Milk Sourdough Shokupan: Keeping the Tang in Check So the Milk Still Shows

One hundred percent whole wheat, no white flour anywhere, 92% hydration, and no raw bran taste. The mechanism is a scald: 20% of the whole wheat flour is mixed with boiling water and left to cool, which gelatinises its starch and softens its bran so completely that the finished loaf tastes like a mild brown bread rather than like health food.

Altus is old bread — usually rye — ground up and put back into the next dough. German bakeries have done this for centuries because stale rye is a better ingredient than it is a food. At 12% of total flour weight, ground altus adds a deep, roasted sweetness that fresh rye flour does not have, holds moisture for days, and lets you use bread that would otherwise go to the birds.

At 85% hydration this stops being dough in the usual sense and becomes something you pour. The technique is almost entirely about restraint: five coil folds to build strength you cannot feel with your hands, then no shaping at all. Ciabatta is not shaped, it is cut — the dough is tipped onto a floured couche and divided with a bench scraper in three strokes.