On Sun, 12 Oct 2008 00:15:00 -0700 (PDT), Eric Abrahamsen
> wrote:

>I made a sourdough starter a few months ago and have been figuring out
>the basics since then, but there are two general questions I'm hoping
>someone here can help me with:
>
>1. About how much salt do you use in your dough? I tend to start with
>about a half-cup of fairly thin starter, add a half-cup of water, and
>then flour from there (I have small oven so I make small batches). To
>this I've been adding about a teaspoon of salt. Does this seem
>reasonable? The dough rises awfully slowly, and I suspect salt might
>be to blame. I've left out salt altogether by accident on a few
>occasions, and the dough sure rose well, but tasted terrible.
>
>2. What makes bread chewy? My bread tastes fine, but it's awfully
>dense and crumbly, and what I'd really like is the kind of chewy loaf
>with big air pockets in it. Is it just kneading time, or are there
>other factors involved?
>
>Sorry for the uninspired questions, but I feel like I'm at a point
>where experimentation isn't providing the answers. Thanks to anyone
>who takes a moment to respond!
>
>Eric

Hi Eric,

Most around here use salt at the rate of about 2% of the
weight of the flour.

So if I am doing a loaf that has 1000g of flout, it will
have 20g of salt.

The big hole (coarse crumb), chewy texture, results come
from three main variables:

Higher protein flours tend to produce breads that are more
chewy (bagels are made with a very high protein flour.) And
higher hydration tends to increase the size of the holes.
With sufficiently high protein flour, dough can be made that
has a hydration of 75% (again, that is the ratio of the
weight of the water to the weight of the flour.) I would
guess from your description that you are using far too
little water.

In addition, longer fermentation tends to coarsen the crumb,
that this last is a bit more tricky because if you let the
dough ferment too long, the gluten will break down, and the
loaf will not be able to hold the gas that is produced by
the fermentation. It can just collapse, rather than
increasing in volume.

All the best,
--
Kenneth

If you email... Please remove the "SPAMLESS."