"Will" > wrote in message
oups.com...
> Hutch... let your mind wander back to those first loaves. Remember
> those records of preferments and proof times? No? I don't remember mine
> either <g>.
>

Nope


> Ric... you need to have a couple of things for us to help you. You need
> a gram scale to measure the the bread's water and flour accurately. And
> you need an oven rack thermometer that measures the real oven
> temperature at the baking position. These are not expensive things.
> Maybe $25 or $30 in total. They will save you a lot of supposition and
> speculation. And get you to excellent bread more quickly than you might
> believe. There are friendly bakers here to guide you and they can...
> rather precisely... but they need accurate information.
>
> Will
>

YES. Emphatical agreement.

And one thing I have gotten better at but cant perfect, keeping the snarts
to a minimum. My wife is always getting on me about flour snarts. Seems no
matter how well clean up after working with starter and dough, I always miss
a tenacious little glob somewhere, the faucet handle, the sink rim, dish
towel, somewhere. Nasty little boogers.

hutchndi