"Fred" wrote in message ...

> Let's go through some of these.

>If I get the dough moist enough that it's
> almost a batter my hearth loaves will look like pancakes.

Even at 80% hydration your loaves shouldn't look like pancakes, but you
really don't need to go that high to get larger holes, though at 80% it's
pretty much a guarantee you'll get them.

> I suppose I could
> live with panned loaves but that isn't what I had in mind.

I don't think anyone suggested pan loaves, not that there is anything wrong
with pan loaves.

>Someone talked
> about "pouring" a dough. My doughs don't pour.

Janet mentioned pouring. When working with wetter doughs they will come out
of the bowl used for the first rise by just tilting the bowl and letting the
dough "pour" out onto the work surface. It doesn't exactly flow. It's not
pouring in the same way a cake or pancake batter would pour. It's
significantly thicker than that even at 80% hydration.

>I'll go
> back to the well on the high hydration idea because I've never gone to
80%.
> So how do you get a normal looking loaf from a dough that is so wet it
will
> spread like batter?

Handling and shaping wetter dough can take some practice. Over a couple of
years I slowly increased the amount of water I had in my dough. I wouldn't
increase the hydration until I felt comfortable working with the dough at
the current hydration level. I still can't shape "normal" loaves once I get
past the high 60s or 70%.

You might want to try making some loaves with a more free shape like
ciabatta when first using wetter dough.

-Mike