it’ll come to me, don’t worry

Remember the Seinfeld episode where George did the opposite of what he normally did and everything worked out well for him? That’s a lot like the Whole Grain course at SFBI. We’re getting the chance to learn from Didier Rosada, who is an exceptional baker and instructor. He’s a very effective teacher and is helping me learn about a very complex topic. I’m also picking up many tricks of the trade which will help me for years to come. But, many of his techniques are “the opposite” of what we learned in Artisan 1 and 2. Some examples:

• You think we shouldn’t add more water on Speed 2? Ha! Just slosh some more in there till it feels right! Really soft, that is. [it's called double hydration and makes for a very extensible, airy dough]
• 2 minutes on speed 2? No way, baby! Use colder water and mix like hell. At least this way I can pull a window. Heck, my dog could pull a window with this dough! [we're taking up to 8 minutes on speed 2 to develop the gluten and it's developed a lot more than Artisan 1, but we haven't over mixed one yet!]
• - Why put a little flour on the table when you can make it a solid mass of white? Go for it! [this highly hydrated, soft dough can get super sticky, so it needs a lot more flour for shaping and proofing]
• Proof baguettes seam down? Surely you jest! Seam up is the way to go. Then you can flip once on the peel and slide it onto the loader. All my baguettes were ‘S’ shaped but it’s a new technique so give it a try! [I'm got a tiny bit better on Day 2, but it's still a challenge]
• 3 fingers between loaves? No Way! 3mm works too.
• don’t move the loaf once it’s scored? har har! Some of my loaves got moved at least three times. I’m surprised they didn’t get moved to another oven. [in fairness, we're baking a lot of bread so we're really trying to be efficient with loader space]

If you’re a ‘follow the directions’ type of guy this week is not for you. But if you want to see a different way which works very, very well, then seeing these new techniques is a real treat. I’m having a ball so far — it’s already opened my eyes to new ways of doing things and new ways to view what we’re doing when we’re working with the dough.

And I sure can’t argue with the results!

This is a wheat germ baguette — all the best parts of a baguette with better nutrition and a nice wheaty taste.

This is a buckwheat pear bread. The buckwheat adds colour and the pears and walnuts add a LOT of flavour!

This is a semolina batard with fennel and raisins. Very similar to what I make at home but with a much more delicate crust and crumb.

Three outstanding loaves on the first day. Gotta love it!

Artisan II is Over!

Originally uploaded by madbaker66

That’s me looking tired and weak-armed, holding a massive boule I made to wrap up my second week at the San Francisco Baking Institute. I forgot to weigh it but I’m pretty sure it’s 5kg.

The loaf is made with a sourdough culture I started on Monday and was baked long to ensure the crumb is fully cooked. I love the dark colour — it’s hard to believe the loaf is made with white flour when it looks like that, but that’s what caramelization does.

Really strange emotional vibe at school on Friday. I’ve made some great new friends in the past two weeks and most of them are heading home now. It’s tough to think about how I’ll likely never see some of them again after getting along so well and having so much in common. It takes a certain type of person to bake bread, I guess, and I tend to click with that type of person.

On the other hand, I’m also wicked homesick, so my emotions are sure getting pulled in two directions. Time to hunker down, get some laundry done and push through the final week. I keep hearing that the new instructor is extremely good, so I’m looking forward to the whole grain class, even as I’m ready to hop on a plane.

Regional Shapes

Originally uploaded by madbaker66

We wrapped up the Artisan II course on Friday by spending some time creating decorative bread shapes. Each shape represents a regional variety that is made in a specific French town. For example, you’d find Pain d’Aix in Aix.

The bread is a basic country bread with white and whole wheat flour, which tastes pretty good but seemed bland after the olive bread we baked in the morning!

Let’s see if I can pick out the shapes from the picture. Starting at the top left corner and moving clockwise we have:

- Fleur
- Fendu
- Tordu
- Tabatiere
- Auvergnat
- Another Auvergnat with a smaller cap (how did two get in there?!)
- Vivarais
- Charleston (a little lumpy)

In the middle is a Corrone Bordelais (my favorite) and the Pain d’Aix, which looks kind of like a bowtie after some red wine. After white wine it looks like a moustache. Trust me on that.

A Mass of Semolina Bread

Originally uploaded by madbaker66

Now that’s what a semolina loaf should look like. The formula is very similar to the bread we bake at the Orange Boot, and I got some pointers about shaping and applying sesame seeds which really helped.

The bread was always tasty, but now it looks great too!

Ciabatta!

Originally uploaded by madbaker66

Wow! I now know what a wet dough really is. The verb we used to describe the dough as we were dividing the dough was ’swimming.’ And it was.

The loaves in the pictures were massive, yet light as a feather. 10 inches square yet only weighed 600 grams.

Another neat technique I learned — you need to dry these out in the oven a bit before unloading to drive out all the steam. Makes for a much crispier crust.

Multigrain Sourdoughs

Originally uploaded by madbaker66

Yesterday was the same flour, with different levains. Today was different flours with the same levain (for the most part.) It was a very challenging day since the doughs were especially tricky to work with.

On the left is sourdough rye. Rye is a very delicate, pasty dough that moves really fast so you can’t be too far away from it. But with the addition of sourdough starter it makes for an incredibly delicious loaf which is worth the effort!

In the middle is a sourdough multigrain loaf. This time we roasted the seeds prior to incorporating in the dough and the end result was even better than the yeasted loaf we made in Artisan 1. This is without a doubt the best loaf I’ve ever tasted.

On the right was a whole wheat sourdough. While it was fairly easy to work with I have to admit that the flavour was a little plain. We’ve made better loaves than this during the week.

Finally, the batard at the back is a 100% whole wheat sourdough made with pumpernickel starter. Now this is a complex loaf. It’s a real pig to work with — the fragile dough makes shaping very difficult without tearing the dough. But what flavour! It’s complex, wheaty, with a strong rye overtone. This is a bread which I’d be proud to offer in my bakery once I practice the handling and shaping some more.

ONE QUICK NOTE: I’ve made a habit of offering my loaves to the folks that work at my hotel. I found out tonight that I’ve got quite a reputation! Everyone knows my room number because the cleaning staff have remarked about how the room smells very strongly of bread every morning. I’m so used to the smell that I hardly notice any more…

Big Boule, Big Flavour

Originally uploaded by madbaker66

Here’s another example of what we do with leftover dough. This is a ‘white’ sourdough loaf that has been baked an extra long time. It may look burnt but it’s not at all. The smell is a deep, rich caramel and the taste is exquisite.

The end result is an entirely different loaf than a basic sourdough — much more complex flavour. I really like it!

Baking off large Ryes

Originally uploaded by madbaker66

When we are working with dough we always make extra so that we’re sure everyone has enough to practice with. This means that there are always leftovers, which we make into really large loaves and bake off at the end of the day.

The rye bread in the picture weigh about 10 pound each. Once they were brown we baked them with the oven door open to keep the heat mellow. It’s the only way to effectively reduce the heat of these large deck ovens when we still want to bake smaller loaves in the lower decks.

This picture is a good example of the docking technique we used with the rye loaves. We use a roller with long plastic pins to poke even holes all over the loaf before we load it in the oven.

Happiness is Sourdough Bread

Originally uploaded by madbaker66

Man am I tired. It’s been a long week so far but a pike of fun too. The loaves in the picture were made on Tuesday, for Day 2 of the Artisan 2 course. It was an interesting exercise since each shape contains a different sourdough starter.

The batards at the back contain a liquid levain (levain = sourdough starter.) The extra water in the levain results in more lactic acid development — think yogurt or buttermilk sour as opposed to vinegar. — and a light, gassy dough. I find the smell to be powerful but the resulting loaf to be very light and mild.

The boules in row 3 contain a stiff sourdough levain, and 40% of the dough weight is made up of levain. The stiff levain causes more acetic acid development (ie. vinegar sour) but only adding 40% still gives a mild sour flavour in the final loaf. One note about the shape — it’s called a “chowder bowl” cut since the score line is a nice guide to cut off the lid and hollow the loaf out for a soup bowl.

The ‘bacillus’ loaves in the front right are made with the same stiff levain as the boules, but the dough contains 70% levain. This results in a much more sour loaf of the type that most people associate with San Francisco Sourdough. Its not my favorite — I prefer a milder sour taste — but it’s certainly true to the loaf’s intent. Quite tasty. The scoring is a really attractive ‘S’ cut with big ears. My scoring technique was going really well with that batch.

Finally, the loaves in the front left are also made with a stiff levain, but the levain is only fed once per day (the other is fed twice per day.) The resulting loaf is the most acedic of the bunch.

It was an interesting experiment with different proportions of the same three ingredients as we could get very distinct flavours from each loaf.

We’re tasting bread with the intensity that some people taste wine, and my palette has developed quite a bit over the past 10 days. I’m thinking that when I get home my sourdough will be a little milder than what we’re getting here, and I’ll have the skills to make the right adjustments to make it so!

My Artisan 2 course started on Monday.  This course is 95% dedicated to wild yeast bread, aka sourdough.  Sourdough breads take longer to develop and rise, and there’s more effort involved in keeping our wild yeast cultures healthy.   That’s why I’m a little behind in my posting — I get back from school, eat some bread and go to sleep.

BUT!  We’re making some great bread, I have pictures, and will share some after school tonight.

PS — the other 5% of the course is decorative shaping techniques, which will be fun too.  Most of that is Friday afternoon, I believe.