Issue 14  ·  Winter, Southern Hemisphere Wellington  41°17′ S
A cut sourdough loaf showing an open crumb, resting on a wooden board beside rosemary

Cold Proof  /  Schedules

The winter loaf wants four more hours

A Wellington kitchen in July sits somewhere near 13 °C. Every bulk-ferment schedule written for a Northern summer is quietly lying to you — so here is the arithmetic for stretching one out without turning the crumb to paste.

Gristline Desk · 6 August 2026 · 11 min read

CRUST 22

The crust scale

Everything we publish is filed somewhere between raw dough and a burnt edge. The number on each piece tells you how far down the bake it sits — not how difficult it is.

  1. 00Raw
  2. 20Pale
  3. 40Golden
  4. 60Amber
  5. 80Deep bake
  6. 100Char

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Why we bother saying it

Baking at 41° South

Almost every baking schedule you will read online was written on the other side of the equator. When it says summer, our kitchens are at their coldest — and a recipe that assumes a 24 °C room will hand you a dense, tight loaf and no explanation why.

Gristline runs on a Southern calendar. Timings are given for the month you are actually in, with the room temperature we actually measured.

13.4°CMedian kitchen temperature, Wellington July
+35%Typical bulk ferment extension against a 21 °C room
4Small mills within a day's drive we buy from
A cut rustic loaf and two slices on a weathered wooden table

The Saturday Dispatch

One email, most Saturdays: what we filed that week, the room temperature it was tested at, and one thing that went wrong. No recipe roundups, no affiliate links.

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