The Whole Shebang

I've been tinkering around with my starter refresh and my recipes, lately. This post brings the whole work flow into one spot. All ounce measurements refer to weights.

Refreshing the Starter

I've developed a process for refreshing the starter that provides a nicely active culture with zero waste. Start with 2 oz. of old starter from the fridge. Add 2 oz. of water and 2 oz. of white bread flour. Mix it vigorously and put it in a warm (70+ degrees F.) place for 8-10 hours. It should double in size and look bubbly.

Prepare the Sponge

All my recipes use the same sponge. Take 4 oz. of newly refreshed starter. Add 4 oz. of water and 4 oz. of white bread flour. Mix it vigorously. It starts off looking like this.

Place it in a warm spot for 8-10 hours. It should double in size and look bubbly, like this.

Rye Bread Recipe

Add the ingredients to the bread pan in the order shown in the recipe. It's not that critical, but the liquids and spoonfuls go on the bottom. The rye flour goes on top of those. The white flour goes on top of the rye, and the sponge goes on top of the white.

Rye Bread by weight
Water	3 oz.
Milk	3 oz.
Salt	1 tsp
Caraway seeds	1 Tbl
Oil	2 Tbl
Vital gluten	2 tsp
Rye flour	9 oz.
White bread flour	6.5 oz.
Sponge

Set the bread machine for the whole wheat cycle and press start.

The top can look a little ragged. I call this the Pompadour hair style. I thought I had that fixed, once. Maybe not.

Whole Wheat Recipe

As with the rye recipe, add the liquids and spoonfuls on the bottom followed by the whole wheat flour, then the white flour, then the sponge.

Whole Wheat by weight
Water	3 oz.
Milk	3 oz.
Salt	1 tsp
Oil	2 Tbl
Whole wheat flour	10.5 oz.
White bread flour	5 oz.
Sponge

Set the bread machine for the whole wheat cycle and press start.

I don't have a recent picture of a completed whole wheat loaf. It sometimes sports the Pompadour hair style. These loaves tend to rise rather high, yielding a tall loaf of bread. I might try swapping some of the white flour for whole wheat in the future.

Whole Wheat Revisited

My whole wheat recipe had been giving me some disappointing results. Part of that was due to my sluggish starter. I also think that the amount of water that I was using was a little skimpy. My old recipe was

Whole Wheat, Take 6
Prepare sponge.  When it is ready, put these ingredients in the bread machine with the white flour going in last.  Add the sponge on top.
Water	4 oz.
Whole wheat flour	2 ¼ cups
White flour	1  cup
Vital Gluten	none
Salt	1 tsp
Oil	2 Tbl
Honey	¼ cup

My next attempt added 2 oz. more of water. I used the 4+4+4 starter refresh. That is take 4 oz. (all measurements by weight) of the old starter, add 4 oz. of white flour, and 4 oz. of water. I let that mature for 10-12 hours. I use the same formula to create the sponge, except that it uses 4 oz. of the newly refreshed starter. My sponge starts looking like this:

That was a 9PM. The next morning at 6AM the sponge has expanded nicely.

For my recipe, I've decided to measure my flour by weight for more consistent results. The recipe is now

Whole Wheat, Take 7
Prepare sponge.  When it is ready, put these ingredients in the bread machine with the white flour going in last.  Add the sponge on top.
Water	4 oz.
Whole wheat flour	10.5 oz.
White flour	5 oz.
Vital Gluten	none
Salt	1 tsp
Oil	2 Tbl
Honey	¼ cup

This mixture made a nice looking dough ball in the bread machine.

The completed loaf rose better than any whole wheat sourdough loaf to date. What can't be seen here is that the pompadour hair style that my rye loaves used to  exhibit has shown up in the whole wheat bread. I'll add some milk in place of some of the water next time.

As a bonus, it was delicious. 

I think I've got this figured out

I haven't posted in a couple of weeks.  It's not because I haven't been making bread, but I think I have the process figured out, now.  I have my two favorite recipes, and they are repeatable. Let's review.

First step for all of my recipes is to refresh the starter.  I discard half of the starter that I have in the fridge and add 3/4 cup of flour (4 oz. by weight) and 4 oz. of water (weight and volume are the same for water).  I let that sit in a warm spot for 8-12 hours, usually overnight.  During the summer, I just put it on the counter in the kitchen.  During the heating season, I put it in the basement in the same room that has the boiler in it.

Second step is the make the sponge for the bread recipe.  For that, I stir down the refreshed starter and measure out 4 oz. by weight.  I don't know what that is by volume.  I always measure it by weight, because that is going to be the most accurate.  The volume is about twice as much before the stirring as after.  Not only that, sourdough starter is kind of sticky, so even if I were confident about the volume, too much of it would stick to the measuring cup.

To that 4 oz. of starter, I add 4 oz. (by weight) of flour and 4 oz. of water.  I cover that loosely with plastic wrap and let it sit for 8 hours.  It's the same idea as the starter refresh.  The remaining starter goes back in the fridge.

A note about ingredients.  For the above steps and any part of the recipe that calls for white flour, I use King Arthur bread flour.  I won't accept any substitute.  I'm not affiliated with King Arthur in any way, but their bread flour makes the best bread.  I won't even use their all-purpose flour.  In my mind all-purpose flour is all-purposes except for making bread.  I think it has to do with the gluten content of the bread flour. The person who taught me to make bread (by hand) about 25 years ago told me to use King Arthur bread flour, and I've never strayed.  I use King Arthur for the whole wheat flour, too. King Arthur doesn't seem to make rye flour.  I use Hodgson Mill.

OK, now we have a sponge.  That gets used to make either whole wheat bread:

Whole Wheat, Take 6
Prepare sponge.  When it is ready, put these ingredients in the bread machine with the white flour going in last.  Add the sponge on top.
Water	4 oz.
Whole wheat flour	2 ¼ cups
White flour	1  cup
Vital Gluten	none
Salt	1 tsp
Oil	2 Tbl
Honey	¼ cup

or rye bread:

Ryer Rye Bread, Take 3
Prepare sponge.  When it is ready, put these ingredients in the bread machine with the white flour going in last.  Add the sponge on top.
Water	7 oz.
Salt	1 tsp
Caraway seeds	1 Tbl
Oil	2 Tbl
Vital gluten	2 tsp
Rye flour	2 Cup
White bread flour	1 1/3 Cup

I use the whole-wheat cycle on my Toasmaster TBR 15 bread machine for both recipes.

I still haven't perfected the white bread recipe, but I like whole-grain breads.  I'll probably revisit it at some point, but I'm sticking with these two favorites for the near future.

Once the weather turns cooler, I'm going to try making some things other than loaves of bread, like English muffins, bagels, and maybe some sandwich rolls.

Push-button Whole Wheat

I thought I wasn't going to need to make bread until next weekend, but it seems that mold spores decided to eat my last loaf before I could.  That left me without bread and without the luxury of planning a day in advance to prepare everything. To make matters worse, I have a singing lesson after work that will keep me away from home until about 6:30 PM.  That wouldn't leave much time for the bread machine cycle to finish before I went to bed.

I decided to try my two-step process that I used some weeks ago where I let my sponge mature right on top of the rest of the ingredients.  I tried this with my whole wheat recipe. 

I started by refreshing my starter over night.  Then, this morning, I intended to put all of the ingredients except for the sponge in the bread pan, add the sponge on top, and set the delay timer on my bread machine for about 12 hours.  The idea being that the kneading and baking take between 3 and 4 hours.  That gives the sponge 8 hours to grow

The recipe is

Whole Wheat, Take 6
Remove 4 oz. of starter.  Add 4 oz. of white flour and 4 oz. of water.  Set in a warm place for about 6-8 hours until it doubles in size.  Then, add
Water	4 oz.
Whole wheat flour	2 ¼ cups
White flour	1  cup
Vital Gluten	none
Salt	1 tsp
Oil	2 Tbl
Honey	¼ cup

.
Only in this case, I didn't set the sponge aside.  I put all of the other ingredients in the bread pan, with the white flour on top, and the whole wheat flour just under that.  Then, I added the just-mixed sponge on top and set the delay timer to have the bread ready in 12 hours.

My intention, was to get this set up and started before I left for work, and come home 12 hours later, after my voice lesson, to a completed loaf of bread.

Unfortunately (for me, not the bread) I was greeted by a migraine as I was getting ready for work, so I decided to stay home.  Not so good for my head, but it allowed me to document the progress of my push-button bread recipe.

With all of the ingredients in the bread pan and the immature sponge on top, I have this:

After several hours, that grows into this:

After the first mixing cycle (several more hours later), I have a nice looking dough ball.

It sticks slightly to the pan as the paddle moves it around, but it doesn't get stuck.  In the end, I have this lovely loaf of bread.

Whole Wheat Reproduction

Last week's whole wheat loaf was perfect.  The only problem was that it took a lot of adjustments along the way to get there.  This weeks goal is to reproduce that success in a more hands-off manner.  Last week's beginning recipe was

Whole Wheat, Take 5
Remove 4 oz. of starter from the fridge.  Add 4 oz. of white flour and 4 oz. of water.  Set in a warm place for about 6-8 hours until it doubles in size.  Then, add
Water	5 oz.
Whole wheat flour	2 cups
White flour	½ cup
Vital Gluten	1 Tbl
Salt	1 tsp
Oil	2 Tbl
Honey	¼ cup

I forgot to add the vital gluten, then I added ¼ cup of whole wheat flour and ¼ cup of white flour twice plus some more white flour to get the dough to the right consistency.

This week, I am eliminating the vital gluten on purpose, adding more flour and slightly less water to start.  My new recipe is

Whole Wheat, Take 6
Remove 4 oz. of starter from the fridge.  Add 4 oz. of white flour and 4 oz. of water.  Set in a warm place for about 6-8 hours until it doubles in size.  Then, add
Water	4 oz.
Whole wheat flour	2 ¼ cups
White flour	1  cup
Vital Gluten	none
Salt	1 tsp
Oil	2 Tbl
Honey	¼ cup

The dough ball looks pretty good during the first mixing process.  It is just a little bit sticky, but not so much that it gets stuck in the corner while the paddle is trying to knead it.

I peeked in a half an hour later and the dough had started to take on the blob shape that had me worried last week.  I tried pinching it, and it felt OK, so I'm not going to tinker with it.

After the second kneading cycle, it looked more like a ball.  I think it's going to work out.

It came out pretty well, but it seems to be yielding to peer pressure from the rye breads and donning the pompadour hairdo.