Baking with Myhrvold's "Modernist Bread: The Art and Science"

[Anna N]

19 minutes ago, Raamo said:

 

Smells good!  Now I have to wait - how long Anna?

 

I don’t know and that’s the truth. I just carry on with my life and every once in a  while go over and check it. I’m guessing somewhere around two hours.  Now I’m becoming anxious for you!

[Chris Hennes]

My wife suggested we have BBQ pork shoulder for dinner on Wednesday when her brother comes to town for Thanksgiving... awesome, another excuse to bake! Tonight I'm making the Modernist Hamburger Buns. I've made the recipe from Modernist Cuisine several times with excellent success, and this one is only slightly different (they omit the lemon oil and vanilla, and use bread flour instead of a soft wheat flour).

 

Here's the dough after mixing to medium gluten formation (it only gets one fold after this, so except for needing a biga it's quite fast to make):

[Raamo]

It's NEARLY cool - couldn't resist - I have to be up stupid early for work (like 4am) so it's time!

 

And look - no big tunnel to France.   Just a small one - my wife says ATK solves this by doing a braid and cutting it in half.

 

And frosted - My wife didn't want to pipe the frosting on - so it's like a giant cinnamon roll.

 

Edited November 21, 2017 by Raamo (log)

[Anna N]

Brilliant. Congratulations.

 

Edited to add:

Now I can go to bed!  

Edited November 21, 2017 by Anna N (log)

[keychris]

The only difference I can see between @Anna N's and @Raamo's loaves there is that anna's was perhaps rolled out thinner (there's more spiral in her loaf) - I wonder if this contributed to the tunnel.

[Chris Hennes]

Here are the burger buns before baking:

 

And after:

 

The oven spring on these is really impressive. They could probably have been proofed another fifteen minutes or so, though.

[JoNorvelleWalker]

Interestingly there is a modernist option for working with smaller quantities of dough:  "The same bowl can be used for mixing the dough, bulk fermenting it, and the final proofing period."   (3-219).

 

The device in question is of course the KitchenAid Precise Heat Mixing Bowl.

 

[adey73]

is there anything new in the Naan bread techniques or recipes in book 5?

[Anna N]

6 hours ago, keychris said:

The only difference I can see between @Anna N's and @Raamo's loaves there is that anna's was perhaps rolled out thinner (there's more spiral in her loaf) - I wonder if this contributed to the tunnel.

 Tunnel or not I sent a photograph by text to my granddaughter who wanted to know if she could drop by after she finished work at 9 pm and grab what was left of the loaf!   She felt quite sure she could plug the tunnel with some Nutella. 

[Raamo]

1 hour ago, Anna N said:

 Tunnel or not I sent a photograph by text to my granddaughter who wanted to know if she could drop by after she finished work at 9 pm and grab what was left of the loaf!   She felt quite sure she could plug the tunnel with some Nutella. 

 

How to make a sweet bread even sweeter!  Sounds like something my wife would do

 

6 hours ago, Chris Hennes said:

Here are the burger buns before baking:

 

And after:

 

The oven spring on these is really impressive. They could probably have been proofed another fifteen minutes or so, though.

 

Those appear more like dinner rolls then buns - or do my eyes deceive me?  I plan to try this recipe next month - some friends are coming and have never had 72 hour pulled pork BBQ sandwiches (from MC)

[teonzo]

13 hours ago, Anna N said:

if anyone wants to chime in and offer some solutions for my new problem or at least my worsening problem of tunneling I will be happy to follow your suggestions when I’m over my sabbatical from this bread. 

 

First of all, congrats, if it wasn't for the tunnel you nailed it at the second try!

 

The tunnel forms because the dough is not attached to the inner spiral. The dough in the outher spiral grows bigger during proofing time, so it tends to detach from the inner spiral. If the dough is just laid over the smear without being "glued" then you will have this trouble. Usually spreads/smears are soft and wet, this way they are easy to spread and act as "glue" between each spiral. Judging by the photos (I don't have the recipe) the smear for this recipe looks to be on the dry side, this prevents the spiral to be "glued" together. It's not a problem for the inner ones, since they find an outer spiral that keeps them in place.

Since you prepare an egg wash for the final surface, then you can use it as "glue" when you roll the bread. Just brush some egg wash over the smear and the raisins, then roll the bread the tighter you can. You need to avoid air bubbles, act a little torsion to the roll while you form it making it tighter, pressing on the lower dough sheet while you roll. This way all spirals will get "glued".

 

This kind of breads are much easier to make in a professional kitchen, a sheeter is a HUGE help, so if you see a professional loaf with a perfect spiral, well, it wasn't the baker, it was the sheeter that did the job.

 

 

 

Teo

 

Edited November 21, 2017 by teonzo (log)

[Chris Hennes]

2 hours ago, Raamo said:

Those appear more like dinner rolls then buns - or do my eyes deceive me?  I plan to try this recipe next month - some friends are coming and have never had 72 hour pulled pork BBQ sandwiches (from MC)

Well, they are the size of hamburgers, which is a bit big for a dinner roll. But otherwise there’s not much difference when you hand shape and bake without a mold.

[Anna N]

Thank you. I think. Because now I want to try it again and I was going to give up for a bit. 

 You are correct, this is a thick,  somewhat dry smear (although I notice that @Raamo‘s seems lighter both in colour and texture). 

 

I am not 100% sure that I  particularly like  what rolling the dough so thin does to the texture of finished product. It too seems rather dry. I doubled the ingredients for the smear and the raisins and wonder if I should cut back to perhaps one and a half times.  Don’t know if that would make any difference. 

 

 Really do appreciate your input. Don’t think my bank account will stretch to a sheeter (but I know a pastry chef who owns one).  

[Anna N]

 

 Lively rye levain.  I spent years and years trying to get one of these things to actually live and now I have two that I can easily share with someone else. I will be grateful to the books for that if for nothing else. 

 

And with this lively rye levain

I made:

 

 Two small loaves of the Jewish deli rye. 

 

 Despite a brand new blade in my lame I still managed to tear rather than score the top. 

 

I was not happy with the crust out of the oven because it was hard. Not crispy— hard.  So I immediately brushed the crusts with butter and will see how that works out. I did brush with oil before proofing but I believe I should’ve done it again before baking. It’s a learning curve as they say. 

 

[teonzo]

14 minutes ago, Anna N said:

Thank you. I think. Because now I want to try it again and I was going to give up for a bit. 

 

 

You need to try other breads now, that's the best way to spoil love your granddaughter!

 

 

16 minutes ago, Anna N said:

I am not 100% sure that I  particularly like  what rolling the dough so thin does to the texture of finished product. It too seems rather dry.

 

This can depend on the type of flour. Flour with the same protein (total gluten) content can give pretty different results. Different ratios between glutenin and gliadin make for very different results in doughs. In this case I would go with a pizza flour, which is more extensible than a standard bread flour. To know the difference in extensibility of the various kind of flours you need to check the P/L ratio. For sure it's explained in the books. Less sure is to find it written in the flour package, but usually you just need to e-mail the producer to know it.

 

 

23 minutes ago, Anna N said:

I doubled the ingredients for the smear and the raisins and wonder if I should cut back to perhaps one and a half times.  Don’t know if that would make any difference. 

 

The main difference is about taste. Personally I think that when I taste a flavored bread I want to perceive the flavor and then the bread, not viceversa. But this is just a personal preference, to each his own.

The second difference is structural. If the smear is dry then it will absorb a bit of moisture from the dough (water migration), making it drier (this can explain why you felt it was dry, too).

 

 

27 minutes ago, Anna N said:

 Really do appreciate your input. Don’t think my bank account will stretch to a sheeter (but I know a pastry chef who owns one).  

 

Hahahaha, I was not trying to induce you in buying a sheeter, that's a non sense for home use. It was a masked compliment: to get a perfect spiral you need to roll the dough at the exact same thickness in each point. This is easy to do with a sheeter (it's automatic), almost impossible to do with a rolling pin, especially with an elastic bread dough. If you don't have a good hand with rolling pins then you don't get a spiral but a monster.

 

 

 

Teo

 

[Raamo]

1 hour ago, Anna N said:

 You are correct, this is a thick,  somewhat dry smear (although I notice that @Raamo‘s seems lighter both in colour and texture). 

 

I think that's my cell phone camera - it seems darker in person.

 

1 hour ago, Anna N said:

 

 Lively rye levain.  I spent years and years trying to get one of these things to actually live and now I have two that I can easily share with someone else. I will be grateful to the books for that if for nothing else. 

 

 

Does your levain grow up much during the day?  Mine is pretty happy to bubble and produce the liquid on top (hooch) but not really go crazy like chris's timelapse.

 

I'm wondering if the fact it's a little under 70F here that's making the difference.  Mr Stinky is over a week old now.  

[Anna N]

14 minutes ago, Raamo said:

 

I think that's my cell phone camera - it seems darker in person.

 

 

Does your levain grow up much during the day?  Mine is pretty happy to bubble and produce the liquid on top (hooch) but not really go crazy like chris's timelapse.

 

I'm wondering if the fact it's a little under 70F here that's making the difference.  Mr Stinky is over a week old now.  

Not sure if you’re asking about the flour or the rye one. The rye one grew  overnight last night. According to what I read I should not expect it to increase in volume the way the flour one does. I wasn’t at all sure that I was going to be successful with  the white flour one but all of a sudden it took off.  I am keeping them in the window where the temperature is around 68 to 70°F although I suspect it fluctuates much more than that.  I want to pinch myself that I actually have some of these things living. I never thought it would ever happen and had sworn them off. 

[Raamo]

Just now, Anna N said:

Not sure if you’re asking about the flour or the rye one. The rye one grew  overnight last night. According to what I read I should not expect it to increase in volume the way the flour one does. I wasn’t at all sure that I was going to be successful with  the white flour one but all of a sudden it took off.  I am keeping them in the window where the temperature is around 68 to 70°F although I suspect it fluctuates much more than that.  I want to pinch myself that I actually have some of these things living. I never thought it would ever happen and had sworn them off. 

 

Sorry flour one - it's smell is not as terrible as the first feeding - but that seems to be as expected.  I have a thermometer right below where it is, in my office which is one of the warmer places in the house.

[Anna N]

2 minutes ago, Raamo said:

 

Sorry flour one - it's smell is not as terrible as the first feeding - but that seems to be as expected.  I have a thermometer right below where it is, in my office which is one of the warmer places in the house.

Mine went through a stinky phase but they now seem to be quite pleasant if you consider yeasty/malty pleasant. I don’t seem to be getting hooch anymore. 

[Raamo]

Just now, Anna N said:

Mine went through a stinky phase but they now seem to be quite pleasant if you consider yeasty/malty pleasant. I don’t seem to be getting hooch anymore. 

 

Ok maybe it's turned the corner - no hooch is visible right now - in past this time (I feed it just over 12 hours ago) it would have some.

 

I'm going to be very busy this week with T-Day - bread for t-day will all be direct, and then I want to try the bagels for breakfast on Friday - I'll have some family still here.

 

Maybe next week it'll be mature enough to try...

[Anna N]

3 minutes ago, Raamo said:

 

Ok maybe it's turned the corner - no hooch is visible right now - in past this time (I feed it just over 12 hours ago) it would have some.

 

I'm going to be very busy this week with T-Day - bread for t-day will all be direct, and then I want to try the bagels for breakfast on Friday - I'll have some family still here.

 

Maybe next week it'll be mature enough to try...

 Looking back in my notebook I see that mine took 10 days before it decided life is good!   On the 10th day I believe it was a usable product. 

[Anna N]

 

 The crumb of the deli rye. This is a very, very mild rye. It barely crosses the line between white bread and rye bread in my opinion. I opted not to include any seeds on account of my granddaughter who doesn’t like caraway or nigella (note to self: perhaps DNA testing is in order).

 

 I used a dark rye based levain (light rye is scarcer than hens teeth in this neck of the woods). 

 

 It is still a very pleasant bread and a nice change from 100% white. I will mess with proportions at some point. 

 

 

Edited November 21, 2017 by Anna N
Remove superfluous photograph (log)

[Chris Hennes]

I'd don't have the books handy right now, @Anna N -- what are the flour proportions in that rye recipe?

[Anna N]

22 minutes ago, Chris Hennes said:

I'd don't have the books handy right now, @Anna N -- what are the flour proportions in that rye recipe?

 Bread flour 84.62% light rye flour 15.38% ;

(from levain)

 

 Bread flour 550 g 100%

Liquid rye levain 220 g 40% 

 

I am merely quoting what I see.. Math is not my strong suit

Edited November 21, 2017 by Anna N
Fix spelling (log)

[Anna N]

 I have a question on the Pain Rustique  Page 50 (4-36) in the kitchen manual

 

 According to what I am reading one mixes up the dough for the pate fermentée And allows it to ferment for 4 hours.

 

But if I read through the section in volume 3-26 the suggested time for the fermentation is 12 hours. 

 

 What, if anything, am I missing here? Obviously one won’t use the pre-ferment until it is ready to be used but there’s a huge difference between four and 12 hours for that to happen. 

Edited November 21, 2017 by Anna N
Added reference to volume four (log)