Whole Wheat French Loaf ( Notes about making the recipe)

I got this recipe from King Arthur's website, link below:

French-Style Country Bread Recipe | King Arthur Baking

Here are a few notes from my attempt at the loaf:

1. Making the Starter - I have to admit on my first attempt at the starter. I forgot to put the yeast in! So, I tried again. I live in Iowa and my house can be quite drafty at times. So, keeping the starter at 70 - 90 degrees was a little difficult and I believe it did play into why the starter did not rise as much as I would hope. I thought it was a possibility that my yeast was expired. I use an instant yeast from a block. The yeast I use is listed below. In the recipe it says active dry or instant yeast - this would be the instant yeast measurements. Anyway, I checked the package, and it expires at the end of 2024.

2. Making the Dough - In my case I had to use the entire time + about 5 hours to get my dough to a respectable proofing. But! it didn't even rise like I wanted. There were not many holes in my ending loaf due to the fact there was not a lot of air holes created while proofing. I figured this was due to temperature and moisture levels. My house is dry as a bone at the moment.

3.Scoring the Dough - I am not an artist as far as design on the bread is concerned but scoring does more than look good. It prevents rupturing of the bread surface due to pressure creating while baking. I had bought a "scoring" knife on sale at a local farm store while on sale a few months ago. It's not really a knife, it just has a thin razor in a holder. There are certain razor blades for different styles of cuts.

4. Baking - I baked my bread with a small pan of water in the oven with it. This helps get the crusty crust. The recipe said to spray the loaf, but I did not have something to spray it properly with. The pan of water acts in the same way.

5. Baking - The key is to get the bread to the appropriate temp. My bread took about 40 minutes which is longer than the suggested time. This could be due to 1) oven temp 2) density of bread (mine was very dense) 3) I didn't break the dough into two balls, it was one ball.

6. Baking - I did want to mention what I baked my bread in. It was a Romertopt Grill Bowl. I got this at a local kitchen store. The enmaled clay helps the bread bake by allowing moisture into the bread while holding a good temperature. The one I have is below:

6. Cooling - I cooled mine on a wire rack. For about 15 minutes.

7. Eating - I had mine with a Thai Rice Noodle Soup, Pics below!