Hamelman's Poolish Ciabatta Hearth Bread and Flatbread Discuss Hamelman's Poolish Ciabatta in the Brick Oven Cooking forums; no that was a different batch of wild yeast with the hot coals on side of oven...

[MAVANO]

no that was a different batch of wild yeast with the hot coals on side of oven

[MAVANO]

what do you mean by venting?

[DrakeRemoray]

Are you steaming the oven before putting the bread in? It looks like you are based on the oven spring shown. Even if you don't, there is a lot of moisture given off by the baking bread. If you crack the door of the oven to let that steam escape in the last 7 minutes or so of baking, it will allow the crust to brown more fully...

[Dino_Pizza]

This seems to be the best Ciabatta thread with much good info & pics. I've been making Reinharts Poolish Ciabatta successfully for a couple years. BUT, I've busy building the WFO all year and haven't made it since. I'm going to do it this weekend in my kitchen oven but have some questions:

1) I can't seem to find KA's "special bread flour" anymore. Only AP and their generic bread flour and for some reason I thought that was made for bread machines. Which KA flour does everyone use in their Ciabatta?

2) There where some earlier posts here about mixing some Caputo in with the KA flour. I've got the big blue bag of Caputo purchased here on FB. Should I try mixing it in? Would that help the regular AP flour?

3rd) I usually made it in 1 day (but the poolish is always the day before). I'll be cooking all day sunday so I'd like to make dough Saturday, overnight refridg, and just divide, proof and bake on Sunday morning. Should I do anything different to Reinharts basic recipe for overnight bulk retarding? Should I instead divide dough, do 1 fold on Sat, refridg it, then Sun, 1 final fold after it comes to room temp then bake?

Any thoughts would be appreciated, thanks, Dino

[texassourdough]

Hi Dino!

I use KA regular bread flour for ciabatta. I don't think adding Caputo would do much different from AP which I don't add. I think you may get in trouble quick if you add low gluten flour without cutting back the water.

Good luck!
Jay

[Dino_Pizza]

Thanks Jay, your right, I wouldn't want to mix low gluten flour with bread flour. Don't know what I was thinking.

I went ahead and baked all my bread today. I didn't have the guts for an overnight retard of ciabatta. I felt I might have worn out the dough if I did. BUT I did do something a bit different:

I used Reinharts Ciabatta recipe BUT when I made the poolish yesterday, I added about 6-8 oz of my sour dough starter into the poolish (which had a 22 oz requirement). I then used Hamelmans timing for rising and proofing (he had a lower percentage of poolish than Reinhart that I ignored), kept my hydration above 73%.

I used "Bobs Red Mill Bread Flour" for the 1st time and would use it again but will stock up on KA next time it's on sale.

I'm happy with the outcome. And the flavor was superb. I've had 2 slices (without butter or olive oil of course) and even at 2 hours young, the finish is complex and goes on and on. Can't wait until its 1-2 days old. I made extra loaves to give away at tomorrows dinner party I'm throwing. Should be a hit. Thanks! Dino

[trockyh]

Dino your bread looks delicious. I think I will do a search for that recipe and make some myself.
Did you mist your oven and or pour water into a tray when you put the bread in to bake?

Thanks,
Tom

[texassourdough]

Hi Dino!

As you know, preferments are a key way to put extra flavor in bread. And a great way of improving ciabatta (which is often done as bland, tasteless, almost-instant bread commercially - or so it seems).

I personally find that dough development (preferments, etc.) make more difference in the quality of the bread than the flour. I have never used Bob's but I use bulk, Gold Medal, KA, etc. bread flours and feel I see about as much variation within KA as I do among the three. I do have an extra trick I sometimes use of adding freshly milled wheat at the 5% range and find the aromatics from the fresh flour add some nice overtones - but it is hard to justify a mill just to add a few grams of fresh flour! I haven't added the fresh flour to my ciabbata but...I may have to try that.

I haven't made ciabatta lately. Maybe this week!
Jay

[Dino_Pizza]

Hi Tom. I did both: I kept a large, shallow heavy duty aluminum al-clad pan on the bottom of the oven (below my oven stone) and poured 1 cup of boiling water in it. Then I misted by spray bottle 3 times at 30 second intervals. This seems to work well with me. I would think it would be easy to find those exact recipes on line. Let me know if you can't.

I gave away 4 loaves to family last night. They make great gifts.

Fresh milled wheat must smell great Jay! I'm going repeat this same ciabatta recipe on Christmas to get it down solid. Then I want to try breads with other grains added in for complexity.

Thanks, Dino

[texassourdough]

Hi Dino!

The "hot" fad in oven humidification is a small cast iron skillet full of lava rock to increase the mass and heat transfer to boil water faster. Simply heat the skillet in the oven with the stone and pour about a cup of boiling water on it just before you close the oven. Works great! (until you drip water on your oven window and a $50 bill flies out of your pocket!

I relly need to do some ciabatta this week!

Jay