Oh, Burn

I've made some bread that has wild yeast, but I spiked it with commercial yeast to speed things up... so this is my first 100% wild yeast bread.

It has a fairly closed crumb, but not overly dense and quite delicious... took forever though. Fed my my wild yeast on Saturday... used said wild yeast on Sunday to make my firm starter... made the dough from the starter, including kneading and a 4 hour proof on Monday... shaped the loaves before retarding overnight... and finally baked the loaves on Tuesday.

I could have made the firm starter the day I feed the yeast, while also kneading, proofing, shaping, and baking on the same day... shortening the process to two days... but the long way maximized flavor and fit better into my schedule.

Besides the time commitment, it wasn't all gumdrops and lollipops results wise either, as I burnt the bottom of my loaves:


Obviously I just cut that off and it's fine, but it's still a little disappointing. Two semi-fails with the wild yeast in a row. I'm a little jealous of food bloggers who never screw up (or at least never write about it).

When I set my oven up for "hearth baking", I put my pizza stone on the very bottom near the heating element, and a pan at the very top to put hot water in for steam. Since I noticed both the burning and the fact that my water didn't all turn to steam... I think I'm going to move the stone up to the lower middle rack, while putting the steam pan on the very bottom of the oven. I'll cross my fingers, and hope that solves it.