Blacksmith Hell

"There are large anvils and cold iron in blacksmith hell..."
Blacksmith at Sutter's Sawmill, near Coloma, California

Finally moved to Puerto Rico with nearly all of the kitchen goods including a new, large anvil:

The work area and the new anvil

The new Globe 10-quart puts all of the smaller KitchenAid toys to shame. It is nice having a kitchen mixer that can maim and cripple you, yet still whip cream.

Now, the only problem is that searching through nearly every supermarket (Grande, Pueblo, Amigo, etc.) bread flour does not exist. Wheat at 18 degrees north (even inter-planted with gandules, or pigeon peas) is not a crop, and the Spanish were more concerned with sugar cane, rum, tobacco, coffee, and gold. Wheat as a bread staple must have been replaced by local starches or corn, of which you can find large amounts at any market.

Finally, we found two bags of flour for "bread and pizza" made be Molinos de Puerto Rico. This enterprise was purchased by ConAgra several years ago, so, you get what you get.

Amapola (Hibiscus rosa sinensis) is a regional flower of Puerto Rico, originally from Japan, that became poplular in Europe in the 1700's. (Puerto Rico was settled by Ponce de Leon in 1508, so there was time for the amapola to be popularized at home, then sent to the colonies)

The label lists 3gm of protein per 30 gm of flour. Using the USDA calculation methods, this could mean 9.4-11% crude protein by weight, making it a mild bread flour. It lists free amylase as key dough modifier, versus malted barley flour. We experiment.

Pre-treatment

Make a non-yeast, AR 60%, dough to let the amylase do its work. This was done by mixing

• 1kg Amapola harina por pan
• 600gm water at room temperature, about 27C

Observing the mix shows that the dough is elastic after 4.5 minutes at first speed, and glossy after 7 minutes, suggesting that the peak on a farinograph would be 7-9 minutes. I do not expect MTI to be very broad (unless this is a repackaging of Buccaneer Brand Pizza flour).

This was left covered for 7 hours.

Mixing

The following morning, the pre-mix was firm with a slightly sweet-sour smell indicating some lactobacillus formation. Finger marks stayed in the dough.


The following completed the mix:

• 8 gm Nea Magia (Greek yeast)
• 600 gm water at 42C
• About 8 gm sugar (no melao, even though it is made in Puerto Rico?)

Let proof for 20 minutes, then poured into pre-mix and paddled for 20 more minutes. Near the end of mixing added

• 40gm salt, and allowed to dissolve

Finally, added 1kg of bread flour and mixed for 9 minutes on first speed.

Spiral hook works well on 3.2kg of AR 60%

Rising and Forming

As this was a test, nothing unique was attempted. The dough was allowed to rise at 27C for two, one-hour periods with intervening knockdowns. Yeast activity was very good and the dough more than doubled in bulk. Although the dough was slightly more sticky than a full 12-13% protein flour, there was good elasticity.

Dough was divided into 33 95-100 gm pieces, balled, and placed to proof for 20 minutes.

Points of view

The 33 balls were formed into equal numbers of rolls, braids, and flats.

Baking

The experiment was to bake on grilles at 450F, as our current oven is partially burned out and we are awaiting replacement. There are no baking stones in the oven.

Baking required 15-18 minutes for a good brown. This is about 50% more than a reasonable convection oven. However, the results were good:

Notes

The grilles give a good bloom, even though the speed of the oven is slower. Next month should arrive with a new convection oven we convinced the landlord to install.

Amapola bread flour needs more delicate handling as shown by the tearing of the braids as the bread bloomed. A stronger flour would have expanded. This means making braids or Kaiser style knots very loose with a good amount of flour to allow slippage.