Marco: Thank you for clarifying the condition of the Caputo 00 dough during the two time periods. In my case, the two periods didn't mean as much since I was making single dough ball sizes. To refresh my recollection on the entire dough formation process, today I went back and reread all your old posts on the subject. That turned out to be a very productive exercise since it helped me pull a lots of odds and ends together and put things into better context, particularly in light of my own research in this area over the last few months. One thing I wondered about after rereading your posts is how do you personally refresh your starters and how often do you do it? And how frequently do you use your starters to make doughs? And, finally, is it necessary (as opposed to desirable) to periodically recreate a starter? By this, I mean to take say, a tablespoon of the existing starter, add flour and water to it, let the mixture work for several hours, and then repeat the process again, and, once the "new" starter is completed and functional, throw away the rest of the original starter. I know that this process is sometimes used to refresh a starter that has problems, but wasn't sure whether it should be done on a normal, routine basis.
Sante Fe Bill: I too wondered about the elevation effects in your recent experiment. Also, I wondered whether your temperatures around Sante Fe are starting to rise, having the effect of accelerating the fermentation/ripening process and making the dough rise a bit too much. Here in Texas it has been very hot, with high room temperatures. Marco says 64.4-68 degrees F is the desired room temperature range. Apart from finding a way to cool down a little space to place my dough, I suppose I could counteract the high room temperature effects by increasing the salt levels to slow down the fermentation process (maybe adding the salt last to minimize effects on the gluten and enzymes), but that doesn't seem to be all that inviting an approach. I'll be interested in following your progress as you continue to experiment with your starters as it warms up there also.
Peter
