I'm just so pleased with the bread I made today, I have to post some photos! I used SourDom's recipe for Pane Francese with the only difference of using less water. The dough turned out quite stiff at first but was just right after the two hours of bulk proving with one fold. Then the shaped loaf spent the night in the fridge and came out nicely risen and holding it's shape well. I'm happy with the crust, crumb and taste! Thanks for the recipe SourDom!
Cheers
Kathy
Replies
Well done Kathy.
Did you have a particular reason for working at a lower hydration? How much less water did you use?
Just curious as I have done some variations on hydration with this recipe.
Keep on bakin'
Farinam
Hello Kathy,
Just to illustrate the difference in appearance you can get with the same recipe. The following shows my two most recent Pane Francesa made using SourDom's recipe as is.
Farinam
Hi Farinam, those loves look lovely!
To answer your question, I find stiffer or stronger dough easier to work with, there is less spread while proving and more oven spring while baking. But now i'm wondering if this has more to do with the strength of the starter than the hydration of the dough. The reason why i'm wondering is that I've made another loaf of Pane Francese and it turned out softer, the loaf flatter but still with more open and moist crumb than the first one. The only difference i could see was in the consistency of the starter, it was more liquid and not as full of bubbles as before. What do you think?
P.s I have some photos but I can't see where they go here.
Cheers
Kathy
Really tempting to go try the recipe myself - I love bread with very open crumb!
Hello Kathy,
One way of inserting photos that has worked for me but has reportedly not worked for some others is to just copy/paste. It seems that you do have to be in the post edit window that has a tool-bar across the top (has icons for formatting text etc). The tool-bar does not seem to come up if you hit reply to a comment.
The other way is to upload your pics to somewhere on the web - your Gallery on this site would do. You can then insert using the icon in the tool-bar with the mountain and sun. If you only have one pic then you should select it in the Gallery and copy (or write down) the URL before you start editing your post. When you click on the icon, you get a dialog box to enter the URL and alternate text. If you have more than one pic either write the URLs down before you start or (I think this will work but have not tried it) open a second instance with your Gallery webpage on a separate Tab and you should be able to navigate back and forth between there and the edit page to copy/paste the URLs.
Hope this makes some sense.
In terms of the dough characteristic, there can be a number of reasons.
One is just the weather at the time - if the humidity is high the flour will absorb moisture from the air. When you weigh your flour, your get a bit less 'flour' and a bit more water - then you add your normal amount of water and the hydration is just a bit higher.
Another is down to different batches of flour, even if it is the same brand, the water absorbing capacity can vary with the source of the wheat and the season.
Yet another is whether the dough/starter is over aged/developed/proved.
So while it is recommended that you weigh all of your ingredients, many recommend that you hold back some of your liquid until you get an idea of how the dough is coming together so that you can control the texture of the dough to what you feel comfortable with.
The other is that you should pay attention to what the dough is doing and adjust your procedure accordingly rather than rigidly following a time-line that has been nominated with a recipe or even that you have dveloped yourself.
Circumstances alter cases like broken noses alter faces - as my mother was wont to say.
Hope this helps.
Farinam