Another Sourdough Adventure

Seriously , i think i need to mute some the groups i joined in . All these food related groups i belong to , i will start muting them this week . It’s only 2nd week of May and i think i have baked sourdough 3 times already . Yes i did an entry on sourdough few days ago , with higher hydration and using turmeric , The yellow sourdough ..

Couple nights ago i was busy making another levain for what else ? Yes , for another sourdough .. i kept wanting to experiment and seeing if i can get a different result . Same method , after this though i might experiment with different method other than Ken Fork’s method . I heard from few comments that his bulking time is too long . I have used his method and while the result was pretty good , i didn’t get the big crumbs i was after but it’s not dense , it’s more like lace crumbs , which is ideal for my family anyway . Meanwhile for the oven spring , i think i only got a really good oven spring once , it was last year . The rest are just so-so , from what i was told , too long of bulking will not give you a good oven spring . Both of bulking and proofing was done in room temperature , although my kitchen temperature around cooler months stay in the mid 60’s .

This particular day i decided to bake sourdough bread , i decided to do bulking still in room temperature , but doing the final proof in the fridge , the plan was to do it overnight . I had 2 boules going at this point , both bulking in room temperature overnight for 9 hours before i shaped them . One stayed in fridge for cold proof for 9 hours and the other one was staying in the fridge for 22 hours .

The results ? Pretty much about the same , had i done a shorter bulk fermentation , i probably had a better oven spring , i don’t know . I am still learning my ways through this . So , i was happy with the scoring for one of the boule though , it looks pretty decent , and the other one not so much because i was thinking too much of it . And the more i thought about it , the more i messed up , plus i forgot to sprinkle rice flour on it , so .. it doesn’t have that white look .

But the crumbs was pretty decent . I ended up sharing it with neighbors .

Next time when i bake this again .. i probably will do the same hydration , 78% or maybe a little lower . But i will cut the bulking time , and then cold proof in the fridge . It seems it does pretty well even up to 22 hours . Plus it seems easier to score a cold dough .