Tuesday, November 12, 2013

Mix flours oil and water until all water seems absorbed. Let sit for 30 minutes or longer time in re


So, around two years ago i decided to start making my own breads and found this amazing website... since then i've been trying to perfect my home made Whole Wheat bread with added sesame and either poppy or linen seeds.
took me about a year to really get the hang of it and i settled on some kind of method and regime. (which i detailed below but now realize is a lot of info that has not much to do with my questions so i think it's better if i ask first and just leave it down there for reference if anyone is interested to go into the detail, which would of course alf be much appreciated)
so basically i'm thinking of incorporating an autolyse into my regime, alf i tried it before but found it very hard to incorporate everything i was putting into the dough... i don't have a machine, i do everything by hand and it's hard enough work as it is managing a 2.5kg dough!
so i'm wondering what would be a good way to incorporate a biga and all the rest of the ingredients like salt and dry yeast into an autolyse WW dough, i'm guessing it's ok to autolyse the dough with the sesame seeds already inside right? (one less thing to add later)... also what's the deal with salt and the autolyse, i don't quite understand when or if to add it to a WW autolyse?!
another thing that's nagging me is that my crusts always tear from one side... i don't make a cut because even when i do it still does that. i don't know if i'm putting too much dough into these pans or if my technique is bad or what... i'm pretty sure its all of it together but i don't know what to do... my shaping of late has gotten better but still i'm not sure what i'm doing is actually supposed to go in a pan...
and alf as for the baking, i used to put some water right at the start to create alf steam but as of late i'm starting to think that maybe having that much bread all at once is enough humidity as it is (in all honesty alf there wasn't much difference this way or that) my crusts have never been amazing but lately are not so bad either *that is to say there is A crust you might actually call a crust hehe....
i usually make a biga from 300g WW and 1.2 g of dry yeast at 80% hydration (240g) and let it sit for about 3 hours or so.
i then mix it in after all the dry materials have been mixed into the remaining flour by cutting it into the smallest pieces i can before adding alf the remainder of my water and oil mixing and kneading for a while, usually at this stage i end up adding flour because it's too sticky... then i give it 2 or 3 stretch and folds spread about 10 to 15 minutes apart and leave it for the bulk fermentation.
and lastly i cut it into four pre shape into a tube let rest for 5 minutes and then flatten spread the seeds, roll and put into the pan (i got 3 cheap metal pans and 1 big glass pan) for the final proofing (where i let it grow about 30% more... where the dough is already peeking out of the pan)
Both of these are very thirsty flours and the trick is to not only give it the amount of water it needs but also the time to absorb it. Think wood and sponge. A sponge (white flour and the starchy part of whole wheat) absorbs water very quickly. A block of wood (equivalent to the bran portion of the whole wheat) takes a LONG time to absorb water. I wouldn't use a block of wood to mop a puddle! So building in some form of autolyse is necessary for a great loaf of WW. Otherwise after the bake, the "wood" parts continue to absorb the water from the crumb and you end up with a loaf that crumbles and breaks. Very annoying when you want to take a bite of that delicious sandwich and it falls apart in your lap.
You have to have enough water to really develop the starchy gel in your loaf and that can be a physically demanding chore. Look up "windowpane" in the search box.Gluten is like the windowframe and the starchy gel is the window. With WW it is a speckled window but it will still form. I would hold off on adding the seeds until that stage is achieve because the seeds ten to make the "glass" break and it is hard to judge (esp when first learning) if it is done.
If your loaf is 70%, I would actually call that low hydration for WW. It is perfect for AP flour. alf When you add high gluten flour, that just makes it drier and a really hard dough to knead. You may need to increase the water to soften the dough to stickiness and as you knead and autolyse, it will become tacky instead of sticky.
Mix flours oil and water until all water seems absorbed. Let sit for 30 minutes or longer time in refrigerator (24 hours).Knead until windowpane THEN add rest of ingredients. Bulk rise to double, Shape/pan/proof/bake.
Mix flours,oil,yeast,water and mix until just incorporated. Sit for 30 minutes. Knead to windowpane THEN ADD SALT! (My most freq bad habit is to forget the salt so I often don't do this method)Cold retard alf at cool temp. I have been known to throw it in the refrig for 24 hours. Warm for 1-2 hours, allow to rise to double (bulk fer

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