Ingredients

• Levain:
• Ingredients Quantity
• Mature, active levain 100g
• White flour 400g
• Whole wheat flour 100g
• Water 400g 85° - 90°
• Final Dough:
• Ingredients Quantity BP%
• Water 684g 90° - 95° 78%
• White flour 804g 90%
• Whole wheat flour 26g 5%
• Rye flour 50g 5%
• Fine Sea salt 22g 2%
• Levain 216g 12%
• Prep-time: 27 hours
• Cook time: 50-55 minutes

Directions

• Sample schedule:
• Feed the levain at 9 a.m.
• Mix the final dough at 5 p.m.
• Shape into loaves at 8 a.m. the next morning
• Bake 12 p.m. noon time
• 1a. Feed the levain:
• About 24 hours after your previous feeding of the levain, discard all but 100 grams of levain, leaving the reminder in your 6-quart tub. Add 400 grams of white flour, 100 grams of whole wheat flour, and 400 grams of water at 85°F to 90°F (29°C to 32°C) and mix by hand just until incorporated. Cover and let rest at room temperature for 7 to 9 hours before mixing the final dough.
• 1b. Autolyse:
• After 7 to 9 hours, mix the 804 grams of white flour, the 50 grams of rye flour, and the 26 grams of whole wheat flour by hand in a 12-quart round tub. Add the 684 grams of 90°F to 95°F (32°C to 35°C) water and mix by hand just until incorporated. Cover and let rest for 20 to 30 minutes.
• 2. Mix the final dough: “Start of Bulk Fermentation”
• Sprinkle the 22 grams of salt evenly over the top of the dough. Put a container with about a finger's depth of warm water on your scale so you can easily remove the levain after it's weighed. With wet hands, transfer 216 grams (or more if your kitchen is cool; see "Seasonal Variations" on page 134) of levain into the container.
• Transfer the weighed levain to the 12-quart dough tub, minimizing the amount of water transferred with it. Mix by hand, wetting your working hand before mixing so the dough doesn't stick to you. Use the pincer method (see page 67) alternating with folding the dough to fully integrate the ingredients.
• The target dough temperature at the end of the mix is 77°F to 78°F (25°C to 26°C).
• 3. Fold:
• This dough needs three or four folds (see pages 69-70). Because overnight levain dough expands very slowly, it can be folded anytime that's convenient before you go to bed, perhaps doing two or three folds during the first hour and the final fold whenever convenient that evening. When the dough is nearly triple its original volume, or possibly a bit less in winter, 12 to 15 hours after mixing, it's ready to be divided.
• 4. Divide:
• With floured hands, gently ease the dough out of the tub and onto a lightly floured work surface. With your hands still floured, pick up the dough and ease it back down onto the work surface in a somewhat even shape. Use a bit of flour to dust the area in the middle where you'll cut the dough, then cut it into 2 equal-size pieces with a dough knife or plastic dough scraper.
• 5. Shape:
• Shape the dough Dust 2 proofing baskets with flour. Shape each piece of dough into a medium-tight ball following the instructions on pages 71-73. Place each seam side down in its proofing basket.
• 6. Proof Set:
• Proof the baskets side by side and cover with a kitchen towel, or place each basket in a nonperforated plastic bag. Proofing time should be about 4 hours, assuming a room temperature of about 70°F (21°C). Use the finger-dent test (see page 74) to determine when they are perfectly proofed and ready to bake.
• 7. Preheat:
• Preheat at least 45 minutes prior to baking, put a rack in the middle of the oven and put 2 Dutch ovens on the rack with their lids on. Preheat the oven to 475°F (245°C).
• If you only have 1 Dutch oven, put the second loaf into the refrigerator about 20 minutes before baking the first loaf and bake the loaves sequentially, giving the Dutch oven a 5-minute reheat after removing the first loaf.
• 8. Bake:
• For the next step, please be careful not to let your hands, fingers, or forearms touch the extremely hot Dutch oven. Invert the proofed loaf onto a lightly floured countertop, keeping in mind that the top of the loaf will be the side that was facing down while it was rising the seam side.
• Remove the preheated Dutch oven from your kitchen oven, remove the lid, and carefully place the loaf in the Dutch oven seam side up. Cover and bake for 30 minutes, then uncover and bake for 20 to 25 minutes, until medium dark brown to very dark brown all around the loaf. Check after 15 minutes of baking uncovered in case your oven runs hot.
• Remove the Dutch oven and carefully tilt it to turn the loaf out. Let cool on a rack or set the loaf on its side so air can circulate around it. Let the loaf rest for at least 20 minutes before slicing.

Notes

• This is a pure levain dough that gets no help from store-bought yeast. It makes beautiful, natural levain bread with just a bit of tang to it. Using a small amount of levain, the long overnight bulk fermentation allows the dough to become nice and gassy by morning, tripling in volume. The shaped loaves are then proofed for about four hours. The aroma and flavor of this bread will directly reflect the character of your levain, with the flavors improving and the acidity mellowing for a couple of days after baking.
• At Ken's Artisan Bakery we make a slightly different version of this dough. It begins with a levain feeding at 3:30 a.m., so I didn't include that version here, for obvious reasons. However, this would be a great dough to use to make a scaled-down version of my 3-kilo boule, as described on page 162; at 1.8 kilos (4 pounds) total, the amount of dough in this recipe will just barely fit on a standard baking stone for a home oven.
• Be sure to bake this bread completely, letting it remain in the oven until it is as dark as possible shy of burning. If you want an even chewier crust, leave the loaves in the oven with the door partly open for a few minutes after turning off the oven.
• Once you've perfected this bread, I encourage you to mix it up and try different blends of flours in your final dough mix; just make sure the total amount of fresh flour is 880 grams to complement the 120 grams of flour in the levain. Another option is to fold in about 225 grams of olives, nuts, or other ingredients, as in the recipe for Pain au Bacon (page 177).
• Flour Water Salt Yeast: The Fundamentals of Artisan Bread and Pizza
• by Ken Forkish
• ISBN-10 ‎160774273X
• ISBN-13 ‎978-1607742739
• https://www.amazon.com/dp/160774273X?ref=ppxpopmobapshare
• Nutritional information:
• 1 Slice of 12 Slices per-loaf
• Calories: 221
• Total Fat: 0.72 g
• Saturated Fats: 0.13 g
• Cholesterol: 0 mg
• Sodium: 357 mg
• Total Carbohydrates: 46.18 g
• Dietary Fiber: 2.34 g
• Sugar: 0.19 g
• Protein: 6.33 g

Nutrition

Photos