Up until the turning out and loading, this round of sourdough had been going quite well. I wanted to fit all 4 loaves into the oven at once, since last time the two load approach resulted in over-proofing on the second load. So I had this plan to load one loaf onto a sheet pan, and the other three onto the pizza stone (which I checked before, would just fit).

This turned out to be a stupid idea. It was hard to implement and resulted in the loaves sticking and stretching in various places during the loading process, and was just generally a bad scene. I think the loaves all ended up OK overall shape wise, but there is some noticeable damage.

The loaf that was on the sheet pan instead of the stone has a completely black bottom. I knew that metal would conduct heat faster and thus burn the loaf faster, but I didn't think it would be quite this bad. I think I just need another pizza stone, and to use both racks in the oven, instead of just putting cast iron mass on the second rack. Or, a larger pizza stone that fills more of the rack.

All that said, the bread actually turned out quite tasty. It had a much chewier crumb than previous attempts, and a more open structure. The crust on the burnt one was very good (other than the burnt part, of course). The other crusts were OK, but not stellar. Overall, probably an A- (but my standards are very high these days).

posted: Thu, 16 Nov 2006 19:58 | permanent link to this entry