Scoring and shaping gluten free bread.

Now, with much gluten free bread scoring and shaping is not really practicable, so it may be necessary to suspend your disbelief while you read this post.

First, let me deal briefly with shaping, and I'll refer to it again later. The way I make gluten free bread shaping is part of the process. It is not the same as shaping with gluten dough, but there are similarities. Generally the dough is strong enough to shape as a batard, a boule or a baguette. It is not possible to get a taught skin on the dough, but it is possible to develop a clearly defined shape and proof the dough in a banneton or couche. 

Here are a couple of batards I shaped before proofing in a linen couche:

The batards are not as even or as uniform as I would like, but for the exercise they will do. They are buckwheat and red quinoa with a cultured buckwheat leaven (ok: a buckwheat sourdough starter). Now I usually only bake one loaf at a time, occasionally two, and I usually score them the same. This time however, inspired by Jesse Merrill's post (http://on.fb.me/1FnnW64) in the 'Universalbread' group on Facebook, I decided to score the two loaves differently.  My aim was to see how the same dough behaves with scoring in opposite directions. Even without gluten there is still a distinct 'grain' or texture in the dough that is developed by the shaping. This little test helped me to understand more about how important correct shaping and scoring are to the final crust and crumb. I aimed to have approximately the same total length and depth of scoring in each direction.

I have found that oven spring usually takes place in the first 10 minutes, most between the 5 and 10 minute marks.

These three pictures of the loaves in the oven show the loaves at the 1 minute, 5 minutes and 15 minutes marks. They are baked on a ceramic pizza stone with steam being generated in a metal dish on the lower shelf. At 1 minute (above) the scoring is still visible, but has barely opened.

At 5 minutes the scoring on the right (scored across the 'grain') is opening more than the batard on the left which is scored with the 'grain'. It appears that the tension in the crust, influenced by the shaping, is pulling the scoring open on the right, whereas the scoring in the same direction as the 'grain' is not under the same tension, and the cuts do not open to the same extent. As the oven spring continues each loaf expands, but the batard on the left is constrained, whereas the loaf on the right continues to expand.

Finally, after 50 minutes (20 with steam, 30 without) the loaves are baked and the effect of scoring and shaping is evident.

There is some crust tearing on the lower right side of the left batard, and on close inspection a number of minor tears in the crust of the left loaf. The loaf on the right has only a few minor cracks in the crust.

When the bread cooled the crumb revealed more of the effect of scoring and shaping. the circular 'grain' of the crumb is visible in each loaf, but more pronounced in the batard on the right. On the right the crumb is more open, and the increase in the girth of the loaf is clearly evident.