I like the bread that resulted from using white bread flour and the desem
starter. It has great flavor, texture and an outstanding crust. I don't like
having to maintain a starter just to make this one bread. I decided to see what
would happen if I inverted the process, using whole wheat flour with my white
starter. It's pretty damned close to the same bread!
It's close enough to the first diversion to make me think about pitching the desem starter.
To approximate the same proprtions, I added 300g whole wheat, 300g bread flour and almost 2 cups of water to 450g of white starter.
The final dough was about 63% hydration. Not huge and can definitely be upped.
I got nice oven spring and good browning.
The crumb was slightly more open. If I up the hydration it should open further.
I like this bread and it works with the white starter!
The starter was at about 66% hydration.
The fermenting and proofing were both about 4 hours.
I baked at 500º w/steam for 15 minutes and about 30-35 minutes at 400º.
.
It's close enough to the first diversion to make me think about pitching the desem starter.
