Recently, I was in the massive, volunteer-run kitchens of the Gurudwara Bangla Sahib, one of the largest Sikh temples in the world and the most important one in the city of New Delhi, India. There I saw one of the most amazing flatbread-production lines I could possibly imagine. Here are the people toasting and flipping the roti, as an act of service.
In Oaxaca the people live on and love soft, flavorful corn tortillas, mostly made from ancestral corn varieties that are grown here in southern Mexico. There is little reason to make them at home (or in my case, where I’m staying here) since there are a thousand tortilla maestras, including these two women who run a taqueria about one minute from my front door. The green thing is a large press used to flatten the tortillas.
I’m heading out of town and away from my oven for a while, so I decided to make some pain de campagne ( that’s the French white country loaf) to practice more before I go. It’s quite easy to do this during my at-home workday since it only requires a few minutes of actual attendance as it bakes etc. Here are the details:
White flour: 92.5%
Whole wheat flour: 7.5%
salt: 2.5%
water: ~ 81% (this round was slightly dryer than when I last made the bread on the weekend)
levain: mostly white levain, slightly wetter than the dough: 45%
supplemental dry yeast: about 1.5g
recipe source: pain de campagne from Ken Forkish’s Four Water Salt Yeast
Method: 4 hour bulk fermentation (a bit less than recommended), 3 turns in first 2 hours. 12 hour overnight prove in fridge. Baked using dutch over method, 45 minute preheat, 30 mins lid on (475) 18 mins lid off (450)
Notes: I haven’t tasted this bread yet, but it came out quite handsome-looking. Pretty good rise and bake, good color. The lavian I used in this round was particularly good-smelling, so I expect the bread to taste pretty good too.
This weekend I baked a two pairs of loaves, one white/country bread using a natural leavening (plus some supplementary yeast) and another, whole wheat loaf using just dry yeast (since I had less time.)
First the pan de campagne (French white country loaf.)
White flour: 92.5%
Whole wheat flour: 7.5%
salt: 2.5%
water: 83% (though I think really it was slightly wetter than this)
levain: mostly white levain, slightly wetter than the dough: 45%
supplemental dry yeast: about 2g
recipe source: pan de campagne from Ken Forkish’s Four Water Salt Yeast
Method: 5 hour bulk fermentation, 3 turns in first 2 hours. 13 hour overnight prove in fridge. Baked using dutch over method, 45 minute preheat, 20 mins lid on (475) 28 mins lid off (450)
Notes: the levain was very wet, so the final dough itself was quite wet, and absorbed a bit of additional flour on shaping. In any case, the loaves looked perfect and bubbly (but not over-proved) after their long rise in the fridge, and the bake didn’t disappoint either. Really good taste and results. Here’s a cross-section:
The taste was really good — soft and not gummy inside, crunchy/bittersweet on the crust, which was of very good thickness.
Next, a whole-wheat loaf:
White flour: 25%
Whole wheat flour: 75%
salt: 2.2%
water: 80% (though I think I once again made this dough a bit wetter than called for.)
dry yeast: about 1.5g
recipe source: 75% whole wheat Saturday loaf from Ken Forkish’s Four Water Salt Yeast
Method: 3 hour bulk fermentation, 3 turns in first 1.5 hours in a warn environment. I was time-constrained, so I skimped on the amount of bulk time here, which was not a great idea — the dough was both too wet and underdeveloped to really hold its structure. For one of the loaves, I had to accelerate the bake and gave the loaf only an additional hour of rising time after shaping. For the second, I let it rise overnight in the fridge and then baked the next day.
Notes: The first loaf was insufficiently proved and lacked much rise to it. The second was probably over-proved (it suffered some deflation during handling and before baking.) In both cases the resulting loaves were squat and lacked volume. The under-proved loaf had marginally better structure (slightly bigger aeration) but slightly worse taste. The over-proved loaf tasted very slightly better but was even closer than the its older sibling. They were pretty though, and we did enjoy this bread with turkey soup:
My starter is out of the fridge this week and having a peppy day — was worried it was going to bubble over. I’m sort of sad that I will need to freeze it soon while I’m away.
Make Challah, as if you were making it normally for two loaves. Instead of braiding, divide, divide, divide and divide once more so there are 16 balls of dough. Roll each one into a large cigar and knot once. Let these rise as you would braids. Baking time was 22 minutes if I recall correctly.
White flour: 11.25%
Whole wheat flour: 88.75%
salt: 2.5%
water: 83%
levain: mostly white levain, slightly wetter than the dough: 45%
supplemental dry yeast: about 1.5g
recipe source: 75% whole wheat levain bread from Ken Forkish’s Four Water Salt Yeast
Method: 5.5 hour bulk fermentation, 3 turns in first 2 hours. 14 hour overnight prove in fridge. Baked using dutch over method, 1 hour preheat, 20 mins lid on (475) 29 mins lid off (450)
Notes: the levain used was a bit on the sour and vinegar-y side of things, so the final bread has a bite to it that I’m not sure I like. Compare to the more funky results I’ve gotten in past efforts. The bake is really nice though — the structure is very airy and full of uniform bubbles. Interior texture is not too gummy, but rather soft and substantial. The crust is very good — uniform, crunchy.