The Fresh Loaf

A Community of Amateur Bakers and Artisan Bread Enthusiasts.

Bread will not rise

Zap's picture
Zap

Bread will not rise

I let my dough ferment for 12-18 hours and then make two balls out of it and wrap it in a tea cloth for two hours and it will not rise. It comes out of the oven tasting fantastic and cooked all the way through with a nice soft crust, but why will it not rise? It starts off as a sticky ball of dough and then after the 12-18 hours it will be more than double the size it was and have a strong yeasty/wine smell and will be stringy. So the fermentation goes well enough, but not the rising.

It may rise just a little bit but not much, I took a picture of it and then compared it to the picture after two hours and didn't notice much difference more than maybe a slight bit of puffiness.

 

I'm following a recipe given to me that is as follows (in summary):

 

3 cups whole wheat flour

1 1/3 cup water

2 1/4 t yeast

1 1/4 t salt

 

Mix all ingredients thoroughly.

Leave in a covered bowl for 12-18 hours.

Shape into two balls, wrap in a tea cloth and let rise for two hours until almost doubled in size.

Cook at 450 for 30 minutes.

pmccool's picture
pmccool

For that quantity of yeast and that quantity of flour, you have a couple of options. 

For room temperature bulk ferment, allow the dough to double; then degas it, shape, allow to nearly double, and bake .  The whole time from kneading to baking might only be a couple of hours if temperatures are 75F or warmer. 

For a longer, retarded fermentation, use chilled water for the dough.  After kneading, place the dough in a covered bowl and immediately put it in the refrigerator.  When it has doubled, which might be 12-18 hours or something different depending on your refrigerator's temperature, remove it and let it come to room temperature.  Shape it and then proceed as per usual. 

The key is to work with the dough when it is ready.  The recipe's process seems to have ignored the fact that yeast can't tell time. 

Paul

Zap's picture
Zap

Thank you. I tried using cold water and only 1/4 t yeast and left it to ferment for eighteen hours at room temperature (about 67 degrees) and it didn't rise or ferment hardly at all or maybe not at all. It was nearly the same size and didn't have any yeast or wine smell.

 It of course did not rise after shaping and covering and came out of the oven edible and cooked all the way through but very low on bubbles and had a dense, cake like consistency. 

So cold water and low yeast was no or too little yeast activity and warm water with a full packet yeast had the right amount of activity for the fermentation period but would not rise once formed into loaves. 

What causes the lack of rise when I use warm water and a full packet of yeast? My thinking was maybe the yeast ran out of food and slowed down so much that they could no longer rise the bread? Or perhaps they raised the alcohol content too high and died (although this seems unlikely, that would be some boozey bread!)? So less yeast would prevent them from running out of food too early?

 

So what are my options? I want fermented bread but also a bit larger, fluffier loaves. As it is the bread comes out fantastic and definitely fermented but just a little small. 

gerhard's picture
gerhard

Was the idea of the  bulk ferment to create flavour?  Maybe you misread the recipe and they wanted small portion of the yeast and 1/2 the flour and all the water mixed as a poolish to sit for 12 hours?

Gerhard

Zap's picture
Zap

No, the bulk ferment is to make sure the entire loaf is fully fermented. 

gerhard's picture
gerhard

All nutrients for yeast where cosumed and yeast died

Zap's picture
Zap

Thanks. The goal is fully fermented bread that successfully rises after shaping into loaves so I want the fermentation time to remain the same, so what can I do to slow the yeast down? Cold water, 1/4 t yeast and room temperature had almost zero activit. So maybe warm water, 1/4 t yeast and room temperature?

On the other hand, even if I change nothing, might it rise if I gave it four or six hours to do so after the eighteen hour fermentation and after shaping? Could it be that there is still a little activity and enough time would make it rise?

dabrownman's picture
dabrownman

Way too long of bulk ferment with that amount of yeast.  It has eaten through all the food and is too pooped to rise again after that amount of time.  I would follow a more conventional recipe.  If you want more flavor then make a poolish like Gerhard suggests with a portiond of the flour and water.

Happy baking

Zap's picture
Zap

I love everything about it but that last rise though. I want it to be fully fermented and the final result is delicious. I just want it to rise a bit before it gets cooked. So how could I tweak it to achieve this?

 

I imagine adding a bit of sugar or flour would reactivate the yeast, or shaping it for rising a few hours earlier, or less yeast, or lower temperature for the long ferment, or letting it rise, after shaping, for four to six hours?

dabrownman's picture
dabrownman

that has way too much yeast in it.  You just need to cut back the yeast and follow the no knead rules.

Here is the original recipe that only has 1/4 tsp of yeast in it

http://cooking.nytimes.com/recipes/11376-no-knead-bread

Here is another version

http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/member/views/sullivan-street-bakery-bread-52596531

It is one of the great, most famous and easy bread recipes of all time

Zap's picture
Zap

I suppose I will try the one thing I have not, which is to keep everything the same as in my recipe but only use 1/4 t yeast. The only big differences between my recipe and the one you posted is the temperature of the water and the amount of yeast. I tried it with cold water and only 1/4 t yeast and nothing happened at all. Maybe a tiny bit of activity but nothing noticeable and it didn't come out exactly like bread. 

gerhard's picture
gerhard

I imagine adding a bit of sugar or flour would reactivate the yeast,

 

One thing people forget is that yeast is a living organism and will only take so much abuse before dying.  By having a dough with that much yeast sit there at room temperature it will eat nutrients and leave waste product in it's place, eventually the environment becomes toxic to the yeast.

Gerhard

Zap's picture
Zap

Yes I understand this. I have made beer for years so I am familiar with the life cycle of yeast in that environment. With beer that is bottle conditioned the yeast is allowed to die down to no activity due to having run out of food and then a tiny bit of sugar is added which gets the yeast going again just enough to carbonate the beer. A similar reaction would be likely in bread that has gone through much the same process.

So if cutting back the yeast doesn't work I may try adding a bit of sugar after the long ferment which should get the yeast active again and help them make some carbon dioxide to rise my bread. The only way I could see this being impossible would be if they had created too high of an alcohol content and so could not live at all, however I am not familiar with how quickly bread yeast creates alcohol up to that level.

With beer it takes a couple of weeks usually before fermentation dies down and one needs to consider that the brewers yeast may have created too much alcohol for themselves to live in or, almost always more likely (depending on how much sugar is present), that they have run out of food. So assuming they have a similar pattern I don't imagine eighteen hours is enough time for them to have created that much alcohol.

I have made wine with bread yeast and it fermented for over a month, so if it was going to create too much alcohol and die from it, it seems like it would take more than eighteen hours to do so and more than likely the yeast in the bread ran out of food but did not die from creating a toxic environment which would make it impossible for them to be revived in. But, bread and grape juice are not the same thing so who knows?

It would have to be from ten to twenty percent alcohol to kill the yeast and make it impossible for them to live or be revived in that environment which would make a seriously alcohol tasting bread and this bread has no alcohol taste at all. Also there is much less sugar in bread flour than there is in grape juice so it may be impossible for the yeast to create enough alcohol to die, I really can't say though since I don't have enough knowledge on the topic.

I will experiment and post my results. 

Zap's picture
Zap

Okay so I kept the recipe identical except I cut the yeast back to 1/4 t. Everything went fine, it rose, but burned just slightly in the oven when it had not done this before.

Thoughts? Did the slightly more airy dough burn for some reason due to it's consistency? Should I lower the temperature or cooking time?