotte.

Thanks, Chris. Who knew? I can pull together a very similar collection:

Orange is 2.75 qt, brown is 2 qt and blue is 3 pint. So I will need to find appropriate proofing vessels and I should be good to go. I have used one of these in the past but never all three.

(rotuts: all of these are thrift shop finds and each will fit in the Breville XL.)

[Kerry Beal]

The top from one of those rotisserie chickens lined with a white towel would work for a proofing vessel for the oval ones.

[Chris Amirault]

Anna, I think those would work even better. And good point, Kerry, about the oval chicken tops. We have bannetons in the house -- Xmas presents to my wife that sat unused for several years -- and though they are circular it's easy enough to place the proofed dough into the oval oven without difficulty. But proofing to the proper shape would probably allow a gentler touch. 

[Kerry Beal]

 

I've discovered that a pair of bamboo chopsticks serve well for the initial mixing of the levain - and also for the autolyse.  

 

 

Today's loaves - levain with some rye and some pumpernickel flour.  Got myself a new bread knife - what a treat to motor though the bottom crust.  

[Chris Amirault]

What kind of bread knife is that, Kerry? 

 

Here are three overnight whole wheat loaves, going pretty much by the book: 

 

 

 

Really happy with how these turned out: great crust and crumb, excellent flavor. I think we'll rotate back and forth between these and the white as our weekly breads. 

 

Now that I have the basics down and am developing a feel for the different steps, I'm wondering why I was so apprehensive about bread-making in the first place. This book rocks. 

[Kerry Beal]

Those look great Chris.

 

Knife is a Victorianox Fibrox.

[Kerry Beal]

 

Just pulled these out of the oven - about 5 minutes before I have to leave for work.  

 

About 100 g of rye flour, 50 grams rye groats, some caraway seeds and 24 hour old levain.  Added extra regular yeast since I needed them ready to go in time for work.

 

 

[Pallee]

Happy to have found this thread. I've been baking from this book since it came out, so fun to see everyone's bread. I recently started adding cooked grains to my dough. Here I sprouted a cup of spelt, then boiled it for 12 minutes, cooked cornmeal and amaranth seeds and added them. Also went up to 50% whole wheat flour. Loved the results.

[CeliaEA]

Hi,

 

As a brand new baker, I'm trying to understand why all the recipes in this book are for two loaves?  (Other than that they're delicious.)  Is it that the ingredient amounts get too minute to measure?  We're a small household, and there's no way we'll go through the bread fast enough to avoid it going terribly stale.  Plus I want to bake more often, so that I have more chances to improve my technique before my memories of what worked last time are equally stale.  

 

I saw one person on this thread had halved the recipe to only make 1 loaf, but any advice you can offer on how to modify successfully would be hugely helpful.  

 

Thanks!

[Anna N]

Hi,

 

As a brand new baker, I'm trying to understand why all the recipes in this book are for two loaves?  (Other than that they're delicious.)  Is it that the ingredient amounts get too minute to measure?  We're a small household, and there's no way we'll go through the bread fast enough to avoid it going terribly stale.  Plus I want to bake more often, so that I have more chances to improve my technique before my memories of what worked last time are equally stale.  

 

I saw one person on this thread had halved the recipe to only make 1 loaf, but any advice you can offer on how to modify successfully would be hugely helpful.  

 

Thanks!

Welcome.

I just halve the ingredients. I don't make any other adjustments. It works just fine.

[smokinjack]

I missed the whole wheat ,raisen pecan bread I used to get before work from La Baguette Bakery in Colorado Springs.

Ken Forkish's 50% whole wheat bread is perfect for adding dried fruit  and chopped ,toasted pecans.I used dried sweetened cranberies

I added 1 cup of cranberries and 1 cup of pecans during the mix.I scaled out one loaf and then scaled rolls at 3 oz. each.

All baked on the Big Green Egg.

[Anna N]

Fantastic. So great to see a baker and a BGE enthusiast all rolled into one! Perhaps this will persuade my Eggfest partner to post photos of our most recent efforts.

[smokinjack]

Fantastic. So great to see a baker and a BGE enthusiast all rolled into one! Perhaps this will persuade my Eggfest partner to post photos of our most recent efforts.

That would be great.I'd love to see them.Are you also on an Egg forum?

I'm "Serial Griller" on the two egg forums.

I love baking on the Egg..especially when it's hot outside and I don't want to heat up the house.

[smokinjack]

Hi,

 

As a brand new baker, I'm trying to understand why all the recipes in this book are for two loaves?  (Other than that they're delicious.)  Is it that the ingredient amounts get too minute to measure?  We're a small household, and there's no way we'll go through the bread fast enough to avoid it going terribly stale.  Plus I want to bake more often, so that I have more chances to improve my technique before my memories of what worked last time are equally stale.  

 

I saw one person on this thread had halved the recipe to only make 1 loaf, but any advice you can offer on how to modify successfully would be hugely helpful.  

 

Thanks!

These loaves freeze nicely.Wrap in plastic wrap after they have cooled and put into a zip lock bag.You might have to slice them in half to get them to fit..but no problem.

Jon

[Anna N]

Hi,

 

As a brand new baker, I'm trying to understand why all the recipes in this book are for two loaves?  (Other than that they're delicious.)  Is it that the ingredient amounts get too minute to measure?  We're a small household, and there's no way we'll go through the bread fast enough to avoid it going terribly stale.  Plus I want to bake more often, so that I have more chances to improve my technique before my memories of what worked last time are equally stale.  

 

I saw one person on this thread had halved the recipe to only make 1 loaf, but any advice you can offer on how to modify successfully would be hugely helpful.  

 

Thanks!

Most bread recipes are amenable to being halved or doubled. Simply divide the ingredients by 2. Rarely are any other changes needed.

[Kerry Beal]

Made a Forkish Pane de Campagne over here in the Cooking on a Big Green Egg thread.  

[Luke]

Another Ken Forkish convert. Started the Levain (from scatch) on Tuesday and followed it up with the Pain de Campagne on Sunday.

 

Levain was made with 40% whole wheat, 40% whole rye, 20% whole spelt ratios.

 

Awesome crumb and taste.

 

 

 

 

[Anna N]

Luke,

Congratulations. That is one beautiful looking bread! I must get back to Forkish.

[dr_justice]

Another convert here. Baked for the first time the overnight white on saturday morning, and my 3 year old was like "want more bread" all day long. I've never seen her want so much bread, ever.

[dr_justice]

By the way, has anyone tried  the bacon bread in Ken Forkish's book?   I don't have the time or work schedule to make levain, which is what it calls for in the book. Anybody tried to incorporate the bacon in the overnight white bread?

 

Speaking of the Overnight White Bread, my work schedule would command that I need to cut about 3 hours from the whole process -- basically I am thinking I would need to bulk ferment for 9 hours instead of the required 12-14 hours.

 

Any suggestions for how I could/should accelerate this process?  More yeast? Warmer water?

[dr_justice]

Space log E-2103.

 

Tried overnight white again.

 

Tried bread flour instead of AP, same brand, because I was out of AP.

Mixed in a tub as per Admiral Forkish's instruction (instead of a large concave bowl).

Reduced water temp 5 degrees to target 78 degrees (I was still off by a few).

Mistakenly baked at 450 for the first 30 minutes, at which point I remove the lid and go: "hey. Why the... Oh damn". Then bake for the the remaining 25 at 475.

 

The result of the experiment resulted in a thinner crust than anticipated.

As for the rest....

 

Oh.

 

Oh my.

 

Ooooooh. Moist. Flavorfoul. Perfect crumb texture.

 

Ooooooooooh.

 

Revelation.

 

Kirk out.

[Luke]

Gave up on the idea of splitting the loafs into two dutch ovens 50/50 as I found it too time consuming, and I was a little concerned I'd be burning more electricity that I wanted too...

 

So, I dug out the good old camping dutch oven! Now this dutch oven is a monster, and normally used on our camp fire, but it can easily accomodate the whole loaf.

 

Baked the overnight white this time as my schedule would not allow a levain bread. Not bad. Could have left it a bit longer in the oven to brown up. It was a tad under-done in the center, but I put this down to changing to the larger/heavier dutch oven and changing the recipe as well. Note to self: dont change two variables at the same time! Actually, I think the issue was I used a pizza stone with this dutch oven like I did last time, but the cast iron is much thicker, so I will remove it next time.

 

Crust

 

and crumb

 

Now dont get me wrong, this is good bread! But was it better than the levain bread? Not even close. The flavour was somewhat bland (but so are a lot of bakery breads), but it was definitely enjoyable. If I was to make a non levain bread again, I would go for the wholemeal to add some extra flavour.

 

Cheers

Luke

Edited September 4, 2014 by Luke (log)

[janeer]

I too find the overnight white bland. I like the poolish better. Pretty loaf, though

[Luke]

Baked the Field Blend #2 yesterday in the large dutch oven. The baked loaf weighed in at 1.5kg!

 

Field Blend #2 is a different animal to the Pain de Campagne, no doubt due to the rye. After proofing in the fridge, it was more fragile and sticky when trying to get it in the dutch oven.

 

The bake went really well....

 

Crust was much darker, and I left it in the oven for quite some time.

 

 

Crumb was a bit tighter as you would expect from a rye. The flavour is excellent, with some deep complex caramel/bitter overtones from the crust. This bread would go fantastically well with beer. But then again, it goes well with anything!

 

....Next experiment is see how Pain de Campagne works with plain flour (10.1% protein). Up until now, all of my white flour in these loafs has been Special White Tipo 00 (11.9% protein). Will let you know how I go....

 

Luke

Edited September 5, 2014 by Luke (log)