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Need help salvaging WW bread dough

Bhamster's picture
Bhamster

Need help salvaging WW bread dough

Laurel's Kitchen (I think--it's a photocopy) Buttermilk bread using 5.5 c ww flour. I don't know if I measured wrong or what but I can't get it to form loaves--too stiff. Rolling into a log just leaves me with layers that won't combine.  Any way to save this dough or do I have to dump it?

Mini Oven's picture
Mini Oven

and taste the dough to make sure you have enough salt in it.  Please don't dump it.  Flatten it out or dip it under running water, squishing in lots of dents and surfaces.  Don't add more flour and if you keep your hands wet (actually very fun to do) you can work in water easily.

Add as much as you need to make a nice feeling dough, as it proofs, the hydration will most likely stiffen a little bit if it is a yeasted dough.  

The difference might simply be the differences in buttermilk. 

Isand66's picture
Isand66

I agree with Mini, but next time get yourself a digital scale and weight the ingredients.  You will be surprised how much you may be off with your ingredient amounts by using cups and spoons.

Bhamster's picture
Bhamster

I actually do have a digital scale and used it--but I didn't realize until afterwards that I was going by grams, but the author gave the liquids in ml. I did add a lot more water (I thought) and probably very close to the right amount of milk, but the honey will have been off.

I wet the dough a lot yesterday and put the dough in the refrigerator to try again today...

Mini Oven's picture
Mini Oven

has an adjustment for milk or water.  

ml in water is the same in grams  but ml in milk is less.  (I think)  Because  regular cow milk has roughly 10% milk solids so about 10% more milk is needed if converting to grams when ml are given.  Honey is dense stuff and goes well with whole wheat.

 Is the yeast already added? or does that happen today?   The dough is easy to save.  How does the raw dough taste?  too sweet? (cinnamon rolls anyone?)  I know it will taste raw, but taste for salt (flatness) and sweetness.

Mini Oven's picture
Mini Oven

sounds good.  How much honey went into it?  Gonna be a sweet one?  :)

clazar123's picture
clazar123

 Using weight by grams to measure ingredients for a recipe will probably be more re-producible when sharing a recipe or scaling it up or down as there is less margin of error.Measuring by cups has a larger margin of error as there is more variation in how each person measures and the difference in the measuring cups from manufacturer to manufacturer. Even with precise measuring, you still need to judge the dough and add/subtract a little of this and that to get the texture correct. Your flour will have different thirst from day to day and batch to batch. I make my favorite breads by just scooping a few coffee cups full of flour and adding enough liquid for the texture I want. I got to this point by making a lot of loafs by recipe, learning how the ingredients affected the dough and paying attention to how I can create the bread I want. SO-keep baking and paying attention.

All that being said-if your dough seems too dry than just add more liquid and have some fun with it. Squish away! Make a note in the recipe for next time because in YOUR kitchen using YOUR measuring method and YOUR measuring cups, that is what you need.

 WW is especially thirsty and very different from AP flour but doesn't seem to be at first. As it sits, the bran bits slowly absorb water and what initially appears to be a wet,sticky dough turns into a perfect soft, tacky dough after sitting for 30 minutes. It is desirable for this to take place before baking because when it happens after the loaf is baked, the loaf becomes crumbly and dry. Don't you just hate when the sandwich falls apart in your hands!

Keep baking!