Jack is Cooking (Baking) Sourdough Bread 9/21/09

Well Hello internet!
So as it is Monday I am baking a loaf of bread.  My last loaf of bread was probably one of the most successful, in terms of its texture and what it looked like.  However since I ran out of white flour while I was making the dough, I ended up substituting with too much whole wheat flour.  This time I am repeating the recipe, but with an opposite ratio.  Instead of 3 cups of whole wheat flour and 1 cup of white flour being added to the sponge, I am going to use 3 cups of white flour and 1 cup of whole wheat flour.

So here it is:

This is my starter and the sponge I made out of the starter.  This morning at about 9 am i put one cup of starter in a bowl with 3 cups of water and 4 cups of white flour.  Mixed them together and then let them sit (covered) for about 12 hours

Here is my sponge:
As you can see it has bubbled up and risen quite nicely.

Next, I remove 2 cups from the sponge and put it back in the starter.  This feeds the starter, so it will be nice and ready to go next week when i make another loaf.
Then I put in half a cup of olive oil, 1 tablespoon of salt and a tiny little bit of sugar, maybe like a teaspoon.

Then to this mixture I slowly added while stirring 3 cups of white flour and 1 cup of whole wheat flour (i like to mix this together before i add it into the sponge).  eventually i can no longer stir with my spoon and i have to mix it with my hands.

This mixing eventually turns into kneading.  i have been experimenting with the amount of kneading.  this time i barely kneaded the bread at all, and also decided to have a slightly moister dough, so it is a little stickier, and not the right consistency for kneading.
Here is the Dough:

Then comes the shaping of the bread.  i folded the bread and rolled it into the shape i wanted and then placed it in the bread rising pan that i have

Here is the bread before rising:

I let it rise for 2 hours, and here is what it looked like:

I then baked it in the oven at 450° for 20 minutes, then turned down the heat to 350° for the final 30 minutes of baking.

Here is the result:

So it looks pretty good i think.  but when it turned out onto the baking pan the upward risingness of the bread turned into outward rising, so the bread is quite wide and flat, but nice and soft on the inside and crunchy on the outside.  the bread also tastes pretty darn good.

I think perhaps the rising problem can be cured by allowing gluten to develop more and then the dough will be more cohesive.  either more flour, and or kneading will probably solve my problem.

We'll find out in a week or two i suppose!