Can I graduate from the beginners forum now?

Perhaps I'm over critical of my own work, but there is one thing I am still unhappy with - I changed from Manildra flour to Western (both strong white bakers flour), and since then the crumb has been, well, doughy.

I like the crumb to be chewy, but since the change, the texture is more like mashed potato, or an old dishcloth.  (Yeah, I'm exaggerating, but it's kind of mushy like that).

I used to have really good results with Western when I was making the same sort of bread with instant yeast, albiet with smaller bubbles, and I baked with ratios up to almost 80% then, so I can handle the wet stuff, and don't think this is about a change in hydration due to water content in the flour.

Can anyone suggest why the crumb has deteriorated in this way?  I'm using the same recipe (68% hydration) & procedure.

One hunch I have is that I threw my starter out of equilibrium when I swapped flour.  Another hunch is that the flour is just "different", and I need to adjust the baking parameters to suit it - perhaps lower temperature for longer?

Thanks for any tips,

Jason.

Yeah, I think I annoyed my yeasty-beasties by changing their food - however there's still enough lift to make loaves.  I have another batch on today, and am going to try an adjustment in baking paramers.  Cooler and longer, in the hope that it cooks the inside more without damaging the crust.

I have been cooking at 225C for 20min then 200 for 20min.  (I throw ice cubes in the oven when the loaves go in.) 

I'll probably do the whole lot at 200C today and see what happens.

I know what you mean about experimenting LeadDog - I'm a "parameter tweaker", on the basis that I think it builds understanding of the processes at work.

Looks like my hunch was correct: a longer-slower bake worked nicely on my last batch of bread.