When I knew nothing about bread baking and just did the no-knead bread it worked beautifully every time.  Now I am developing more serious interest in making bread and nothing is working whatsoever.   

I am trying to make Jason’s Ciabatta http://www.thefreshloaf.com/node/2984/jasons-quick-coccodrillo-ciabatta-bread.  I don’t have a bread mixer but I wanted to make Jason’s recipe anyway, by hand, as some people say it can be done.

I quote campcook  http://www.thefreshloaf.com/node/12994/best-ciabatta-recipe:

I have been making Jason's recipe with variations for some time.  It is very forgiving and produces excellent results every time.  I have flattened it into pizza, folded in extra ingredients, used fresh ground whole wheat flour and cooked it over a campfire -- all to the raves of my tasters.

 Recently, I started doing it almost no knead with no mechanical mixer.  I stir the dry ingredients thoroughly, then stir in ice cold water and let it rise over night.  (We are camping in the mountains so it is very cold at night but I still put it in a cooler to slow the rise.)  In the morning, I (wet) stretch and fold it a couple of times before dividing it for the final 40 minute rise.  Each loaf is wet stretched again before baking one at a time in my camper oven.  I have a pizza stone in the oven to help hold temperature constant.  Each loaf gets 25 to 30 minutes at roughly 500 degrees ( we are at 7000 feet here.)  The results are just fantastic -- big open holes, chewy crust and wonderful flavor.

I have flattened this dough into pizza or near pizza shapes and just shortened the bake time.  I have added slivers of garlic at times, nuts, whole grains and raisins at other times - it all worked.

He says (in the boldface above) that he is getting the same result from stretching the very wet dough about a couple of times when  the recipe directs to beat the hell out of dough….upto 30 mins at high speed(??) 

Here is what is happening to me:

I mix the ingredients together lightly and after a few mins rest I turn the wet dough with a spatula a few times, sort of like stretch and fold in a bowl.  It seems to firm up and become smooth and shiny but still floppy.  But I am (was) assuming at this stage I am far, far away from what the dough is supposed to be as per recipe because people are beating it in a mixer for a long while before they say it ‘comes together’.  I now throw the dough on a board and do the French fold which is touted to be great for very wet doughs.  But, within a few turns, instead of progressing towards coming together,the dough gets GOOPIER  and WETTER and breaks down completely.  As I try to lift it the dough drips for my fingers.  What wasn’t pancake batter a few moments ago suddenly turned into stretchy batter.  It is still shiny but instead of smooth it looks rough, like cellulite. I scrape it off the board into a bowl and let it go.   The yeast works because I see a lot of bubble eventually but NO rising in the dough.

I have tried this six times now and sometimes with different flours.  It is happening every time.

Is it possible that the very wet dough develops gluten very quickly and then breaks down?   Then I really need only a few folds?  How can dough be this sensitive?!  Then how is it that all those happy people beat it for so long?  Is it that the gluten does break down while mixing but they don’t notice it because things are moving in the mixer but strangely the gluten comes back together after prolonged mixing?  The yeast not raising the dough is kind of telling isn’t it?

Or, if not the above, then what? 

Some people have stretched and folded several times but I am not getting there.  The dough seems to disintegrate right at the beginning. 

I want to almost buy a mixer to do this kind of dough.  God, I am restraining myself not to do that.  I want to be able to do this by hand producing the same bread at the end.  It has got to be possible.  No?    

Can anyone help me with what I am doing wrong and what I should try? Any insight from fellow, but, experienced bread bakers will be so appreciated.

 Meanwhile I am still working on it to test the variables.  And I will post what happens. Maybe I will just go ahead and bake whatever happens and see.

Many thanks for taking the time to read this long post!

K.

Hi All --

I was wondering if anyone had any opinions or advice on which machine would be best for baking gluten free bread? I'm looking for one that would let me put my ingredients in the same way a regular loaf is made instead of premixing it in a bowl and dumping it in the breadmachine to bake as I've seen mentioned on blogs. Basically I hate mixing GF dough. :)

I'm always looking for new GF bread/biscuit recipes if anyone has any to share.

Thanks so much!

I have started using a predigestion for my WW loaves to compensate for phytic acid, but I seem to be having trouble getting a good rise out of my loaves.  My predigestions have been approx 12-14 hours with 3, 45 min rises after adding the additional ingredients.  Has anyone else had any problems with this? I am wondering if the 14 hours is great for dealing with phytic acid but perhaps breaks down the gluten too much for average sized WW loaves.  Thoughts?

So I shaped a sourdough boule last night and put it in the refrigerator. This morning when I took it out, this is what I saw:

Any idea why I might have gotten that blowout on the left side? I shaped carefully with good surface tension. Could I have let it bulk ferment too long (~9 hours) before shaping?

What do the terms "high gluten" and "high protein" mean when it comes to flour that is optimal for bread baking?  Are they the same thing or should your flour have mostly one or the other?

Hi Everyone,

Newbye here.

I had little success with my first couple of loafs, as they were quite heavy and dense - i thought could this be fault of my flour?

I found data about my used flour (405D), which says "amount of gluten" 25-27%, and this flour is extreemly small dense and white (so called extra quality)

Would changing flour change quality of my bread? When i was buying this flour i looked for the most expensive one, but now i think this could be mistake?

I started my own sourdough starter a couple of months ago - simple organic white bread flour and water - and moved it into the fridge a couple of weeks later. It is lovely, lively and just the right level of sourness.
But I have recently started to notice something odd.
My method is to perpare a semi-stiff preferment, before mixing the final dough, i usually don't knead it much, but rather let it rise for 8-12 hours with random folding in between. The folds usualy quite clearly make the dough stronger and smoother, but recently it feels like the opposite is happening. The folds or short kneads seem to make the dough "break up" - instead of the surface becoming smooth it starts to break up, and the dough becomes more sticky each time. It feels like perhaps somehow the gluten isn't strong enough - and i'm not handling it too roughly.
I am perplexed as the first month or so, even after moving the starter to the fridge, it was working so perfectly, but now it's getting more and more frustrating.
The final bread still turns out fine - if only after a bit more effort: i've had to reduce hidration, retard it, increase proofing time, because it somehow doens't have the upmf anymore. But the final bread still tastes lovely i.e. I haven't noticed any increase in sourness or anything like that.
Any ideas? Will be greatly appreciated!
Maja.

Howdy!

The last few times I've baked sourdough bread, gluten strands have had a difficult time forming, and they seem weak. I knead it in my Bosch first, and had better luck by hand just today. At first I thought I might be overkneading it in the Bosch, but the last time, I'm sure that's not the case. When the dough rises, the gluten strands that had formed are very weak and the dough falls apart easily. When baked, the crust is lumpy since the skin on the dough is weak and breaks while rising.

Any ideas?

Thanks!

Hello,

With the help of folks on this forum, I've been perfecting a South-Beach-friendly whole-wheat bread recipe (ie., using no sugar or white flour). The ingredients and procedure I'm using now can be found at:

     http://bmbmisc.home.comcast.net/bread_2.html

The resulting loaves are tasty and have a nice, although heavy, texture.

I've read elsewhere that a couple of TABLEspoons of vital wheat gluten are recommended per cup of whole wheat flour. As the link above shows, the recipe I'm using calls for much less.

If I want a somewhat lighter loaf with more of a rise to it, would it make sense to experiment with more wheat gluten? What do you think?

Thanks,
Bill

Hello Loafians-