Keeping a perpetual sponge, biga, poulish, preferment
In both the baguette and ciabatta recipies I'm working on, the longest step is the first one: creating the preferment and ageing it for 6 to 24 hours. Today I'm experimenting with loaves made from prefermentation steps where I doubled the recipe. When creating the actual loaf, I weighed out the quantity of preferment that the recipe called for and added it to the dough. Then I mixed the preferment with another batch of water and flour (but no yeast), waited for it to show signs of life, then stored it in the fridge.
I hoped this would help me get down to 2-3 hours of lead time for a loaf of ciabatta. The baguette recipe still calls for a 12-16 hour proofing session in the fridge, but at least that's 12 hours of lead time instead of 24...
At any rate I was wondering whether anyone did this for anything besides sourdough starters. I'm guessing that my loaves will take on a sour character over time? Or is this just a bad ideal all around?
For clarity, I'm using the Cooks Illustrated "Dinner Baguette" and "Whole-Wheat Rustic Italian Loaf" recipes.
In both the baguette and ciabatta recipies I'm working on, the longest step is the first one: creating the preferment and ageing it for 6 to 24 hours. Today I'm experimenting with loaves made from prefermentation steps where I doubled the recipe. When creating the actual loaf, I weighed out the quantity of preferment that the recipe called for and added it to the dough. Then I mixed the preferment with another batch of water and flour (but no yeast), waited for it to show signs of life, then stored it in the fridge.
I hoped this would help me get down to 2-3 hours of lead time for a loaf of ciabatta. The baguette recipe still calls for a 12-16 hour proofing session in the fridge, but at least that's 12 hours of lead time instead of 24...
At any rate I was wondering whether anyone did this for anything besides sourdough starters. I'm guessing that my loaves will take on a sour character over time? Or is this just a bad ideal all around?
For clarity, I'm using the Cooks Illustrated "Dinner Baguette" and "Whole-Wheat Rustic Italian Loaf" recipes.
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