This Weeks Bread

Pain Au Levain

This is a bread I have wanted to try since I started my sourdough journey. It is based on the pain au levain in the book Bread Alone by Dan Leader and Judith Blahnik. I should also mention that I have had this bread from the Bread Alone Bakery in Boiceville, NY and it was delicious. It was being baked in a wood-fired oven when I was there.

I used to make this starting with a pinch of yeast (< 1/16 teaspoon) like the book calls for but now I wanted to start with sourdough starter. If we accept that 1 teaspoon of yeast and 70 grams of 100% hydration sourdough starter can be used interchangeably, then 4 grams of starter should replace the pinch of yeast. The other issue with this bread is that the original recipe calls for a bread flour with 20% of the bran remaining. Until recently I had not been able to find anything even close. Then I discovered what is called bolted flour at Breadtopia (no affiliation with them). Bolted flour means a percentage of the bran is sieved out with a fine mesh sieve. It is also called high extraction flour. Everything else is left in so in theory, there should be more flavor and nutrition. So I contacted Breadtopia, told them what I was looking for and received a positive response. They don’t actually measure the bran left but their estimate was that it in the vicinity of what I was looking for. Based on that I ordered a bag of their Select Bread Flour. This flour is certified organic, unbleached, unbromated, non GMO, stone ground and bolted. This flour has a strong 14% protein level. The other big advantage to flour from Breadtopia is freshness. The bag I received was milled on the same day I placed the order and that it was shipped.

This recipe is the definition of slow bread. It starts with building a chef over 3 days, converting the chef to a levain on the fourth day and then mixing the dough, bulk fermenting, dividing, shaping, proofing and baking on the fifth day. The reason so much can be accomplished on the fifth day is the levain is a high percentage of the final dough. Bulk fermentation and proofing each only take about 2 hours. I actually had to set up a timetable for the various phases of the process. The most critical was that from the mixing of the levain to mixing the final dough needed to be at least 8 hours but not more than 10 hours. So I mixed the levain at 10:00 pm and the dough at 6:30 am the following morning. Luckily the timing on everything before the levain was flexible and not time consuming. The dough dictated the timing after it was mixed. My bulk fermentation time was two hours and fifteen minutes. Proofing only took one hour and forty five minutes.

The original recipe gives and unusually wide range of 142 grams for how much flour to use. All flour absorbs different amounts of water and I will admit I should have added more flour. I used the midpoint of the range but in hindsight, I should have been at or near the top of the range. When you’ve never used a flour before you just don’t know how it will behave. All you can do is to make notes for the next time. The result was the dough spread out way too much yielding flat loaves. I used 750 grams of flour but would use 780 to 800 grams the next time.

This was a very wet sticky dough that was difficult to work with throughout the process. I had to use a lot of extra flour in forming and shaping the loaves to prevent the the dough from sticking to everything.

The amounts in the original recipe were listed in ounce and fluid ounces so I converted everything to grams.

The Ingredients

Ingredients	Amount	Bakers %
The Chef
Day 1
100% Starter	4 g	3.5%
Water	118 g	104%
Select Bread Flour	113 g	100%
Day 2
Water	118 g	104%
Select Bread Flour	113 g	100%
Day 3
Water	118 g	104%
Select Bread Flour	113 g	100%
The Levain
Chef	All
Select Bread Flour	170 g	100%
The Dough
Levain	510 g	68%
Water	532 g	71%
Select Bread Flour	680-822 g	100%
Fine Sea Salt	15 g	2%

Note: Baker % for the dough based on the 750 g flour actually used.

My Process

1. Day 1, start the chef by weighing water in a 2 to 3 quart container. Add starter and flour to container. Mix thoroughly. Cover and leave on counter.
2. Day 2, weigh water and flour in the chef container. Mix thoroughly. Cover and leave on counter.
3. Day 3, weigh water and flour in the chef container. Mix thoroughly. Cover and place container in the fridge for up to 3 days until ready to make the levain.
4. Day 4, remove chef container from fridge about 12 hours before making levain.
5. At least 8 hours but not more than 10 hours before mixing the final dough add the flour to the chef. Mix thoroughly. Cover and leave on counter.
6. Day 5, weigh out the ingredients for the final dough. Not all the levain will be used. I chose to discard the remainder. It could be saved and turned back into a chef and refreshed periodically just like a starter.
7. Add the water and the levain to a mixing bowl. Mix with a dough whisk until the levain is incorporated into the water.
8. Add the flour to the water mixture a couple of handfuls at a time incorporating each addition before making the next addition. Add the salt while the dough is fairly liquid. Continue to add the flour until a firm dough is formed. Transfer to a dough fermentation container.
9. Knead the dough by hand for 15-17 minutes or perform 4-5 stretch and folds on 15 minute intervals covering in between.
10. Bulk ferment until dough is soft and less sticky, about 2 hours.
11. Flour a work surface. Remove the dough from container and knead briefly.
12. Divide dough in to 2 equal pieces.
13. Form each dough piece into a ball. Cover with a damp towel. Let rest on work surface for about 30 minutes.
14. Flour 2 – 14”x6” oblong cloth lined bannetons with a mix of rye and rice flour.
15. Working with one piece of dough at a time, flatten dough ball into an 8” diameter disk.
16. Shape dough into a batard. Roll dough until it matches the length of the banneton. Place dough into banneton and cover with a damp towel or plastic wrap.
17. Repeat for the other dough ball.
18. Let dough proof until a finger impression fills slowly but remains in the dough, about 2 hours.
19. 1 hour into the proofing time place the baking stone on the center rack position of the oven and a sheet pan on the rack below the stone. Preheat the oven to 450 F.
20. Line a cookie sheet with a sheet of parchment to use as a peel.
21. Transfer one loaf from banneton to parchment and slash loaf. Repeat for second loaf placing on the same parchment sheet.
22. Spritz loaves with water and transfer to baking stone in oven. Close oven.
23. As soon as possible open oven and pour 1 cup boiling water on the sheet pan and quickly close the oven door to trap the steam.
24. Bake loaves for 25-30 minutes. After 12 minutes slightly open the oven door to vent any remains steam. If any water remains on the sheet pan, carefully remove it from the oven.
25. Remove loaves from oven when baking is done and place loaves on cooling rack. Don’t slice until cooled, about 2 hours.

These loaves came out of the oven looking like giant ciabatta instead of pain au levain. I discussed the reason above. Luckily appearance has nothing to do with flavor and this bread tastes great. There is no mistaking it for anything but a sourdough, but it is mild and in the background. I was concerned that the long fermentation of the chef/ levain would have an overpowering sourdough flavor but it didn’t. There is a complexity and nuttiness in the flavor that I just haven’t gotten with supermarket bread flour. The crumb is moist but didn’t develop large holes like there wasn’t enough gluten development.

The method described for getting steam into the oven did not work as well as either using a dutch oven or covering the loaf with a roasting pan. Unfortunately, our roasting pan lid is not large enough to cover two loaves so I was stuck using this method. The crust came out soft and not nice and crisp like all my previous sourdough breads have been.

This was my first time baking bread with something other than King Arthur flour and all in all I would say this was a successful experiment. There is still work to do to get the loaf I had hoped for. It wouldn’t surprise me if it takes several more tries to get what I’m looking for. I am also going to expand the usage of different flours from a variety of sources.