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[bakerslog]

Aligning with the steam blower

I made a batch with the usual recipe, two battards both scored with a single slash along the longer edge. Our oven has a ventilator on the back and blows steam from the right (its placed quite high and slightly towards the front of the left side of the oven). Placing the battard with the long side facing outside is the "natural" way to place it on the baking stone, so up until now I made the score face outside so the ventilator is not blowing on the cut directly.

Notice how the left side had a considerable larger oven spring. Up until now I thought it might be due to imperfect shaping or something like that, but on a hunch I placed the second loaf in the middle, but facing the steam blower.

It got a much more consistent oven spring and I think the slight bulge on the right might be due to the steam blower being closer to there.

It seems I will need to experiment with placement within the oven.

[bakerslog]

Kalács

1st and 2nd try attempt

Kalács is something like a braided briosche, traditionally done for Easter in Hungary. I followed the recipe of "Szabi, a pék" mostly, except that I don't have those cast iron pans.

For two kalácses:

- 600 g flour

- 60 g butter

- 250 mL milk (actually more is needed I think see below)

- yolk of two eggs

- 180 g ripe sourdough

- 100 g suger

- 8 g salt

Prep:

1. mix sourdough with half of the flour and all of the milk, leave out overnight

2. mix in everything except the butter, rest for 15 minutes

3. mix the butter rest for an hour then 3 stretch and folds with 45 minute intervals (he actually rolled the dough out and literally folded it like sheets)

4. divide into twelve balls of equal size, rest for 30 minutes

5. make 12 little snakes from the rolls, with the middle being fatter than the ends and braid two kalácses, each from 6 strands

6. cover with whipped egg and rest for 2 hours

7. bake (10 minutes 230C with steam, and 40 minutes 195C without steam, but see notes)

Some conclusions:

- for some reason an enormous amount of sourdough goes into the recipe, but it is actually needed to get any rise

- the original dough is too dry so after braiding the dough will not stick together and the cake will fall apart when cut, so adding a bit more milk (and maybe sprinkling the strands with water before braiding) could help with that

- you need to learn how to roll it fat in the middle and thin at the edges

- the first one was undercooked, the second one burned, so maybe 220 and 180 and steam all the way?

- the butter needs to be soft but not liquid, so remember to take it out from the fridge first thing in the morning

[bakerslog]

Unexpected high hydration

I followed the usual recipe, but alas, I managed to read the 506 g of water as 560 g, bringing the hydration up to a whopping 89%. It was actually super cool to work with so maybe I'll just stick to this :)

The bake was same day, with about 2 and a half hours of proofing on the counter (I popped the second loaf into the fridge when I started to bake the first to slow it down).

Temperatures:

- heat to 300 °C

- switch to 130 °C steam injection, let the temperature drop to 250 before putting in the bread, then after 3 minutes turn off everything until I heat the 10 minute mark

- at 10 minutes turn up to 230°C steam injection until 30 minutes and then 20 minutes on 200°C without steam or fan for a total of 50 minutes

Beautiful ovenspring:

[bakerslog]

Same day bake, with oven turn off

Same day is a bit of a cheat, because I made the levain yesterday, otherwise usual procedure, but instead of putting the dough in the fridge I let them rest for an hour after final shape on the counter and then baked them.

# 1

Oven heated to 300, then switched to 230 with steam injection and left to drop until 250 before putting the bread in. After putting the bread immediately turn down the heat to 130 (smallest the oven can do with steam injection) and baked for 15 minutes like that and 10 more with oven turned to 230. Finished with 20 minutes of 200 without steam.

# 2

Heated up to around 280 before repeating the above, and only 10 minutes of 130 steam.

[bakerslog]

Difference to baseline:

Used a bread flour from Nagyi instead of királybúza

Left to prove in the fridge for about 26-28 hours instead of the usual half that

Probably a tad longer autolyse

The dough seemed really stiff after autolyse so I added more water (unmeasured amount)

I now have a proper lame :)

First bread was scored facing the fan in the oven, the other was as I usually do (facing out)

I didn't water the score

The dough looked rather puffy, compared to its usual self:

The oven was heated to 250 C, then 20 minutes steam on 230, and 20 minutes without steam on 200 C for the first and 30 minutes for the second.

First bread turned out textbook magnificent

But the second one burst at the bottom.

I'd say this was either because I messed up the shaping of the second one, or because the stone really lost a lot of heat while baking the first (the drop from 250 to 230 was considerably faster the second time around).

The extra 10 minute bake doesn' seem to have changed anything (top is 20 bottom is 30 minutes without steam):

[bakerslog]

Baseline bread

I placed the levain beside the heater accidentally, which meant that by the time I woke up and started the bread it was more than double the height. I also let the bulk fermentation go a bit longer than I wanted, around 75% rise instead of the usual 50%.

The ear is suboptimal.

[bakerslog]

Scoring test

Same dough, but one loaf will be scored perpendicular to the surface and the other much steeper, almost parallel with the counter.

Mixed everything, when levain was double height, then left to rest for 30 minutes.

Two stretch and folds with 30 minute intervals.

Four stretch and folds with 15 minute intervals.

After final shaping, they were left on the counter for about 30 minutes, then placed in the fridge for about 7 hours for the one I baked first.

I put the baking stone one rack higher than the lowest, not sure if this is what caused the problems.

Also, very likely should not have skipped the autolyse ... The crumb reeks of not well developed structure. Maybe next time I should do a window pane test as well.

Conclusions

Cutting at a steeper angle does make a better ear.

Otherwise, not putting the stone on the lowest rack is probably a bad idea.

[bakerslog]

Setting today's bake as the baseline process for later comparisons

Starter is around probably 70% hydration, 50% whole-wheat rye flour and 50% AP flour, fed rather randomly and kept in the fridge.

Levain was 30 g starter, 60 g királybúza (high protein hybrid of common wheat and spelt, can be easily bought in Hungary) and 60 g water at tap temperature. Levain was prepped before going to bed and left on the counter overnight, so considering yesterday's weather it probably fermented for around 11 hours on 20-24 °C as the house cooled and warmed up, before it was added to the autolyse.

Autolyse was 650 g flour (again, királybúza), 506 g water and 14 g of salt, for about an hour. Then the levain was mixed into the autolyse by hand afterwards. Technically, since the salt is added, it's probably not very accurate to call this an autolyse, but I don't like trying to mix salt in after the dough got a bit of strength. I'm also strongly considering simply skipping autolyse in the future.

Stretch and folds was done four (five?) times in 15-30 minute intervals, as I happened to manage, but I kind of tried to check by eye if the dough has relaxed enough to warrant a new stretch and fold.

Bulk fermentation was allowed to happen until the dough rose by around 25%.

I then split the dough in two and preshaped each part, then let them rest on the counter (I did not cover them) for around 15-20 minutes and then I final shaped them and put them into bannetons and then the bannetons into plastic bags. For the preshape and final shape I used the exact same technique, copied from Foodgeek. The bannetons were dusted with white rice flour, probably too excessively. The bannetons are oversized for the loaves (which will end up to be around 0.5 kg each) and are from Sütőlapát Bt. I'm in the process of getting more appropriate sizes.

I usually place the bannetons right into the fridge (at 3 °C, which is where my fridge is set) overnight for a bake in the morning, but this time I left one of them to proof for an hour on the counter and baked right after that and baked the other one this morning.

Baking:

I have a chamotte brick baking stone from Igazi Pizza and an oven that can do steam injection. I set the oven to top-bottom+fan setting to 250 °C for an hour with the stone on the bottom most rack. Before putting the bread in I switched to the steam injection setting and 230 °C (the oven doesn't allow for higher with steam injection) for around a minute or two while I prepare the bread for actual baking. I don't (yet) know how fast it fills the inside with steam so this seems safer.

I scored the dough by simply holding a blade in my hand as I don't have a proper lame (I'm not entirely sure I actually need one though). I think I have been doing this wrong up to now, so I scored at least a centimeter deep and made sure score sideways at around 30-45° angle, so to cut flatly kind of under the dough. I also brush the cuts with a bit of water.

Then the dough goes into the oven (steam, 230 °C for around 20 minutes, then I turn the oven to top-bottom setting, 200 °C and open the door for a few seconds to let out the steam.

Conclusions

Baking without the overnight proof led to a shorter bread, with more consistent height along its length, since it didn't have time to flow apart in the very long banneton. It also had an ever so slightly less sour taste, compared to the overnight fermentation.

Baker's percentages

Approximate numbers because I don't measure feeding the starter (I also didn't bother to estimate errors).

whole-wheat rye: 0.63%

white AP: 0.63%

wheat x spelt white flour: 98.75%

hydration: 81.64%

inoculation: 20.86%

salt: 2.09%