/ck/ - Food & Cooking

>>4947113
In a convection oven, I bake at 550F with steam for 2 minutes, then drop to 475F for the remainder of the bake. If it's a high hydration whole wheat dough, then I'll often start at 475F with steam, and just keep it there for the duration of the bake.

The dough should be as sticky as you make it. Different breads require different hydration doughs. There is no hard and fast rule about how the dough should feel for every bread. In general, higher hydration doughs produce a more open and rubbery crumb. Low hydration doughs, on the other hand, produce a more dense and delicate crumb.

Assuming you are starting a starter from scratch, mix together flour and water in a 1:1 ratio on day 1. On day 2, take 1 part starter from the day before, and add in 1 part flour, 1 part water. Repeat daily until the starter is doubling more rapidly than 24 hours. At that point, you'll need to start multi-daily feedings (usually 2 is sufficient) when the starter is at the peak of its rise. When I start twice daily feedings, I often begin feeding the starter in a 1:2:2 (starter:flour:water) ratio to give it more food (and me more time between feedings). Once you reliably get a double in your starter volume within 3-6 hours of feeding (dependent on ambient temp), it's mature enough to use. This generally takes 2-4 weeks. A lot of people like to start the starter with whole wheat flour, since it seems to give it a kick start with the bacteria and yeast most commonly found on the bran of the wheat kernel. Once the starter is alive and well, you can transition it into a white starter by feeding it only white flour.

Pic related: it's one of my starters.

>>4093625
Here it is this morning. Just about doubled, and you can see all the activity in the starter that is providing that leavening power.

I zapped a bowl of water in my microwave for a couple minutes to make it humid and warm in there, then placed my starter in it for an hour or so to try to bring it up to temp and get it super active.

Next step is another feeding to bring up the volume.