Pandemic Baking: First Time Whole Wheat Sourdough Bread #1 and #2

Kristen of FullProofBaking has been posting some amazing Instagram photos of her sourdough bread, so it was time to try out her recipe using her techniques.

Her recipe uses 20% whole wheat and 80% bread flour, making a small loaf about 650g (2/3 the size of what we have been making.)

FullProofBaking whole wheat recipe
Bread flour (78.5%)	255g
Whole wheat flour (21.5%)	70g
Water (77.8%)	253g
Leaven (20%) Fed, at its peak	65g
Salt (2.4%)	8g
LOAF SIZE	651g
Baking instructions	Preheat Dutch oven to 500 deg F (min one hour) My oven reaches ~460 deg F during the bake Bake with lid on for 20 minutes Bake with lid off for 20 minutes (longer if needed) Optional: convection oven for a couple minutes to reach the color you like

Her techniques included an autolyse, a lamination step, and coil-and-fold instead of stretch-and-fold.

We decided to follow her techniques and her timeline in an attempt to achieve the same open airy crumb from her pictures.

Our timeline for Whole Wheat Sourdough #1 and #2:

8AM:        Fed the starter 1:2:2 based on Kristin's notes

10AM:      Autolyse flour + water

2PM:         Add Levain

2:30PM:    Add salt

3PM:         Divide dough and light fold

3:45PM:    Lamination

4:30PM:    Coil fold #1

5:15PM:    Coil fold #2

6PM:         Coil fold #3

7:45PM:    Shaping then retard overnight

Next morning bake:
Whole wheat Sourdough #1

1. 8:15AM: Preheat the Dutch oven at 500 deg F

2. 9:35AM: Bake with lid on for 20 minutes

3. 9:55AM: Bake with lid off for 20 minutes

4. 10:15AM: Convection on bare racks for 1 minute

Whole wheat sourdough #1

Cross section of Whole wheat sourdough #1

Whole wheat Sourdough #2

1. 10: 30AM: Preheat the Dutch oven at 500 deg F

2. 11:07AM: Bake with lid on for 20 minutes

3: 11:27AM: Bake with lid off for 20 minutes

4. 11:47AM: Leave in oven (OFF: reading 420 deg F) for 5 minutes

Whole wheat sourdough #2

Cross section of whole wheat sourdough #2

Both loaves rose really well, had nice open crumb, and tasted really good.

The crumb is not as evenly open as FullProofBaking's bread, so we need to continue to work on our techniques.

But we really liked using her techniques, and the size of her loaf.