"Bouchon Bakery" Sourdough Boule
Baking it Saturday, started the levain Tuesday -- feed twice a day through Friday, spend most of Saturday proofing, forming, baking, cooling.
Went to Lowes for river rock and steel chain, went to Sam's for hotel pan, ordered long-necked watering can from Amazon. All of this constitutes my "steam kit."
This had better be the best damn loaf I've ever baked. Or else!
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If you want a very lazy alternative, I've been using about 12 g of firm sourdough starter (from Maggie Glezer's Artisan Baking) and dissolving it in 1.5 cups cold water, then adding it to 3 cups flour mixed with 1 tsp. salt.
Following the no-knead method, I combine the dough ingredients the night before baking, then bake the loaf in a covered dutch oven the next day.
Voila! Easy sourdough boule.
Jim Lahey has my everlasting thanks for his original no knead recipe and technique.
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Why on earth would you need all that stuff for a steam kit? Whenever I make baguettes, I steam the oven by putting a baking pan with ice cubes on the bottom shelf of the oven and closing the door. Also spritz the oven with water.
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re: ChefJune
"Why on earth?" If one were to make a top ten list of the ways cooks hold themselves back, one item would have to be misjudging the magnitude of an effect. The poster child for this: In the 1950's people heard that copper was a good conductor of heat, so they bought these Revere Ware pans with an ornamental film of copper on the bottom. A pathetic offering to the copper gods, establishing good intentions, with no discernable effect on the food.
Spritzing the oven actually has some effect, but not enough. Until one has seen the difference, one has no idea what's possible with bread.
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re: Syzygies
Here's a good link on the physics: http://www.mansfieldct.org/schools/mm...
Cast iron holds about 13% as much heat as water, and stone holds 20% as much heat as water. So if one does the math, a 15 lb cast iron skillet (e.g. the Lodge 15" skillet) at 500 F will boil off about 250 ml of water. It makes scant difference whether one uses hot tap water or boiling water, and the convenience of ice cubes isn't that costly.
If one spritzes that same cup of water around the oven itself, one cools off 15 lbs of oven to the boiling point, perhaps not what one wants.
So 50 lbs of rocks and chains begins to make sense. In the BBQ world, however, people are pretty fussy about heating metals from the hardware store; galvanized metals in particular generate poisons. I worry about people getting into trouble improvising on Bouchon's advice. I also worry about rocks exploding. Now sand, that would be an interesting experiment.
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