Artisan bread N+1

Artisan Bread
Going back 2 nights, I made preparations to bake bread. That is, for baking either the next morning or afternoon.

Here's the recipe.

But wait, first I had to make the Biga or Starter

@ 11 p.m. I made the biga using bread flour instead of all purpose.

At 8 a.m. the next day, I made the dough, using the entire biga and using

4 cups of bread flour &

3.5 cups of whole wheat flour.

Being a bit adventurous, I used 4 cups of water instead of the 2.25 in the recipe. I'd tried 2.25, but (because I mix by hand?), I couldn't get all the flour moistened. 3.25 cups worked pretty well in the past.

at 11:30 a.m. the dough went into the fridge because I had to go out.

@ 10 p.m. I returned, splitting the dough into four and did 4 or 5 stretch/folds on each lump with 10 min between S/F's. No kneading--this is not meant to be work.

In between stretch/folds, I made four bottomless boxes from cardboard--4x10x3" high and cut parchment paper to fit the bottom and run up each side.

after final S/F each lump of dough went into each of the boxes (above).

At noon, I turned on the oven 425 deg. a ceramic tile on the lowest shelf. After 30 min a pan of water went into the oven below the stone. @ 60 min I lifted the boxes & tried to slide 2 loaves of bread off the baking sheet onto the tile. No go, the dough refused to budge. It also went flat. I shoved it on and got two loaves of bread like you see below. It's more Ciabatta than Pugliese, but what do I know? I googled the difference and I am still befuddled. Nonetheless, the bread had a good crust, was soft and chewy inside and tasted great! Great means great whether plain, w/butter, w/olive oil +/-balsamic vinegar, etc. We ate half a loaf in 10 minutes

With the 3rd loaf, I pushed a baking pan up next to it and got slightly taller bread, more like a traditional french loaf.

I don't have a pic of that 3rd loaf as Daughter #2 absconded to British Columbia with it at 3 p.m., but the 4th loaf went into (8 p.m.) the oven. I slid the baking sheet holding this loaf into the oven, & then slipped the cardboard box off. The 4th loaf has maintained the torpedo shape imposed by the box.

This is loaf #4 on the left, fresh out of the oven. Below, a view of the bread sliced in which I can see that I forgot to poke the top of the dough to rupture the big bubble on the top of the loaf and to enable the bread to rise a bit more in the oven. The crust is decent, the crumb decent & the taste is outa this world.

This loaf had its start almost 48 hours ago.

My evaluation of my efforts.

1. I have used the entire biga after the first few efforts because it doesn't take much yeast or flour. The recipe says to measure out 13/16th cup biga--no can do.

2. In the past, I had used rolled up wet towels to keep the dough from spreading (effective) and they didn't stick to the dough. I liked the bottomless boxes which served well to keep the dough from spreading flat which gives a flat bread. The reluctance of the loaves to slip off the baking sheet surprised me. they also stick more to the parchment paper. The towels are effective and more dependable than the boxes and when used with parchment paper, slide without issues.

3. I didn't like the wetness of the dough, because it wanted to spread over the work surface while it rested between stretch/fold events.

4. The bread flour and whole wheat flour replaced Eagle Mills Ultra Grain flour (Costco) This is great bread but not good science, changing so many variables at once.