Bannetons, Bowls, and Whatever You've Got
Okay. Your dough's shaped into a tight round, and now it needs somewhere to sit for its cold proof. This lesson is just about the container. Sounds simple, and it mostly is, but I get enough questions on it that it earns its own lesson.
First thing: you do not need to buy a banneton to make good bread. I said the same thing about Dutch ovens a few lessons back and I'll say it again here. Buy the flour first, buy the toys later. I shaped rounds into a regular mixing bowl lined with a flour-sacked towel for a solid year before I bought an actual banneton, and the bread didn't know the difference.
What a banneton actually does
A banneton is a basket, usually cane or rattan, sometimes coiled rope, shaped like a bowl. Its whole job is to hold your dough's shape while it proofs and to wick a little moisture off the surface so the skin firms up. That firmer skin is what lets you score cleanly later and get a good clean release when you flip it into the pot.
That's it. It's not magic, it's a mold with some breathability. You could get the same result other ways, and lots of people do.
What you can use instead
- A mixing bowl with a towel. Line it with a flour-sacked towel (the thin waffle-weave kind, not terrycloth, terrycloth sheds and sticks) and dust it heavy with flour or rice flour. Rice flour is a little better here because it doesn't gum up as easy against the dough.
- A colander lined the same way. Works great actually, better airflow than a solid bowl.
- A proper banneton, cane or rope. Once you've got one, dust it well, don't skip that step or you'll fight it later.
Whatever you use, the container needs to be roughly the size and shape you want the loaf to end up. Too big and your dough spreads out instead of holding height. Too small and it'll climb the sides funny.
Flour it right or pay for it later
This is the part people rush and regret. Whatever vessel you're using, get flour into every seam of it. If you're using a cane banneton, work the flour into the weave with your fingers, don't just dust the surface. Rice flour or a 50/50 mix of rice flour and bread flour holds up best. Straight bread flour can still stick, especially with a wetter dough, and especially in our dry air where the dough's surface can tack up fast if you dawdle.
If it sticks when you go to flip it out, you'll tear the skin, and that skin is doing real work for you at the score-and-bake stage. Not the end of the world, you can patch a small tear, but it's not the loaf you wanted.
Seam up or seam down
Seam side up in the banneton, always. That seam is going to become the top of your loaf once you flip it out onto your peel or parchment, and that's where you'll score. Set the dough in gently, seam up, dust the top (which will be the loaf's bottom during proofing) with a little more flour, and that's your dough for the next 12 to 18 hours in the fridge.
The cold proof itself
Cover it. I use a shower cap, honestly, the free ones from hotels, stretched over the bowl. A plastic bag works too, or a lid if your bowl has one. You just don't want the surface drying out and crusting in the fridge, same problem as the dry-air crusting issue I've mentioned before with room-temp proofing, just slower.
Then into the fridge it goes. And here's where I have to tell on myself a little.
I once left a dough to bulk ferment overnight before a Saturday framing job. This was before I had my proofing tote dialed in and before I trusted timers the way I do now. I got busy, forgot about it entirely, and didn't get home until four in the afternoon. That dough had climbed clean out of its bowl and onto the counter. A blob, just sitting there next to the toaster like it owned the place.
Richard had already cleaned it up by the time I walked in. Didn't say one word about it. That silence was worse than if he'd teased me, honestly. I felt it.
That was bulk ferment, not cold proof, but the lesson's the same. Set a timer. Don't trust yourself to remember, because you won't, especially on a Saturday with a job on your mind. I use my phone now, no exceptions.
My honest opinion on all this
If you're choosing between an underproofed loaf and an overproofed one, take underproofed. Every time. I know everybody's chasing that big open holey crumb, and a long cold proof helps get you there, but if you push it too far you get a slack, gummy mess that won't hold a score or a shape. I'd rather cut it a little short and get bread I can actually slice for a sandwich. That's just me, but it's saved me more loaves than it's cost me.
Before next time
If you don't have a banneton yet, dig up a bowl and a thin towel before our next class so you've got something to shape into. Don't run out and buy anything special.