It was pretty sad. It's a 100% whole wheat loaf (actually, it's 100% Emmer). Breadtopia has an Emmer sourdough recipe that looks like it turned out somewhat well, but it's also fairly compact and doesn't show much rise. My bread looked like this when sliced:
This made for a week of disappointing sandiwches. The flavor was pretty typical of 100% whole wheat bread, which could be a good or bad thing, depending on your preferences. Aside from the all-whole-wheat factor, there were a couple of additional things that might have played a role: 1) I over-hydrated the dough. I knew I should've restricted the water a little but didn't. My Mockmill grinds grain somewhat more coarsely than some whole wheat flours I have seen, and the coarser grind doesn't absorb as much water. 2) My flour might have been unduly coarse. I might need to adjust the stones in my mill.
A third possible contributing factor is the climate. It's summer now, and my house is warm, which can lead to excessive pre-baking rising of the dough. If the dough rises aggressively before going in the oven, my experience is that further rising once it's baking is curtailed. That can be addressed through a shorter counter-top rising period, but I usually let it rise overnight, so it's going to be sitting on the counter at least 7-8 hours in most cases.
The next week (this morning), I decided to go back to a basic 50/50 mix. The results were much better:
No comments:
Post a Comment