A lot of people (the very few who read my blog) have told me that they have no clue what I am talking about when I write about bread. I've tried to include some more detailed explanations in this post to explain what everything means.

This weekend I decided to stop messing around with my baking and pay closer attention to each stage of the baking process. I wanted very sour bread with a nice crust, a very open crumb, and a wheat flavor.

I started by decreasing the hydration of my barm to 50% (meaning two parts flour to one part water). A barm is a starter culture that contains wild yeast. It can also be called a sourdough starter, mother starter, etc. It is more or less referring to the same thing.

Hydration refers to the relationship of water to flour in a dough. Flour is what is called a "100% ingredient." That is to say, it is the benchmark in all recipes. So, if I have 4 ounces of flour and 3 ounces of water in a dough, it has a 75% hydration rate because water comprises 75% of the weight of the flour. Alternatively, if I have 6 ounces of water and 4 ounces of flour, I have a 150% hydration rate. Same reasoning applies.

Hydration typically does what you think. It makes a softer, looser crumb. However, when we are dealing with a barm, it has an added effect of enabling the growth of acetic bacteria. "Acetic bacteria prefer the denser, less-aerated environment of the firm starter; lactic bacteria prefer the wetter sponge of the barm method." (Bread Baker's Apprentice, p. 234). My goal was to make a very sour sourdough by decreasing the hydration of my barm for a day or two prior to starting the recipe.

I started the bread on Friday night. I followed Reinhart's base sourdough recipe. To do so, I had to adjust the flour:water ratio of the firm starter to accommodate the change in hydration of the barm. The math isn't bad. Reinhart's firm starter calls for 4 ounces of barm, 4.5 ounces of flour, and 1-2 ounces of water. The barm is normally 100%, so that means that it represents an addition of 2 ounces of water and 2 ounces of flour. So the final firm starter should have 6.5 ounces of flour and 3-4 ounces of water. My 4 ounces of barm had 2.67 ounces of flour and 1.33 ounces of water because it had a 50% hydration rate. 2.67 is two thirds of 4 and 1.33 is the last third (remember, it was a 50% hydration barm). So, to reach the prescribed flour:water ratio, I had to add less flour and more water to to the firm starter to make up for the dryness of the barm.

It was at this stage that I added some spelt flour. It is similar to wheat and I thought that it would bring out a nice flavor. The firm starer had 20% spelt and the final dough had about 15% spelt. It was enough that the bread had a strong wheat flavor but was not so strong that the bread had a wheat texture. Also, gluten development in whole wheat breads is very difficult and, since I was going for an open crumb, I knew that the more spelt I added, the harder my goal would be.



In addition to making the firm starter on Friday, I also mixed the final dough's flour and water together for a process called autolyse. The reason why bread has a shape and is not a soupy mess is because the flour has protein that, when activated, form long strands of gluten that hold the shape of the bread. Gluten gives bread a chewy texture and helps create an open crumb. Autlysing is the process of mixing the flour and water together and allowing the water to work its way into the flour and develop the gluten. It doesn't require much effort beyond a rough mix of the two ingredients, but it does involve some patience.

I wanted to get a very open crumb, so I chose a 12 hour autolyse. As the yeast eat the natural sugars in the flour, they produce ethyl alcohol and carbon dioxide in the process. The alcohol gives the bread flavor and the carbon dioxide gives the bread an open crumb (meaning air holes, etc.). If the yeast did not release carbon dioxide, the bread would be as dense as a flour/water mix. However, if the gluten is not well-developed, the carbon dioxide will diffuse throughout the bread. That means there won't be an large holes (think good baguettes) and the dough will instead have a tender, even crumb (think brioche or sandwich bread). Where the gluten is not developed at all, a lot of that gas will escape. That would be bad. Since I wanted a very open crumb, I tried hard to fully develop my gluten. Hence the 12 hour autolyse.

The firm starter and flour/water mixture sat out for 3 hours and then went to the fridge to hang out overnight.

I made the dough the following morning at 8:30, meaning I mixed the firm starer in with the flour/water mixture that had been autolysing and added the .5 ounces of salt called for by the recipe. Instead of letting the yeast get acclimated in the new dough, I had to throw it in the fridge right away to go watch Northwestern unfortunately lose to MIchigan State. Oh well. When I got home at 4:30, the dough looked anemic. I gave it a warm rise by taking it out of the fridge and letting it hang out in my kitchen until about midnight. I then threw it back in the fridge for the night, took it out the following morning at 8 a.m., gave it an hour or two to rise, divided it and let it rest, shaped it and let it rest, and then baked it.

The bread was good. The dough looked flat when I shaped it, but it had tremendous oven-spring. The crumb was exactly what I wanted and the crust was a deep brown. It could have been more sour, but I am not sure how much the spelt flour inhibited that aspect of its flavor profile. Oh well. This is the first time that I have been entirely happy with my baking technique. I have some work to do on scoring, etc., but this was a breakthrough. Bread is a slow food. You just can't rush it. I guess the same goes for learning to bake.