I'm very pleased with my personal version of the basic Sourdough Boule. It gets a bit of rye flour, adjusted whole wheat flour, and I'm calling it a French Country Boule. Yeah. I know that's overreaching, but I'm sticking with it. The loaves have been coming out consistently lovely in every way and it's so damn easy. Thanks to all who have contributed information, encouragement, critiques, and inspiration.
I'm going to add Italian now and take a shot at ciabatta with the biga and all that. Looking around the 'net for hints and recipes, I note that instant dry yeast seems to be part of practically every ciabatta preparation, including the biga. I figure I can use a bit of my own yeast to get the biga going. No big deal. But it also seems that practically all of the recipes add a teaspoon or so of instant dry yeast to the actual dough. I kind of resist the idea as pointless. I figure that a good active preferment shouldn't need the yeast granules. Maybe I'm missing something. Maybe I should just go ahead and see how I do without it.
But I figure I can benefit from other forum members' thoughts on this. What have been people's experiences with ciabatta?