# bread recipe, unsure about yeast amount



## butzy (Jan 8, 2010)

I copied a recipe from a newspaper the other day and I am unsure if I copied it correct.

It is a no knead bread, or at least something close to it. In the evening all ingredients are mixed together, then it is left overnight and baked in the morning.

The ingredients are 400 gr flour, 300 ml water, 6 gr salt and 1/4 pack of yeast, dry granules. The packs  of dry active yeast here are 7 grammes, and according to google it is the same as in the country where I got the recipe from.

Is less than 2 grammes yeast enough for this type of bread? Is that because of the long period the yeast has to do its job? I haven't made bread for a long time, but make pizza fairly regular and then I use a pack of yeast for about the same amount of flour.


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## siduri (Aug 13, 2006)

Yes, exactly.  It's the long rising that gives the bread its taste and apparently also its keeping quality.  I make - i should say made, now my husband has taken over - this bread about once every five days, and it keeps, in a paper bag, for all that time without getting stale or moldy.  I use 1/4 teaspoon (even less than this recipe calls for) and let it raise 24 hours.  It fits in with our schedule better. Mix in the evening and cook the next evening.


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## kokopuffs (Aug 4, 2000)

siduri said:


> ... I use 1/4 teaspoon (even less than this recipe calls for) and let it raise 24 hours. It fits in with our schedule better. Mix in the evening and cook the next evening.


1/4 tsp yeast for how many cups of flour?


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## butzy (Jan 8, 2010)

Thanks Siduri, I am going to give it a try.
This should work with whole wheat flour as well, isn't it? Or should it rise longer in that case? Just an added question: at the moment our day temperature is around 30 oC, night around 20 oC (86 and 68 F respectively). I dont expect any problems. Summer is 43 / 33 oC (110 / 90 F ) and winter 25 / 8 oC (77 / 46 F). Would this method still work? We have no heating inside the houses. Our outside temperature and inside temperature are more or less the same.


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## michaelga (Jan 30, 2012)

Whole wheat flour usually requires more hydration and a longer time to hydrate.

With this recipe you probably won't notice much difference as it's 75% hydration already and a long time to hydrate 10 hours or so.

The long time spent sitting on the counter allows the yeast to build up to normal levels without things becoming 'beer' flavoured... the long hydration also allows gluten to develop without all that 'hard' work.

At your ... very warm temperatures you'll likely see things race along. Overnight will probably be closer to 6 hours or so possibly even less. In the USA it is very rare that the ambient temperature is even close to the 'room' temperature.

Average room temp in the USA is considered to be about 70F or 21C. It changes a bit depending on where you live but not by much.

Your best bet would be to start a batch early one morning and then start testing it throughout the day with the window-pane test.

Mix it up - let it rest for say 5 hours ... maybe... then test it. Keep repeating until you can almost read through it.

Depending on humidity - i'm guessing 6 hours maybe 7 at the most.

Anyway let us know how it turns out (use small batches) I've never had to bake in very warm climates and have no idea what humidity you live with.

o/


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## siduri (Aug 13, 2006)

kokopuffs said:


> 1/4 tsp yeast for how many cups of flour?


oops, 4 cups flour, 1 1/2 cups water, but i do it by eye, it should be rough looking and all the flour dampened. 2 tsp salt

Butzy, i've done it with whole wheat flour - usually use a little more water, since it absorbs more.


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## butzy (Jan 8, 2010)

Busy with my first attempt and messed up straight away.

I mixed everything together last night, poured the mixture in the tin and placed in the cold oven (no draught)  and this morning it looked fine, nicely risen etc. BUT I realized that I had forgotten to put salt in the dough. And since bread without salt is unedible in my opinion I decided to  just mixed it in and am now letting it rise again.

Hope this works (yes I know, follow the recipe, weight out everything before you begin, but I didn't).

I'll let you know how this works out.

By the way, I have used all purpose flour as we didn't have bread flour.

As for summer baking: I suppose I'll just have to let the dough rise at night, or maybe even in the fridge.

In the winter maybe by daytime. It is quite an extreme climate here

Anyway, let's first get this thing right and see if I actually like the result.


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## siduri (Aug 13, 2006)

There are so many ways to make bread.  One is to make a sponge (i never got all the technical terms right, poolish, biga, etc) where you mix flour yeast and water without the salt, then add more flour and water and salt later - since the salt apparently retards the rising at first (though salt-free bread ends up being very low rising so it probably also reinforces the gluten? i'm just guessing).  Anyway, bread is very forgiving.  It might turn out ok.  But i think you are making a different kind of no knead bread than i know - the one i know that's veyr popular, has you bake it in a pot that has been heated in the oven for a long time at high heat, and then you form the loaf and put it in the hot pot with hot cover and bake. 

Anyway, good luck and don;t get discouraged.  It's very gratifying to bake bread and not all that difficult once you have the technique.


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## butzy (Jan 8, 2010)

Thanks for the kind words Siduri 

As a kid I baked a bit, using a ready bread mix. Then nothing for years, till I tried my hands on making pizza, as I wanted one and the closed pizza shop is 150 km away 

Anyway, I read this recipe somewhere and it sounded like a very easy and pleasant thing. Mix up some ingredients in the evening, put in a tin, (form, tray whatever it is called) and turn on the oven in the morning and an hour later you have fresh bread!

It actually didn't turn out too bad. The saltness is a bit uneven, due to the late and not complete mixing. It did stick to the tin though. I am blaming that on me taking the dough out, mixing it with salt and then putting it back in the same tin which I didn't clean.

The bread is fairly dense with a chewy, crispy crunch, which is something I really like. Considering the fact that I used ap flour instead of bread flour, I am actually pretty happy.


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## kokopuffs (Aug 4, 2000)

siduri said:


> There are so many ways to make bread. One is to make a sponge (i never got all the technical terms right, poolish, biga, etc) where you mix flour yeast and water without the salt, then add more flour and water and salt later -...


Here.


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## siduri (Aug 13, 2006)

koko - ? here?  not sure what you mean.


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## kokopuffs (Aug 4, 2000)

siduri said:


> koko - ? here? not sure what you mean.


Click on this link: http://www.thefreshloaf.com/node/2784/biga-v-poolish aka "Here" in my previous post.


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## butzy (Jan 8, 2010)

Time for an update:
I have been baking a couple of breads now with different amounts of wholewheat and white flour. The no-knead recipe with the use of a pre-heated cast iron pot works better than the one I used before. 
Yesterday I tried another recipe, more or less no-knead in a normal loaf tin. It all looked good till it went into the oven. In the oven the bread sort of collapsed (actally ended up smaller than before it went in the oven). It also took a lot longer to bake than stated in the recipe. Would that mean that the oven temperature was too low? I don't have an oven thermometer, so I cannot check the real temperature. It is a gas oven and I had it set on 200 oC (that's just below 400 F). My previous breads were almost all baked at 220 cC (430 F).
The bread did taste very good though, but just wondering.....


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## michaelga (Jan 30, 2012)

You know what i'm going to ask?

Gimmie the damn recipe and details.....

- without any real information ... it sounds like you 'over-proofed' your dough.   It went into the oven... oven spring occurred and it fell flat...

Gimmie more info... and you'll get better answers!


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## butzy (Jan 8, 2010)

Okay,
700 gr wholewheat flour, 600 ml water, 1 tablespoon honey, 1 tablespoon salt, 1 packet easyblend yeast.
All mixed together for about 2 minutes.
Dumped in a greased loaf tin, left to rise for about 2 hours, sprinkled with sesame seed and put into the pre-heated oven.
It is recipe from linda collister and it is called Grants loaf.
In her recipe she lets the dough rise for 1 hour and she uses spelt, but says you can use wholewheat flour instead, but you need to let it rise longer. It was also a fairly cold day, so I let it rise for 2 hours.
Do you think that may have been too long?


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## siduri (Aug 13, 2006)

In breadmaking, the time is not relevant, it's the rising you have to test.  If you poke the dough with your finger, about halfway to the first knuckle, and it leaves a dent, it's ready.  If it collapses around your finger, it's overrisen, and you should re fold and reform and re-rise (it will take much less time this time).  If it springs back completely it's not ready.  The time is only indicative, it can tell you if it's about time to check on your dough, not if it's ready.

There are those who will tell you to measure the dough in a straight sided container and make it double, but that's not accurate either - how can you get precision with a domed risen dough, first of all, and second of all, how much it will rise will depend on the flour and flour is not (i hope, not yet) made in a chemistry lab.  So its rising power is determined by the temperature the wheat is grown in, the particular strain, and who knows what else. 

But when the dough collapses around your finger, the gluten is no longer able to hold up the height.  If you bake it you risk having a cavernous dry interior. 

This information is from over 40 years of experience making bread at home - plus a little technical stuff picked up along the way by reading cookbooks, but mostly experience.


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## chicagoterry (Apr 3, 2012)

Totally agree with everything Siduri said. The poking-with-a -finger test is the only way to go. Bread recipes are best thought of as guidelines. A lot of successful bread baking is "feeling" the dough at various stages and once you get a feel for it, there's actually a lot of flexibility in making bread. There's a lot of trial and error involved during the learning curve. Usually the "mistakes" will still taste better than store-bought bread.


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## michaelga (Jan 30, 2012)

butzy said:


> Okay,
> 700 gr wholewheat flour, 600 ml water, 1 tablespoon honey, 1 tablespoon salt, 1 packet easyblend yeast.
> All mixed together for about 2 minutes.
> Dumped in a greased loaf tin, left to rise for about 2 hours, sprinkled with sesame seed and put into the pre-heated oven.
> ...


Definately not too long. I'd have left it overnight at least to develop the gluten. Wholewheat can take a very long time to hydrate and it won't develop much gluten until it is hydrated.


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## siduri (Aug 13, 2006)

MichaelGA said:


> Definately not too long. I'd have left it overnight at least to develop the gluten. Wholewheat can take a very long time to hydrate and it won't develop much gluten until it is hydrated.


Yes, but with a full envelope of yeast Michael? I do no knead bread but with 1/4 tsp yeast for 4 cups of flour. That can sit 24 hours, but with a full envelope??


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## michaelga (Jan 30, 2012)

It will be very yeasty but if you don't develop the gluten all that lift from the yeast will never stay in the bread.

The bread needs structure from somewhere.  

Make the recipe again - halve it and try a few different times.  Better yet double the receipe and do three tests and one control.

1) you keep poking until risen and record the time

2) you let rest for 8-10 hours overnight

3 you let rest for an entire day

4) you cook exactly as you did the first time ... to see if it might have been some other factor.


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## kokopuffs (Aug 4, 2000)

My unbleached white, whole wheat and rye all bake in an oven preheated to 500F and (EDIT) after 10 minutes the temperature is reduced to 450F for the remainder of the bake time.  Total bake time is 30 minutes.  Rye and WW flour constitute 1/6th of the total flour by volume.  And the loaf bakes on a baking stone made by Fibrament.


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## butzy (Jan 8, 2010)

Thanks for all the help!
I'll keep experimenting and will keep you posted. Thing is, the bread tasted good even though it didn't look the best. My collegue eat 8 slices in one sitting
Anyway, I was wondering beforehand about this recipe, considering the amount of yeast and short rising time. As I understand it (from books and all the info on this forum) a no-knead bread works with actve yeast and a long rising time.
I am thinking of doing this bread again, but kneading it for a good 10 minutes before letting it rise and/or reducing the yeast and letting it rise for much longer.
Again, thanks for all your help.
I will get it right (love the smell of fresh bread)


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## michaelga (Jan 30, 2012)

> As I understand it (from books and all the info on this forum) a no-knead bread works with actve yeast and a long rising time.


not exactly true ... the yeast plays a role but in a mechanical way to "'internally knead" the dough as the bubbles form (stretching the dough) and then travel up through the dough (further tugging and pulling the dough)

Here is a good explanation:


> So *how does the no-knead bread recipe,* which, appropriately, has no kneading involved *produce the same effect?* With the help of enzymes. Flour naturally contains enzymes that break down long proteins into shorter ones in a process called autolysis (_auto_ meaning "self" and _lysis _meaning "break down"). Bakers have known about this process for years, and many incorporate an autolysis step into their recipes, mixing together flour and water and allowing it to rest before adding the remaining ingredients and kneading (salt can inhibit the action of autolysis).
> 
> By breaking down the proteins into shorter pieces in this way, they become much easier to untangle and re-align, greatly increasing the efficiency of kneading.
> 
> ...


http://www.seriouseats.com/2011/06/the-food-lab-the-science-of-no-knead-dough.html

is the link to the whole article.


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## kokopuffs (Aug 4, 2000)

Using an eight to twelve hour poolish in my 2 # loaf, I knead the dough no more than 30 seconds.  Gluten forms spontaneously.


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## siduri (Aug 13, 2006)

Thanks Michael.  That was what i was thinking, the bubbles of yeast doing the kneading for us, but wasn't sure about how that little bit of bubbling could actually produce the gluten.  You filled in the rest. 

While you're explaining, my no knead bread has gotten too dense over the years.  I do a quick knead in my hands (in the air) just stretching and making the bread into a ball - i hold by a part and let the rest pull itself out, then fold back, then do it a couple more times, then pull under all around to make a nice ball to form a sort of "skin" to hold in the yeast bubbles - could this be what's doing it?  I guess i can't keep my hands out of it.  But would that make the bread dense?  Should i just fold over and come what may?


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## michaelga (Jan 30, 2012)

Sure sounds like you're overworking the dough.    Too much gluten and the yeast can't give it any rise when it hits the oven.

The first several hours with a no-knead dough there is pretty much zero gluten and the yeast just bubbles away creating great flavours.  

By kneading it at the start you jump start the gluten and the yeast continues to develop it for the entire time.

The gluten development also doesn't seem to be linear - it tends to speed up.  

Kind of like when making puff pastry - the first tri-fold only makes 3 layers, the second tri-fold makes 9, the third tri-fold make 27, then 81, 243, 729, etc. etc.

I don't have any precise times but i'd start by cutting 5 hours off the resting time if you knead it at the begging.

Better yet don't do anything but let it sit - for me that is the attraction.  Get home from work through it all in a proofing bucket, let it rest until the next evening and then shape and cook.


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## kokopuffs (Aug 4, 2000)

MichaelGA said:


> The first several hours with a no-knead dough there is pretty much zero gluten and the yeast just bubbles away creating great flavours.
> By kneading it at the start you jump start the gluten and the yeast continues to develop it for the entire time.
> 
> The gluten development also doesn't seem to be linear - it tends to speed up.
> ...


It's NOT the yeast that creates flavors but rather, the diastatic malt aka malted barley that breaks down the starch into sugars and it's those sugars that create flavor. (EDIT) Diastatic malt is therefore an ENZYME. Read up on preferments. I make my poolish eight to twelve hours before mixing in the remaining ingredients (flour, water, salt and yeast) and within three hours my loaf is outta' the oven. Most of the work therefore has been accomplished during the poolish's fermentation time, that preceeding eight to twelve hours. Here, I think you're micromanaging a bit too much. Once the dough has been completely mixed, I knead for no more than thirty seconds and get a great rise, proof, oven spring and ear. Once kneaded the dough is allowed to rest for thirty minutes it is then french folded and allowed to rest another twenty minutes. This is done once or twice more prior to the final proof in the banneton.


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## michaelga (Jan 30, 2012)

There are many contributers to the flavour in bread - Yeast being a very important one, definately not the only one by any means.

I've used preferments all my life and even have a 15 year old sour dough starter sitting on my counter, i'm quite familiar with them.

I'm not trying to be rude but you seem to be miss-using terms and/or getting things mixed up.

- there is no barley involved in most bread (you sure can use it - but it isn't relative to this thread)

- malt is an additive that is most commonly used in europe, it can be either non-diastatic or diastatic.... non-diastatic is for sweetening the dough, diastatic breaks down starches into sugar enhancing the activity of *yeast*.

- you said "Gluten forms spontaneously" - what is described above is simply explaining how it is formed. (ie. the non-magical explanation)

- lastly you're not even talking about no-knead bread... poolish- kneading - resting - french folding etc. (a great technique and great bread i'm sure)

If you want to see how much flavour yeast contributes, make your favourite recipe but leave out the yeast - then compare the taste of the unbaked dough...


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## kokopuffs (Aug 4, 2000)

It seems to me that malted barley is added to most commercially mass produced flours.  Not so with those coming from the smaller mills like Weisenberger and the Rocky Mountain Flour Mills.  Without malted barley, fermenting doughs made with those boutique flours was sloooooooooow.


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## kokopuffs (Aug 4, 2000)

MichaelGA said:


> There are many contributers to the flavour in bread - Yeast being a very important one, definately not the only one by any means.
> 
> I've used preferments all my life and even have a 15 year old sour dough starter sitting on my counter, i'm quite familiar with them.
> 
> ...


Seeing that you're based in Canada which offers a huge production of wheat, (EDIT) perhaps Canadian mass produced (EDIT) flours may not (EDIT) include diastatic malt unlike ours but I know not.


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## kokopuffs (Aug 4, 2000)

MichaelGA said:


> ...- you said "Gluten forms spontaneously" - what is described above is simply explaining how it is formed. (ie. the non-magical explanation)
> - lastly you're not even talking about no-knead bread... poolish- kneading - resting - french folding etc. (a great technique and great bread i'm sure)
> 
> If you want to see how much flavour yeast contributes, make your favourite recipe but leave out the yeast - then compare the taste of the unbaked dough...


Without wanting to hijack this thread, what I'm trying to indicate is that my dough is not kneaded for several minutes, rather, just half a minute and I get satisfying results. It's a "minimally" kneaded bread in other words. As to the yeast, you're correct. I remember using different yeasts for the beer I've made in the past and the yeasties did, indeed, influence the overall flavor.


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## siduri (Aug 13, 2006)

Michael, i was not kneading at the beginning but at the end, before forming the loaf that will then be put in the hot pan and baked.  

Kokopuffs, the recipe for no-knead bread is a very specific one, there is no kneading,  no poolish, and there is a 12 to 24 hour rise but in it, all the ingredients are present, and a second 1 - 2 hour rise of the formed loaf.  The flour i use is white flour, plain.  So the flavor that is formed is formed in the long cohabitation of the yeast, maybe some stuff that's in the air, and the flour and water.   Also even if i use whole wheat flour, it contains just whole wheat, no malt.  I don;t know what kind of flour you;re using, but you mention commercial flour so maybe that's why.  The no knead bread we're talking about is one loaf.


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## kokopuffs (Aug 4, 2000)

siduri said:


> Michael, i was not kneading at the beginning but at the end, before forming the loaf that will then be put in the hot pan and baked.
> 
> Kokopuffs, the recipe for no-knead bread is a very specific one, there is no kneading, no poolish, and there is a 12 to 24 hour rise but in it, all the ingredients are present, and a second 1 - 2 hour rise of the formed loaf. The flour i use is white flour, plain. So the flavor that is formed is formed in the long cohabitation of the yeast, maybe some stuff that's in the air, and the flour and water. Also even if i use whole wheat flour, it contains just whole wheat, no malt. I don;t know what kind of flour you;re using, but you mention commercial flour so maybe that's why. The no knead bread we're talking about is one loaf.


Your long rise, 12 to 24 hours, partly accounts for the flavor, allowing the carbos aka starches to break down in to sugars and sugars contribute to flavor. Hence the long rise for sourdoughs as well. The addition of diastatic malt aka malted barley speeds up the conversion of starch into sugar.

EDIT: most of the mass produced flours in America already have malted barley added to it for that purpose but not so with the smaller mills. And yes, I certainly add a bit of my own to the doughs already having MB included in it.

Now as to flour for my 6C loaf:

1C of either rye or WW or KA Bread Flour

5C of either KA AP flour or White Lily *Bread* flour (both of these flours clock in at 4g protein/serving)

And imho White Lily *AP* flour is just too light to use as an AP flour in breadmaking.


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## siduri (Aug 13, 2006)

Kokopuffs, Pretty much all everyday Italian bread (in italy) is made with white flour - actually much lighter than american all purpose flour,.  I don't know what lily white is, so i can't say.  Anyway, the flour we get here, 0 or 00, is actually too soft for baking American cookies and piecrusts with, and i have to decrease the fat and increase the flour to get them not to be greasy and flat.  But it makes fine bread.  I like both white and dark bread, but for scraping up condiments at the bottom of the salad, or various sauces that remain on the dish, i think white is the best backdrop to these.   Another traditional italian bread is made with beige flour, probably sifted whole wheat.  It';s got a nice subtle nutty taste. 

In Italy the contents of bread are controlled by law, flour, water, salt and yeast.  No other stuff.  Though judging by the rapid deterioration of italian breads in the last 10-20 years i suspect they get around that by buying treated flour.  So now i make my own.


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## kokopuffs (Aug 4, 2000)

siduri said:


> ...Another traditional italian bread is made with beige flour, probably sifted whole wheat. It';s got a nice subtle nutty taste.


It's probably "clear flour" that you're referring to. Just google it. It's sifted WW to certain degrees.

White Lily is a flour made in the southern U.S. and to me it feels like a soft wheat, softer than the more commonly widespread Pillsbury and KA flours, and I really prefer the softer crumb that White Lily Bread Flour produces compared to the other two flours that I mentioned.


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## siduri (Aug 13, 2006)

It might be more like italian 00 flour then.  But i can't say for sure.  They also sell a bread flour here recently, called "manitoba" which i presume is a harder (winter) wheat.  Italian wheat is harvested in june, so i believe that's why it's very soft.


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## kokopuffs (Aug 4, 2000)

And also in America, clear flour is used often in rye breads.


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## kokopuffs (Aug 4, 2000)

siduri said:


> It might be more like italian 00 flour then. But i can't say for sure. They also sell a bread flour here recently, called "manitoba" which i presume is a harder (winter) wheat. Italian wheat is harvested in june, so i believe that's why it's very soft.


Manitoba flour, read here.


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## butzy (Jan 8, 2010)

Thanks all, i'm getting more and more clued up about baking bread!

I tried baking my bread again, This time I thought maybe I should make sure the gluten get developed, so I actually tried kneading the no-knead bread.(This was before reading Michael's response to Siduri). The end result was about the same as my previous result, except that it didn't collapse.

The bread has risen to its maximum level in about an hour (I had it rise for about 3 hours, but took a look every so often)

Testing it by sticking your finger in it doesn't work in this case. The dough is so wet, it just sticks to your finger and you can't see an indentation at all

What do you guys all think of the amount of water used in this bread? It sounds and feels high to me (85%)?

The previous no knead breads I have made were around 75%

I like the taste of this bread and am now looking at the following options:

I keep the recipe more or less the same, use less yeast, and let rise for a long period

- Should I keep the same amount of water or bring it down to 75%

- Would the flavour change? I imagine all sugar in the honey will be used by the yeast and the flavour will change

I change the recipe and make this into a knead-bread.

- I reduce the water to about 65%, knead for 10 minutes, let rest for as long as it takes (presumably 1-3 hours), knock back, give it a short rise and bake

Talking flour:

We have not much choice here. It is real white bread country!

We have

- AP flour

- Bread flour (white)

- Self raising flour

- Cake flour

- Brown flour (wholemeal)

It is the last one I am using at the moment.

I'm starting to like this whole bread baking thing, so once I have tackled this, I want to go to sourdoughs and Italian and French breads (as far as possible with the limited choice of flour),

Thanks for all the help, comments etc from everyone and don't worry about hijacking treads, it all serves to increase my knowledge!


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## siduri (Aug 13, 2006)

Glad you like our hijacks and diversions.  I don;t know about ratios, but if you want to do the poke test, either wet your finger first, and it shouldn't stick, or flour it very well - probably if the dough is so wet, i'd wet it. 

And try the same but with 1/4 tsp yeast and rising 18-24 hours.  no kneading.  It will be tastier and last a week in a paper bag.  It was a real revelation for me.


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## kokopuffs (Aug 4, 2000)

butzy said:


> ...I like the taste of this bread and am now looking at the following options:
> I keep the recipe more or less the same, use less yeast, and let rise for a long period
> 
> - Should I keep the same amount of water or bring it down to 75%
> ...


Experimentation works great. Try making loaves with a 55% hydration.

Also you'll probably get a taller, quicker rise and oven spring using a mixture of AP and (about 17%) bread flour.


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## kokopuffs (Aug 4, 2000)

siduri said:


> Glad you like our hijacks and diversions. I don;t know about ratios, but if you want to do the poke test, either wet your finger first, and it shouldn't stick, or flour it very well - probably if the dough is so wet, i'd wet it.
> 
> And try the same but with 1/4 tsp yeast and rising 18-24 hours. no kneading. It will be tastier and last a week in a paper bag. It was a real revelation for me.


Can this 18-24 hour ferment be proofed in a banneton or is it worked at all? Proofed in a banneton/brotform?

Also I'm not certain if the month of harvesting the wheat has anything to do with "hardness or softness" of the kernel.


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## siduri (Aug 13, 2006)

This would be the first rise, in the bowl you mix it in. You mix it in the bowl, just so all the flour has gotten wet, then let it sit (i stick the whole bowl in a plastic bag) and after 18-24 hours i form it (usually what i do is dust with flour so i can handle it, pull it out, and in mid air fold it and pull the outside under, adding the flour needed not to let it stick, maybe for half a minute, and then i sit it on a piece of baking paper set in a bowl or frying pan, put that all in a plastic bag, while i heat the oven to about 450 with a cast iron pot and its cover inside. It rises an hour or two, while the pot gets hot, and then when it tests ready (poking method) i lift paper and all and put it in the hot pot, cover it and cook for half hour, open the cover and cook another ten min or until it's the color i like and a skewer inserted inside comes out dry.

I imagine if you use a baneton, you would put it in the baneton only after the long rise, and then after that transfer it to a baking stone. I don;t have a stone, and like the round bread. I'd actually like to get a rectangular cast iron pot for everyday use, because the slices are more even, and it wouldn;t affect the bread.

Here's my recipe, derived from the original published in the NYTimes, which i adapted and then revised after reading the Cooks Illustrated version.

4 cups flour

1/4 tsp dry active yeast

2 tsp salt

1 1/2 cups water

a squirt of vinegar (i add this, when i remember, because our water is particularly hard and it seems to help it rise better)

Mix the dry ingredients in a big bowl, add the liquid, mix only until combined, adding more water if necessary to easily wet all the flour at the bottom (i usually have to add some) to make a "raggedy" dough.

Put the bowl in a plastic shopping bag, let it sit 18 - 24 hour (i do 24 because i can mix in the evening and bake the next evening, when i have the time, but i've done it 12 hours, morning to evening, when i've needed it more urgently)

Flour the top, lift out of bowl and fold it (on a table or in the air or in the bowl itself) a few times, always "inward" so you get the layers of gluten entrapping the top surface of the bread and a little surface tension there.

Put a sheet of parchment paper on a small frying pan or a soup bowl, lay the dough rounded side up on it. Flour the top, stick pan and all in a plastic bag. I imagine this is used in lieu of a baneton

Turn on oven to 450 and put a cast iron pot and its cover in the oven (you can really use any sort of pan, with cover, as long as it's somewhat heavy at least on the bottom, and has no plastic parts, or i imagine you could heat a stone, or a stone and a clean ceramic flower pot to put over the top. The idea is the heat comes in from all sides, like in a brick oven. I also believe i read the steam trapped in it makes for a more crackly crust (lke a steam injected oven) Let it all sit for 1 - 2 hours until tests ready.

Slit the top deeply with a really sharp knife with a decisive movement (i like to cut it in a cross, so the crust is more manageable to slice without coming off in chunks later)

Lift the paper and dough like lifting a cow in a sling and set it all, paper and dough, inside the hot pot, cover immediately and bake for 1/2 hour - uncover, and bake another ten to twenty minutes till colored as you like it and tests done (tapping sounds hollow, skewer comes out clean, or whatever you prefer)

This makes the bread i used in the tiny picture i use as my avatar.

I've made it with `100% whole wheat flour, have done variations with parts of the flour substituted with any or more of the following: whole wheat, rye, 1 tbsp wheat germ (gives a wheatier taste), 1/3 or so cup oatmeal, cornmeal, all or part kamut flour. The white flour rises more, the others less, but are also really good. The 100% whole wheat makes a nice rustic loaf, the way people have eaten for ages, a little lower but very good.

My understanding from what i;ve read is that winter wheat is smaller but more glutinous, and summer wheat more carbohydratous /img/vbsmilies/smilies/smile.gif but i don;t remember where i read that. (And i certainly didn;t read "carbohydratous")


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## kokopuffs (Aug 4, 2000)

> Originally Posted by *siduri* ...
> 
> Here's my recipe, derived from the original published in the NYTimes, which i adapted and then revised after reading the Cooks Illustrated version.
> ...a squirt of vinegar (i add this, when i remember, because our water is particularly hard and it seems to help it rise better)
> ...


...A squirt of vinegar to neutralize the water's hardness.

...Water aka "steam" trapped inside of the dough accounts for the oven spring and therefore holes. Initially bakers will fill their ovens with steam to produce the maillard (?) reaction at the surface, transforming sugars into caramel and therefore producing the crackly crust..

...Carbohydratous = higher in starch and therefore lower in protein (gluten). With flour, there's an inverse relationship between gluten and starch.


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## boar_d_laze (Feb 13, 2008)

Siduri,

To make bread with an airy and open structure requires two things. You've got to develop the glutens, and the dough has to have enough little pockets of the right size so that they expand as the bread bakes.

Your problem probably isn't gluten related.

Most probably, when you talk about making a ball with the dough, you're kinda-sorta describing a technique called "pulling down." The purpose of pulling down is to create a tight skin on a loaf so the loaf will hold its shape when it's baked on a stone or pan and not in a loaf pan or other vessel. But, since you're baking in a vessel it's not doing you any good and only doing you wrong. You're collapsing the dough when you do it, and even though you get some rise back during the second proofing period, you've destroyed the cells from the first proof, that they won't expand during the oven-spring period.

_So don't do it._

Instead of pulling down, use the French-fold technique, trying to deflate the dough as little as possible. Our man Kokopuffs is expert at combining the French-fold and no-knead techniques.

BDL


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## siduri (Aug 13, 2006)

Thanks BDL.  That's useful.  While I'm not looking for "light and airy" but rather "chewy and holey",  i imagine this is equally applicable.  I want to get the feel of bread as it used to be sold here, and is no longer, alas.  The bread was heavy, as in it appeared to have a high mass, but had holes throughout it.  Holes about half a cm or more, though somewhat lower and wider, which i presume were openings between the gluten strata. 

When we still had the old type of "real" bread here, but the lighter probably fast-rising bread was becoming more common, i would watch the storekeeper pick up the loaf (they usually have big 2 kg loaves, and they cut off a chunk depending on how much you want).  I would watch the hand and arm to calculate how heavy it was.   Most Italians would want "light" bread and so i would also ask, is it heavy or light, and so if it was light, they would always say so, thinking that was what i wanted.  But the look of their arm lifting the big loaf was the best gauge. 

I can still find, at an exorbitant price, bread from Lariano, outside of rome, which has those qualities, but more often than not it's fake lariano, and light as a feather.  And dry.  And tasteless. 

When i get a baking stone or metal plate or whatever, i'll try the same principles to make english muffins (which i have no intention of cooking in a frying pan, since it takes too long and too much watching and always burn on me).  But the holeyness (not, holiness, please) in the context of a certain mass (or chewiness)  is what i'm looking for. In the bread i'm searching for there are little threads of glutenous dough that are suspended stiffly through the hole sometimes - a sign of chewiness.  . 

Meanwhile i think my problem is that i've been overworking the dough and making it too dry. 

And kokopuffs, is it the steam that's produced by the water in the dough that  makes for the holes?  I thought it was the gasses produced by the growing yeasts and their, ahem, digestion.  I didn't imagine bread would get up to water boiling temperature.  But maybe the water is necessary for their larger growth?


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## butzy (Jan 8, 2010)

Right, turned the original recipe into a no-knead bread. Well, almost the original recipe....

Ingredients: 500 gr wholemeal flour, 325 ml water, 1/4 teaspoon yeast, 1 tablespoon honey, 1/2 tablespoon salt





  








1-before mixing.jpg




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all the ingredients except water





  








2-after mixing.jpg




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after mixing (with a big plastic flat spoon)





  








3-after rising.jpg




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after rising (about 13 hours or so)





  








4- second rise.jpg




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quickly formed into a ball and ready for second rest (I used cornmeal to prevent sticking)





  








5-cold day.jpg




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it was a cold day today (bored while pre-heating the oven to 220 oC with the cast iron pot inside it)





  








6-bread still in pot.jpg




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bread in the pot after 20 minutes with lid and 25 minutes or so without.





  








7-cooling down.jpg




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cooling down for a little while before slicing





  








8-structure of slice of bread.jpg




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the first slice

I tried measuring the temperature of the bread with an instant read thermometer. It was well over 95 oC, soI might have been measuring steam or so instead /img/vbsmilies/smilies/smile.gif

Anyway, as expected, the bread tastes a little different from the one I tried before. It seems slightly less nutty. I can't taste the slight sweetness of the honey anymore either (which doesn't really surprise me as the yeast probably ate it).

It is a dense bread again, but like Siduri, I don't mind that at all


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## boar_d_laze (Feb 13, 2008)

Siduri,


> _Meanwhile i think my problem is that i've been overworking the dough and making it too dry._


Whatever the problem is (or are), I can safely guaranty that when it comes to low or no-knead breads, overworking is not among them.

Allowing the dough to rise too long so that it became too flabby, or tightening the dough too much when you pulled it down are the most likely causes. The best solutions are to keep you eye on the rise -- don't count on the clock to do it for you; and to French fold.

I'm not a low no-knead baker, but he and I Kokopuffs and I have been talking about baking with the French fold technique since we met on this forum.

Maybe you should try posting on The Fresh Loaf, but Kokopuffs has been doing low and no-kneads for a long time, and can probably help you as much as anyone -- providing the two of you don't go too far the ingredients rabbit hole. He's the first person of anyone I know in real life or online I'd want to walk me through the processes.

I gotta say though that if there's some particular, traditional type of bread you want to make, your best bet is to use traditional techniques and not try to short cut it with "no knead." You can always use the "retarded rise" technique so you can go to work or whatever your meshuggeh priorities tell you is more important than baking.

BDL


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## kokopuffs (Aug 4, 2000)

siduri said:


> ...And kokopuffs, is it the steam that's produced by the water in the dough that makes for the holes? I thought it was the gasses produced by the growing yeasts and their, ahem, digestion. I didn't imagine bread would get up to water boiling temperature. But maybe the water is necessary for their larger growth?


Carbon dioxide + steam = hole enlargement = oven spring.


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## kokopuffs (Aug 4, 2000)

butzy said:


> Right, turned the original recipe into a no-knead bread. Well, almost the original recipe....
> 
> Ingredients: 500 gr wholemeal flour, 325 ml water, 1/4 teaspoon yeast, 1 tablespoon honey, 1/2 tablespoon salt
> 
> ...


What I think I'll do is post a new thread in the near future entitled "Koko's low knead bread".

Is whole meal flour the same as whole wheat? If so, then you might get better, lighter results substituting AP for at least half to 5/6ths of the whole meal. And I'm not insinuating anything here but perhaps if this is pretty much your first experience with bread making/baking, I would suggest first learning how to make a standard loaf of bread with nothing more than 5/6th AP and 16th bread flour using an appropriate amount of yeast that'll take the bread thru the final proofing at the 8 -12 hour mark once the dough has been mixed and kneaded. Once you've gotten down a "standard" loaf, then you branch out into something more 'complex' as it were with the 'no knead' bread.


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## butzy (Jan 8, 2010)

this is the flour (and yeast) I used. There is no extra info on the bag.





  








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I don't have that much experience baking bread. I have made pizza and foccacia on a fairly regular base though.

Then I saw an easy recipe in a newspaper and I tried that. That was with white flour. Not the best bread I have ever had, but a lot better than we can get here.

From there I went to a couple of no-knead breads with different amounts of wholemeal (wholewheat/brown?) flour. Again all very edible.

Then I stumbled on a recipe that was sort of a quick no-knead bread and that one caused most of the posts above.

The thing is : I like chewy bread. The commercial breads we can normally get around here are just air. There is no bite (or flavour) left in them.

The white bread is terrible, the brown bread is like white bread and almost the same colour. The wholewheat is a bit better, but still too open, airy and not enough flavour.

Hence my experiments.

I was thinking of making a "normal" knead bread next, again with wholewheat/meal/brown flour (400 gr), about 55-60% water, packet of yeast, bit of sugar or honey, tablespoon of salt.

Kneading for about 10 minutes, rising, knocking back and baking at about 200 oC.

Do you see anything wrong with the idea or amounts?

By the way, what would happen if you put a normal knead bread in a preheated cast iron pot? Would that work as well?


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## siduri (Aug 13, 2006)

Thanks both bdl and kokopuffs. 

as soon as i can find a way to make a living otherwise Bdl, i will gladly turn my baking into my number one priority.  Or any other manual job, for that matter.  I'm sick of sitting!  The no knead gives me the flavor i like, i just want to get back the texture i used to have.


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## butzy (Jan 8, 2010)

Kokopuffs: what would you figure is the best type of bread to make for a beginner? And would you have a detailed recipe?
There are a couple of limitations:
I cannot get fresh yeast, so it has to be either instant or dry active yeast
The only flour I can get is brown (wholemeal), bread flour and household flour (all purpose?)
I use a gas oven.
I have cast iron pots and a couple of tins, although the material of latter is quite thin, more like a cake tin.
I don't mind if it needs kneading or not. I just want to make some good bread!


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## kokopuffs (Aug 4, 2000)

Makes a 2 pound loaf and this recipe can be halved. I use a baking stone for a better oven spring and I use *very hot water *both for better penetration of water into the flour and for a better rise and oven spring.

*TOTAL INGREDIENTS*

6C flour (5C AP + 1C or either bread, rye or whole wheat flour) Beginners should stick with 1C of BREAD FLOUR.

1 1/2 tsp SAF Red Instant Yeast

2 tsp salt

Water (approx 2C but this with be detailed in the following steps)]

Optional:

1/2 - 1 tsp diastatic malt for a better rise and oven spring

2 TBS Olive Oil to increase shelf life greatly.

*POOLISH*

Start the poolish at 9 o'clock the night before since this is to be a TWELVE HOUR POOLISH.

2 1/4 C AP Flour

0.16 tsp instant yeast (it's okay that this measurement is inexact...just use a heaping 1/8 tsp)

1 1/3 C minus 4TBS water heated to 125F - 130F (you read this temperature correctly

1/2 - 1 tsp diastatic malt (this is optional)

Mix all of the dry ingredients then add water and mix well using a rubber spatula. Cover the vessel. And twelve hours later the poolish should have risen. (I use a 2 QT dough bucket for the poolish)

*THE DOUGH*

3/4C + 1TBS water heated to 130F

The remaining ingredients

Start this procedure at 9 o'clock the following morning.

Take the *heated* water and pour it around the periphery of the poolish to loosen it from it's container. Use a rubber spatula to loosen. Dump the poolish and water into an appropriately sized mixing bowl and mix almost thoroughly along with the optional 2 TBS OLIVE OIL.

Add the remaining dry ingredients (these should be mixed well beforehand) about one third at a time to insure the dough mixes well. Don't over mix. The dough will be quite shaggy with some dry ingredients left over. Dump onto the counter top and stretch the dough to expose its moist interior. Add as much dry ingredients to the moist interior as possible. Knead once or twice. Repeat once or twice the procedure to incorporate the remaining dry ingredients.

Knead for about half a minute plus some. NO MORE. The dough will be quite shaggy and perhaps dry in places at this point. Don't worry. Shape into a sphere and place in the mixing bowl you used for all of the ingredients. Some of that dry flour coating the bowl will ultimately be incorporated into the dough as time goes on.

Allow the dough to rest and rise 30 minutes on top of the oven. Dump onto the *slightly floured (slightly floured) *counter top and shape into a rectangle approx 1 foot by 1 1/2 foot. French fold, place back into the mixing bowl and allow to rest 20-25 minutes.

Repeat the rectangle and FF and allow to rest another 20-25 minutes.

Repeat that procedure once or twice more.

Then form into a sphere pulling and stretching the surface to underneath the sphere. This creates surface tension. Rest for 20 minutes.

Form the final shape and place into a banneton for final proofing. (for a two pound loaf I use a long banneton measuring approx 18 inches in length)

Allow to rest and rise/final proof for 30 minutes. At the end of the rest the surface of the dough should feel slightly dry but don't worry if it doesn't.

*THE BAKE*

Slash the formed dough and place into an oven preheated to 500F.

After 10 minutes have passed, reduce temperature to 450-475F and allow to bake for 20 minutes more.

Remove from the oven and allow the loaf to rest for a couple of hours prior to serving.

You'll notice that the dough is quite warm and I allow the dough to rest on top of the oven for added warmth and a better rise.


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## butzy (Jan 8, 2010)

For whoever is following this thread:

it continues here: http://www.cheftalk.com/t/75815/my-batard


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