More investigations on proofing

This has been a weekend without any bread baking. But I have been doing more research on bread making technique and recipes as I try to decide what loaf to make next.

First I talked with Jan about some of my dilemmas. I'm always so impressed how often she bakes her go-to loaf of bread. One thing she keyed me into was that in order to find a warm spot to proof bread, she heats up her over for a minute and then turns it off. Sticks the dough in a earthenware bowl that she's warmed up with warm water and then dried. And this creates her nice proofing environment in her oven. I may try this method even though I have the proof setting on the oven. Need a second pan filled with water to go into the oven is annoying enough to me that the proofing setting might not fly for me.

I also followed Aimee's advice to check out Cook's Illustrated. They have a lot of nice short articles about exactly the kind of technique questions I've been asking. One thing I noticed is that they recommend all purpose flour for food processor versions of some recipes where they use bread flour for the stand mixer version. Interesting... not sure how universally applicable that is but worth understanding. They even have an article on what true pumpernickel bread is. Could throw many new questions into the hopper, but I'm not going there yet!

They also suggest the "warm up the oven" method of Jan's for proofing. Although they don't know her "warm up the bowl" trick! There was also a nice little tip about knowing when you've really reached the rise you're looking for. Suggests that you can put a rubber band around your proofing container that shows the original level of the dough when you first put it into the container. Then it's easy to eye ball whether it has doubled. Love this idea.

But of course more knowledge leads to more questions and dilemmas. If I use the earthenware bowl for proofing, then it requires more guess work to see if it's risen the right amount given the shape of a bowl. If I use a plastic proofing container with straight sides, then there's no earthenware to warm up. I guess maybe I'll just try both. Wonder if my plastic container is safe in the oven at 100 degrees. Argh, and then we're back to the beginning.