Next up from the bake-along of Rose Levy Beranbaum's The Bread Bible is the Sweet Potato Loaf, a yeast bread with mashed sweet potato added to the dough. I baked a small sweet potato a few days ago and popped it into the fridge for later use. Later turned out to be today's bread. I was tripped up again by the design of The Bread Bible instructions, where the first sentence in each section is a sort of summary subhead, not really the step-by-step instructions. Step 1, the making the sponge, also covered baking and mashing one's sweet potato. I conflated the step 1 items and put my mashed and measured potato into the sponge...then looked further along and had to figure out what had happened to the potato that was to be added when actually mixing the dough. I decided to move ahead with my sweet-potato sponge, and indeed don't see any reason why this couldn't have been the intended method.
Sponge made and covered with the blanket of the remaining flour and yeast, I let it sit for an hour at room temperature then refrigerated it overnight. I brought it out the next day and let it sit at room temp again while the butter softened, then mixed the dough, let it rest to hydrolyze, then kneaded it with the KitchenAid until I had a lovely, slightly sticky, pale orange dough.
It rose quite enthusiastically, with the first rise taking under an hour and the second more than doubled in 45 minutes. Then I shaped a loaf, going back to Rose's instructional pictures because my last few loafs have all had large air pockets toward the top of the loaf. Again the rising was very quick, and I put the loaf in, as instructed, with the pan on a pre-heated stone and with steam added via ice cubes in a heated skillet. This bread was in a hurry all the way through, as it browned early, then was done (with the internal temp a bit high) in the minimum baking time.
My finished loaf looks a bit crumpled as I brushed it well with melted butter, softening the crust. And again I had an air pocket or two, though smaller--I'm not sure why my bread baking has recently developed this issue, as I can't think of anything I've changed in my supplies or habits. (I've been googling, and my current theory is that my breads are getting over-proofed. 
Will try to correct this on the next loaf bread.) Oh, well, the bread tastes fine regardless.
I had my first piece as an accompaniment to a bowl of black-eyed pea stew with andouille and collards, hitting as many of the Southern New Year's Day good luck foods as I could. It was wonderful as toast and just plain, and kept well too.
Looks beautiful, Nancy! Thanks for clarifying the steps and heads up on the temperature.
ReplyDeleteWell done, it looks fabulous! I was a bit confused on a part of the directions, too. Thank you for clarifying :)
ReplyDeleteHi Nancy, I don't know if you concluded on what was causing the irregular crumb and large holes under the crust, but as I was flipping through the Bread Bible, I came across a picture of the Basic Soft White Sandwich Loaf (p. 195). In that picture, the cut loaf illustrates the exact same crumb as yours! Check it out.
ReplyDeleteThanks! It's reassuring to see that even the book photo shoot had some, though some of mine have been...much larger, shall we say. I'm currently working on the "bread was overproofed' theory, and will try to bake my next loaf a little earlier in the process.
DeleteNowadays, when shaping the loaf, i roll out the dough which ensures getting rid of all big air bubbles. it really helps!
ReplyDeleteThanks, Rose, I'll give that a try. I pressed this one out with my hands pretty thoroughly then rolled it up into the loaf shape, but obviously that didn't do it.
DeleteI have the same problem with the headings too. Lucky it didn't matter about the sweet potato going in early!
ReplyDelete