Focaccia - May 13, 2020

Typing with Project Gemini in mind

Today's focaccia did not turn out as well as what I made a couple weeks ago, described at this post.

=> gemini://sawv.org/2020/04/29/focaccia-apr-29-2020.html Focaccia bread made on Apr 29, 2020

Prior to proofing, I shaped the dough into rounds that were probably to wide, diameter-wise, which made the dough thinner and/or over-worked or something.

The final product did not spring up as much. It also did not taste as oily and salty as the previous focaccia.

It's difficult to make successful bread-related products repeatedly. Pizza, naturally-leavened sourdough bread, Moroccan-style bread, and focaccia. That might be too many things to try to do well. I should stick with pizza and my sourdough bread.

Actually, I should focus on one thing: 100 percent whole grain naturally leavened sourdough bread. I can make pizza bread with that bread. For the 100 percent whole grain bread, I can vary the flours. Lately, I have used 50-50 red whole wheat and white whole wheat. I can mix in spelt and rye flours too. The point is to focus on the process and try to make it well over and over, which can be difficult as the weather changes and gets warmer.

With my bread, I can continue to ferment and proof at room temp or place the dough in the refrigerator, during one or both of those processes. I can dig out my big, square cooler and try proofing in my make-shift proofing box where I add a cup of boiling water to the cooler and proof the dough inside the closed cooler where the temp is at least 90 degrees and the humidity is at least 90 percent.

Plenty of variables exist with whole grain, naturally-leavened sourdough bread that uses only three ingredients: flour, water, and salt.