On May 3, 3:18*pm, Yah Evets > wrote:
> After reading a bit and trying to figure out what went wrong, I think
> the recipe that I was using might not be the best one for me to start
> out with. *Letting the bread rise for 12-16 hours isn't working for me
> at all. *The bread gets all messed up in that amount of time. *So I am
> going to try a poolish approach instead, and let the sour develop
> beforehand, and then add more flour, make a loaf, let rise and pop in
> the oven.. *It seems a lot of recipes work this way, so I'm hopeful.

For my second attempt, I went with the Vermont Sourdough recipe in
Hamelman's book and followed the instructions pretty closely. Using a
levain method, I made up the starter-dough and let it sit for 12
hours. I then mixed that into the full recipe and put it in the
fridge for 16 hours after about 5 stretch and folds. (Hamelman
suggested 2.5 hours at room temp and two stretch and folds, so this
step was a little bit longer.). I then did another stretch and fold,
shaping, let rise for 2.5 hours, slashed and baked at 400F with
occasional spraying and steam 5 minutes past 200F on a preheated
stone.

The results look VERY promising.

Covering the dough worked very well. I used some Glad "Press and
Seal". The final proof for me is still a little tricky as I am
limited in what I have available to use as a covered area without
having handle the dough a bunch to get it on the cooking surface.
I'll have to come through this soon, I think, if I want to have more
control over my bread shape, etc.

A bread pic I took with my phone of the two loves fresh out of the
oven:

http://img145.imageshack.us/img145/2214/bread.jpg

I'll let you know how the holes look inside when I cut it open.

I've also started to thicken my starter to 1:1 by weight and look
forward to experimenting with that.

Thanks, everyone, for the feedback!

Steve