|
I've tried about 5 different recipes for a basic round white bread 'county' loaf in a dutch oven. And even with wildly different methods like no-knead vs mixer, multiday rests in fridge vs same day, instant vs active-dry yeast, different varieties of folding & shaping, bread flour vs AP flour, making a basic overnight 'starter' thing, etc... the result is always absolutely exactly the same. 1) The initial bulk rise/ferment works fine. 2) After knocking it down and shaping there is never any additional rise, it only settles out sideways. 3) There is absolutely zero oven spring/rise in the oven. (Using a preheated dutch oven at 450) 4) The outer crust is usually pretty good thanks to the dutch oven. 5) There are lots of air bubbles inside but they are all small/even, almost cake-like appearance. 6) The inside of the bread has an odd shiny/plastic-y/eggy texture that's very unpleasant. I can't over-exaggerate how different some of these recipes are, it's simply astonishing to me that they all always come out with the exact same problem. And it's borderline inedible. I'd appreciate any suggestions at all, I'm totally at a loss of what else to change.
|
#
¿
Aug 2, 2020 16:03
|
|
|
|
| # ¿ Apr 28, 2024 02:35 |
|
|
you ate my cat posted:This one is probably a hydration issue, I think. I had this problem with a couple of my first attempts at sourdough, and it came with some other symptoms that I connect with high hydration dough - difficult to handle, doesn't keep a good shape regardless of how much tension you get on the outside, that sort of thing. I cut the water a little and had much better results the next time. This is interesting because I've been extremely careful weighing everything. All these are intentionally pretty high hydration it seems like. But I guess that can exacerbate problems with gluten development too? Taking a look online at some comparisons though it seems like I might favor a lower hydration bread that has closer to a store bought texture (dryer but less big airy holes in it) anyway.
|
|
#
¿
Aug 2, 2020 18:45
|
|
|
It was definitely cooked/set. I'm guessing just because it rose/sprung so little that there was just such a dense texture of the plastic/rubber in between each air bubble. I've definitely had bread from a bakery with a hint of that internal shiny/plasticized characteristic and it wasn't off-putting because there was so much more air inside. I'd definitely be fine with a more sandwich or italian? style bread. What makes no sense to me is in, for example, babish's video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jizr6LR83Kk&t=200s That's an 88% hydration dough (354g water 400g flour) which seems insane that it comes out more like a traditional sandwich loaf, and only 1/8 of a teaspoon of yeast yet it blows up like a drat soccer ball. In this other recipe I've tried: https://www.kingarthurbaking.com/recipes/no-knead-crusty-white-bread-recipe Even though it's a terrible picture you can see that internal texture (the shinyness) is there, but it's just much less dense than mine. And that's a 75% hydration and uses an entire packet of yeast (for two loaves). My picture earlier is of this recipe. At this point I'd say the #1 issue is I need to get it to not be dense, whatever other things are going on I can adjust later, but currently everything is flat out inedible because of how dense it is. Rescue Toaster fucked around with this message at 14:22 on Aug 3, 2020 |
|
#
¿
Aug 3, 2020 14:18
|
|
|
The thought that the outside would set and trap the bread at a given size, causing it to be dense, has occurred to me, not sure if there's any truth in that. Especially if the yeast are out of fuel at that point and can't push through it. I also have a proper lame now for slashing it rather than my crappy knives. So that might improve things too. For starters I'll try a little lower hydration, be careful not to over-proof, and better cuts w/ the razor, and see what happens.
Rescue Toaster fucked around with this message at 15:36 on Aug 3, 2020 |
|
#
¿
Aug 3, 2020 15:33
|
|
|
Ginger Beer Belly posted:2) I used Active Dry Yeast instead of Instant Dry Yeast, and I naively followed the advice that it could be bloomed in room temperature water. I am in Iowa and our room temperature is sub-70F. Even though I did not get foam from proofing the yeast, I proceeded with the recipe. When I got to the initial proof, I set my Anova Precision Oven to 85F and 60% steam, and got next to no rise in the expected 45 minutes. After waiting for a good 2-3 hours after contemplating starting from scratch, I got a bit of rise, and decided to increase the oven temperature to 90F. That got me a good rise and I proceeded as normal. I get this too. Absolutely no recipes rise, at all, unless I go really high like 85-90 degrees for proofing. I don't know if it's the water here in Iowa, the yeast I keep getting, or what. But even when it's like 72-74 in my kitchen, it'll sit for hours and hours and barely budge. And then I think with the heat it tends to over-proof somewhat, once I shape things there's never any second rise at all either. Drives me insane and I've never seen a good explanation for it. More than half a dozen bread recipes I've tried have all been a miserable failure so far, all due to proofing problems I think.
|
|
#
¿
Mar 22, 2021 03:13
|
|
|
Hmmm, I have a carbon filter for drinking and I use that water, which I think should remove chlorine. But I've never tried RO or distilled. I should try some bottled water sometime. I've also considered setting up a little temp-controlled light bulb or similar in one of my big coleman coolers that I normally use for resting meat off the smoker.
|
|
#
¿
Mar 22, 2021 15:04
|
|
|
I made some of that english muffin bread for toasting a while ago, and I recall it took a long time to rise to the top of the bread pan even in a proofing box, and then once I baked it, it collapsed a bit. I'm guessing that sounds like over-proofed, and I probably need to scale up the recipe a little bit (maybe 15%) so that it fills the pan more quickly without over-proofing? Does that sound right?
|
|
#
¿
Aug 3, 2022 18:21
|
|
|
fourwood posted:That sounds about right to me, but how big is your bread pan? I feel like this sounds like what happens when I make the default KA recipe in a 9”x5” pan instead of the 8.5”x4.5” the recipe asks for, so that could be a factor. I think that is the case. My nordicware bread pan is quite wide and flat, like 4" at the bottom but 5.5" at the top, so it has quite a slope, too. I think I have a generic nonstick loaf pan that's a little taller and narrower. EDIT: It went ok, I scaled it up by 15%, and it rose nicely but ended up a little dense in the middle. That's not TOO bad because I slice it thin and freeze it for toasting so it doesn't hurt so much. Rescue Toaster fucked around with this message at 17:34 on Aug 6, 2022 |
|
#
¿
Aug 6, 2022 13:41
|
|
|
I've watched like every youtube video that exists on english muffin recipies, and they all end up just looking like biscuits or plain bread. They cut 'em open and close up and somehow think that simply saying "Look at all those nooks and crannies!" makes it so, when it is very visibly just solid bread, maybe with a slightly soft/loose crumb. I've never seen one that looks anything like the real store-bought english muffins, in terms of the airyness/holes. On the other hand, I haven't had an actual storebought english muffin come out like that in ages either. The last batch of Bays english muffins (my normal go-to) were so dense and solid you could kill an Ox with one hit. I'm assuming there's something weird in the process they use for the mass produced english muffins to get them that airy, or at least that is supposed to do that when they bother to get it right?
|
|
#
¿
Mar 22, 2023 02:38
|
|
|
I think I'm probably over-fixated on having giant holes in there. What I'm really trying to avoid is a dense/doughy interior. Either if the bread is just heavy/dense to start with, or I probably lack the right vocabulary here, but if you pinch a slice of the bread a bit and it doesn't bounce back, just sort of compresses. I have a lot of stomach problems so anything that feels like it's going to sort of wad up into a gut bomb is a big no-go. So I'm always trying to keep things light/airy/springy. But that seems tough to get consistently at home at least for me (maybe I do need to introduce some dough conditioners/improvers).
|
|
#
¿
Mar 24, 2023 14:38
|
|
|
People seem to say that having bad yeast is a fairly rare occurrence with modern supplies. But I would say more often than not, if I take my measured water, heat it up into the 100-105F range (with a thermapen, so I'm not overheating it), put yeast in and wait 10-15 mins, absolutely loving nothing happens. Not a single bubble, no smell of yeast, nothing. It's at LEAST 50%, more likely close to 75%, across different brands of packets and such. Usually with a 3-pack thing, all 3 are bad. There's either some kind of plague on all the yeast being produced in the midwest or my pantry I guess has some mystery radiation or something that kills everything put in there. Sometimes I do get ones that work and get a huge bloom on the top, so it's not like my 'process' (warm water & time) is wrong, it's just straight up dead. What the gently caress?
|
|
#
¿
Sep 9, 2023 20:50
|
|
|
|
| # ¿ Apr 28, 2024 02:35 |
|
|
Thumposaurus posted:Are you using filtered water or tap water? I do have a filter that should remove chlorine, I feel like I've used that but I'll have to test more carefully maybe do a straight comparison with a couple packets of yeast.
|
|
#
¿
Sep 9, 2023 22:53
|
|