Help with wild sourdough bread baking??

[kitchen_kink]

Hey all,

I know many of you work with wild sourdough, and I've started my own starter and am on my third attempted loaf.

I've been working off of this recipe - which is really more of a guideline - and I'm running into some problems. Mainly, the loaf is not rising much, even when I let it rise under heated conditions, or for a very long time. What does rise tends to spread out rather than puff up, and the dough, which initially feels almost too dense, becomes wet and sticky and hard to handle.

I'm about to put the third in the oven, and it's looking a little better than the first two, but it definitely spread out a lot. I put oil in the bowl this time so I'd be able to fish it out and hold it together more easily.

The bread that comes out has tasty crust and tends to be tasty all through, but the middle is usually bunched up and inedible.

Thoughts, bakers?

Comments

[mama-hogswatch.livejournal.com]

Sounds like a weak starter.


Feed it with half a cup of warm water with half a cup of RYE flour every 12 hours for a day or two. It'll zing on back up.

[dietrich.livejournal.com]

How will I know when it's doing well? I've read some things online that it's supposed to rise or double in volume as bread would, and then other things make no mention of that at all. I'm also curious how thick it should be.

[mama-hogswatch.livejournal.com]

I tend to go by smell. You know how when you proof commercial yeast, it gets a head and a very distinctive smell? You want that smell. It'll be a bit beery, though with more of a "bite".

[kissoflife.livejournal.com]

No advice here yet, but thanks for sharing this. What does this direction mean: 'Transfer your dough gently to the peel.' Is that Englishish for 'pan?'

[dietrich.livejournal.com]

A peel (http://www.google.com/search?q=bread+peel&hl=en&tbs=shop%3A1&aq=f) is a big wooden paddle with a bevelled edge, essentially; generally seen in pizza places, it's used for transferring a large thing made of dough onto the stone in the oven. (I had to look it up, too.)

[rosiewoodboat.livejournal.com]

Make sure your dough isn't too dry when you turn it out and put it in the oven. It should be rather sticky, wetter than you'd expect.

[nick simmonds (from livejournal.com)]

Something that I found working with wild yeast was that I had to make a certain critical mass of dough to get a really good reaction. And that that critical mass of dough was *way* more than I thought it would be. When I was making smaller dough amounts, I got pretty much what you're describing, a super dense center.