February 22, 2010 - 10:12am
degassing
I've read various recipes that contradict each other concerning the degassing process. Some suggest total degas, some none and others somewhere in the middle. Is there a standard approach to degassing?
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I've read various recipes that contradict each other concerning the degassing process. Some suggest total degas, some none and others somewhere in the middle. Is there a standard approach to degassing?
Just depends on the texture you are aiming for.
http://www.thefreshloaf.com/node/15714/are-there-any-rules-degas-breads
In general, it's a good idea to degas between fermentations, but at the stage of shaping and final proofing, whether or not you degas is a question of desired outcome.
Between fermentations, degassing redistributes the sugars in the dough, providing more food for the yeast, while distributing the flavour compounds, etc, produced during fermentation. So if you're using multiple fermentation stages, you want to degas between them.
But come shaping time, the style of bread dictates what you do. If you want a tighter, fairly even crumb (say, in a sandwich bread), degas. If you want big holes (say, for a nice baguette), degas as little as humanly possible.