I have to admit, lately I haven’t been weighing or measuring my flour and water. For the past many years I faithfully did. But lately I’ve just been going by feel and the nature of the flour. Occasionally I blow it, usually by overhydrating making it tough to get a formed loaf, but I have more successes than failures. I feel like I am getting a better understanding of the nature of the yeast beasties. This is my 75 per cent whole wheat {give or take} with a rye starter. I used the Forkish technique… Modified to be less wasteful.
Not perfect, don’t get a great oven spring, but tasty and good texture. Of course the drawback to not writing my proportions is that no 2 loaves are exactly alike. Oh well.
Lana
from Portland
Looks beautiful!
The right way to bake is the one that you most enjoy doing…and eating. Someone else said it better lol. (When I’m baking for my family, I tend toward slight over-fermentation.)
I’m with you on winging it for the most part. I do weigh the amount of flour I use so I know it will fit right in the cloche, but if I ever get a proper steaming oven and start baking flat on a stone, I’m pretty sure that will go out the window. I guess I also weight the salt out of habit.
I eyeball the initial water short and then add more by feel. I use a teeny, tiny amount of starter so never weigh that. I always wing the proofing times based on what I see and feel in the mixing bowl.
Eric has a whole series of “easy bake” recipes here that are all about winging it and developing your bread intuition. Here’s episode 1:
