07/04/07

Pain Sur Poolish

I decided to take a break from Sourdough baking. I got some inspiration from The Fresh Loaf and decided to try one using my own formulation. This has 30% poolish with 100% hydration. The preferment really added great flavor to the bread. The dough itself was retarded for at least 18 hours in the fridge. Oven spring was spectacular although the crumb could be better. The next time round, I think I will add a couple more stretch and folds.

Experiment with smaller bread size

Pain Sur Poolish

I have been baking with loaves which were way too big and this has contributed to problems like underbaking. This week, I decided to form more loaves with the dough. The sizes are what is normally seen in the bakeries like Cedele. I suppose it makes economic sense to sell small loaves as opposed to huge ones. However, huge loaves are a privilege of home bakers and when I started baking successful loaves, I wanted to see huge ones. I suppose greed got the better of me. Now, I am beginning to think that medium size is better. Perhaps, Buddha was right after all when he said to follow the middle path.

I intended to give away the loaves to friends who have helped me recently. Since I have limited capacity, smaller loaves seems the way to go.

4 loaves of Pain Sur Poolish. I made the batard with cinnamon sugar for my son.