Pain de Campagne Alternatif

 Before any French speakers descend upon this blog to heap scorn upon me for abusing the language they love, I hope they'll have some perspective on how little influence my blog has on the rest of the world. The title is just for fun as was baking this recipe. The classic Pain de Campagne, AKA French Country Loaf, has used either whole wheat, rye, or a combination of the two as the secondary flour. I used white whole wheat and rye and got what I consider to be a really nice loaf.

The minor details I used in this recipe included a two stage build for the starter, an overnight stay in the fridge as part of the proofing, a cross hatch slashing pattern to enable a better oven spring and an eccentric appearance, and finally, the initial baking stage being done under an aluminum foil roasting pan. In return, I got a great crust and a moist crumb with a pleasant tang to the flavor.

Starter
120 g at 100% hydration

Main dough
264 g DM bread flour
33 g whole rye flour
33 g WM white whole wheat flour
220 g water at 85F
8 g kosher salt

 This is a variation on the recipe using 50 g of white whole wheat rather than the WWW and rye combination so I'm confident that I can replicate the success.

I'm also working with IDY on other recipes. Basically, I'm targeting 70% hydration as a starting point. The boule was baked in my stoneware bowl, using a 200g poolish with 60 g of WW flour. The total flour weight was 360 g. The batard like creation utilized a 70% hydration preferment of 170 g, including 30 g of WWW. Total flour weight for the batard was 300 g. Both were a bit under proofed but with good flavor that I attribute to the slow overnight builds for the preferments.


Winter has been dry around here in that no one has really been able to justify hauling out their big snow blowers. We did have some actual, rare January thunderstorms last month that brought the most precipitation so far.  We're not fans of the brief spells of brutally cold air that have visited us here on the Middle Coast but we do tolerate them as best we can and acknowledge that they kill off some of the more obnoxious insects, especially the notorious oak leaf itch mites. You'll never see those mites in action because of their diminutive size but you'll know they've been around in a couple hours.

There have been a lot of hawks  in the area during the past five weeks or so, mostly red tailed and Cooper's hawks. The usual suspects have been populating the feeders with a lot more goldfinches than usual. The flickers and blue jays are only occasional as are the starlings. 

Comments, humor, and questions are welcome.