Failed bake is not a failure. Nieudany wypiek to nie porażka.

I would like to show you quickly what I tried making this weekend, why it did not work, and what I plan next.

Chciałbym Wam dziś szybko pokazać, co próbowałem zrobić w weekend, czemu nie wyszło i co planuję następne.

[Polska wersja poniżej]

Only once have I managed to bake really decent baguettes. Other times they were horrible, too flat, to hard, poorly shaped, overproofed, not enough whatever. Just bad. I decided to fix it this weekend. And it did not go very well.

I decided to use a different recipe than usual – with a bit of sourdough in the levain. The reason is that many times the baguettes I made had this sour aftertaste, very unpleasant. I hoped that adding some sourdough could fix that.

A post shared by Breadcentric (@breadcentric) on Jun 3, 2017 at 3:09pm PDT

The events started to roll:

• I think I overproofed the levain.
• I think I added too much water for my flour.
• I think I made it even worse when doing a stretch and fold.
• I think I made the bulk proof too long for the warm weather that we had.
• I think I shaped the baguettes quite well, they were rather even and not too thin.
• I think I made the final proof too long for this hydration and temperature in the house.
• The baguettes hardly grew or opened in the oven.
• I burned some of them a bit.

I went to bed on Saturday thinking that it makes no sense to try again.

But then Sunday happened. We tried them and the aftertaste wasn’t there. They did not rise, but they weren’t too fluffy or dry, the crumb resisted the teeth the way it should. It would be a bit softer if it rose in the oven. We ate most of them today, and they were delicious. And we wouldn’t mind having more.

A post shared by Breadcentric (@breadcentric) on Jun 3, 2017 at 4:25pm PDT

To finally make them properly, I would have to make them regularly to learn more, to understand the details and to improve my skills, and this may be too demanding for me and my family. But then we really liked them, so I’m sure we will try again.

Just one thing to share here: If something doesn’t work, it’s ok. This happens. Maybe it’s just not the time, maybe you need to try again. Or try something else instead. But you’ve tried and this is awesome. Don’t get discouraged because of a hurdle.