Help: Getting the height of store-bought sandwich loaves
Hi all!
Two weeks ago I started my foray into bread making with the intent of understanding the basic mechanisms *in-detail* of bread. I wanted to understand each ingredient and why it does what it does. I wanted to know what a healthy dough looked like, and how I could predict what the final crust and crumb of a bread would be simply by handling and reading the dough. I have started with a basic white sandwich bread, and I've baked a batch of bread nearly every day these last two weeks. I've come a long long way thanks to all the advice I've found on this forum!! Thank you!!
My measure for success and that I can move on to actual experimentation is creating a bread that resembles store-bought breads almost exactly in height, weight, and number of slices. Yesterday I *finally* created a loaf that can be used to make sandwiches. I nearly cried I was so happy. :) However, it's shorter than I would like. See pictures. My problem is I'm looking to recreate the bread dimensions at the store exactly. See tl;dr below.
My current recipe is this:
- Bloom 24 g instant active yeast 10 minutes in 2.25 cups (533 mL) of water (I have hard water, so it consistently comes out to 550ish grams of water.)
- Mix 43g white sugar, 21g iodized salt, 25g vegetable oil, and 375 g AP flour into yeast and water until smooth.
- Mix up to 469 g more flour into dough by parts until shaggy mass consistently throughout
- Knead until it passes the windowpane test (This loaf was my first time really passing it! I could see my skin tone!! *geek moment*)- 12 minutes for these loaves.
- Bulk rise in oiled bowl until just doubled and passes bulk-rise poke test as described by Juergen here. I placed the oiled bowl above my pre-heating gas oven on a rack, so just the warm air above the oven was circulating around the bowl. 20 minutes for these loaves
- Shape the loaves according to Titli here via the rolling method @ 2:25. I may not have stretched the top edge of the gluten fine enough.
- Place in oiled bread pans and prove until doubled in size and passes the proving poke test described by Juergen above. 20 minutes for these loaves. My bread pans are 9x5x2.75"
- Bake 30 minutes EDIT at 350 deg. F.- usually at this point the bread comes out a light pale golden color.
- Set on cooling racks, baste (used a vegan butter here), and cover with towels to cool at least 30 minutes before cutting.
Both loaves come out to 1 lb 8 oz, like most of the store-bought loaves here, and I was able to slice one loaf into 17 slices, like most of the store bought loaves here. So I know the weight of the bread, length of the pan AND width of the pan are all similar to store bought. What do I need to do to get the height the same? My gut tells me less yeast, longer rises, but what does your experience say?
Tl;dr- my bread comes out to the same weight, length, and width of a store-bought loaf. What makes store-bought loaves so tall?
Thanks in advance!
-Bree
The crust and crumb of your bread appears to approximate store-bought quite well.
There are a couple things I noticed about your recipe that stuck out in my mind:
24g seems like a lot of yeast. As a comparison, one of the little packets that come in strips of 3 each weighs 1/4 ounce, which is around 7g. You're using over three times that much, which might explain why you're able to double your dough mass in 20 minutes. I think your gut is right - back off on the yeast a bit. Instant is powerful stuff and you should be able to leaven the amount of dough you're making with 5-10 grams with no problem. It might take a little longer to rise, but the flavor difference is worth the time sacrifice. Also, instant yeast does not need to be proofed in water before mixing - it certainly won't hurt a thing that you do it, but it's an extra step that's not really necessary. You can just add it to the dry ingredients with everything else in the bowl.
Your dough might be overproofed if you're allowing it to fully double, even if it does pass the poke test. Reducing the amount of yeast will will help with this. White bread has the best oven spring if it is not 100% proofed before baking. 90% is a good level to shoot for, then it gives the bread the chance to expand in the heat of the oven.
Then the last thing that came to mind was the fact that, even if everything else about the dough were perfect, there might simply not be enough dough in the pan. The 9x5x2.75" pans that you're using can actually hold a lot of dough, and if you underfill them, the bread will still be great, but won't achieve the height you're looking for. In this post, the topic was discussed on how much dough a pan should be filled with. I have not actually done the experiment of filling the pan with water and weighing it, but for the sake of argument the raw mathematics should suffice: Your pans are 123.75 cu in. which equals 2027mL. If they were filled with water, that water would weigh 2027g. For a 90% proof, dividing by 1.9 equals 1067g. If my math is correct, your recipe ends up with around 1500g dough after mixing (assuming you use the whole 469g of extra flour) so when you divide it in two, you're coming up about 313g short of what the pan could theoretically hold. Try adding more dough to the pan and see if your quality remains the same while providing you with a taller loaf.
Hope this helps. I'm very curious to see what suggestions others may provide - this forum is the beneficiary of collectively thousands of years of breadmaking experience.
--Mike
Glad I'm not the only one who thinks loaf pan recommedations are too small! Maybe that's more geared for batter & quick breads so they don't spill over. I routinely make 24-28 oz in 8 x 4, 32 oz in 9 x 5, etc. Bought the KA long clay baker 3 months ago; KA says 2 lb dough max. Their recipes for that pan range from about 24-32 oz (24 oz dough doesn't even fill the base halfway; 32 oz barely hits half). Even the KA photos show baked loaves barely over the top of the base. I did a few bakes in their range: high-yeast KA recipes for the pan, and several slow-rise TFL levain from white to multi-grain porridge, using the long Brotform banneton. Next I tried 3 lb; no problem. I've done 3-1/2 - 3-3/4 lb with no lid-sticking issues, and nice height/shape. I discussed it with KA. The rep is a bread baker, looked at each recipe and said I wasn't the first person to question the 2 lb issue. He noted the same dough limit on the long Emile Henry and Breadtopia bakers. He agreed it seems they can easily hold more, to follow my gut and post my results on KA. I bought that baker mainly to achieve lots of even slices for a neighbor famiiy I share bakes with. Makes it easy for them to do sandwiches for the kids.
Thanks for this post and the prior link; I'll do the water measurements this weekend.
This post seems to be a wealth of information, but for the life of me I can't translate it! You're using a lot of jargon I'm not familiar with, can you break this down for me?
Sorry, and thank you in advance!!
trouble with, but KA stands for King Arthur Flour, an American flour purveyor based in Vermont, that also sells a vast array of baking equipment.
TFL stands for The Fresh Loaf
Clay bakers are stoneware baking pans that typically come with a lid - the enclosed environment simulates a brick oven with more even heat radiation, and it traps the moisture released by the dough so it essentially steams itself.
Levain is a mixture of yeast, flour, and water that is added to the dough for leavening. Usually you see the word levain in reference to natural yeasts like sourdough or yeast water, while a poolish or biga is a levain mixed up using commercial yeast. But since these are all words from other languages, it seems they get used interchangeably a lot.
Porridge, in the context of breadmaking, is a measure of grain that is mixed with water and heated, much the same way you would make oatmeal. Once it cools, this hydrated grain is added to the dough.
Brotform and banneton are the German and French words, respectively, for the same thing: a basket where shaped dough is placed during the final proof before baking. It helps with structure by giving the dough something to "lean" against as it rises, and there are many shapes available. They are typically made from coiled rattan or wood, but plastic and wood fiber (cardboard) versions exist too. They can be quite pricey, so a decent substitute can be made from a bowl lined with a tea towel dusted with flour.
Breadtopia is a bread blog site that also sells an array of baking equipment.
Hope this helps and wasn't too elementary.
--Mike
Mike thank you so much for taking the time to respond!! I have a few questions and comments:
1. I'll get back to you with the results of decreasing the yeast. When I first started this recipe I was using 9 grams (or 2.25 tsp) of yeast and my dough was short, dry, and dense. The rise took forever and went no where! I suspect heavily this is because I had no concept of what real gluten development looks like. I barely have a more solid grasp on it now! The decrease in yeast experiment is back in the queue now.
2. What does overprooved dough look like? Are you saying that the dough will get even higher in the oven by not allowing the dough to double than if I do? I really have no concept right now of how to judge when my dough truly is "doubled" in the loaf pan, mostly because of the domed quality of the rise. I have no idea how to judge, then, the difference between 90% and 100% increase in size. Do you have a trick for this? (See also #3 below).
3. I'm grateful to know of a way to measure the right amount of dough in my pans! Thank you for the help. Question on your math though: isn't 90% of 2027g=1824g (2027x0.9)? Maybe I don't quite understand the concept of what a 90% proof is. Can you explain this to me? I can't wait to add this experiment to my queue also.
4. Due to sheer stubbornness, I'm not ready to add more dough to the pan. Referring to my replies below, I'm trying to understand the mechanisms of gaining a maximum height from a specific weight. If my store bought loaf weighs 24 oz, has 17 slices, and is 5"W x 4.75" tall, then I want to know how to get mine that way. So I understand the *technique* behind it. Not that there's something inherently wrong with shorter slices, I just want the knowledge! I'm worried that by adding more weight to get the height, I'll miss out on a technique, pan size, or ingredient that could help me get there. This is because my final goal ISN'T, in fact, to emulate store bought bread for the rest of my life, but I figure if I can have a firmer grasp of how that loaf is made, it will make my foray into artisan and whole wheat breads so much easier to troubleshoot! Do you think this is foolish?
Again, thank you so much for your knowledge! I'm so grateful for all the replies I've received so far!
is a complex thing to judge. It has a lot of factors to it, such as the tension of the dough, smoothness, visible (or invisible) bubbles, surface moisture (or dryness), etc... It becomes easier with experience, but even experienced bakers occasionally misjudge it. You're on the right track by picking one recipe and making it over and over - you'll get better and better at being able to tell where you are on the spectrum. The finger-poke test is a good place to start, but it's not the end-all be-all, so pay attention to as many details as you can both before and after baking.
With regard to the pan math, the reason you divide by 1.9 instead of just 0.9 is because the "1" represents the original volume of your dough, and the "0.9" is the amount by which it increases after the rise. Added together, you get 1.9 which is the original volume plus the rise.
I don't think you're foolish having a specific goal to attain in your baking attempts. However, don't be too devastated if you find it to be impossible. Remember that the first goal of business is to make a profit. And when producing food, especially something "fluffy" like bread, being able to make a little material look like a lot of food maximizes that profit. Commercial bread makers use machines like Ferrari engines that make home mixers look like egg beaters; they have dough "enhancers" that are scientifically formulated to exploit every last property available in the grain in order to increase the volume of the loaf; they have steam-injected ovens that allow the crust to remain in a gelatinous state for just a few fractions of a second longer to squeeze every bit of expansion out of the dough before it hardens; and they have decades of experience doing this.
Keep fighting the good fight, and eventually you'll get a product you're thrilled with. In the meantime, even the mistakes are usually edible and typically still better than what you can buy in the grocery store.
--Mike
Try using bread flour, not AP. Also, try a second rise before the final proof.
BTW, emulating store-bought bread is setting a really low bar for your bread. A 20 minute bulk fermentation is a crime against bread-making. Plus, your bread looks *very* white, which suggests a *lot* of mixing and/or using bleached flour, which you shouldn't use.
Personally, if I were happy with the flavor and texture of the bread, I would just boost all ingredients 10% to get the volume you're looking for.
I really appreciate this fact, thank you for pointing it out. I know what I'm doing may seem unorthodox, lol! Rest assured, emulating store bought is NOT my final goal! Right now, my main focus is on the skills and the technique. If I can make basic, no frills sandwich bread that matches the style bought in stores exactly, I know I've got a good hold on the basics. If I can take any recipe and change my technique, tools, or the ingredients to fit a certain shape, then I'll feel confident in my troubleshooting when I move on.
Another reason to emulate store bought first is for the economic factor- I can compare the cost to make it vs cost to buy it, tit for tat.
So, the low bar is the point right now. I'm a complete and utter beginner! If I can't make a basic sandwich bread my aspirations for artisan bread will be much more frustrating to reach.
My plan, once I get consistent results, is to then start changing my ingredients one by one to see how it affects the over all product- substituting the AP flour for with bread flour, WW, or fresh ground, all or in parts. Subbing honey and other sweeteners for the sugar. Increasing or decreasing salt, etc etc.
A couple questions:
1. Thank you for your suggestion for the second rise! It's on rise number 2 as I type. What good will this do for the bread, do you think?
2. What's the purpose of bread flour, how is it different from AP? Does bleached vs unbleached really make a difference, all other things being the same?
1. The more rises you can provide for the bread, the more bubbles you'll get on the inside of the dough, which increases the potential for expansion. You're limited by the amount of yeast food in the dough, so if you allow too many rises, your dough will be overproofed.
2. Bread flour has more of the protein that forms gluten, so it can capture more of the expanding gasses during fermentation. The trade-off is that the texture will be a bit chewier than with AP. You'll have to see if the trade-off is worth it.
I see! So it's a balancing act. My bread just came out of the oven, and it does indeed look noticeably taller. I'm letting it cool, but I'm hopeful for the crumb inside! Fingers crossed.
How do you personally tell when dough has reached its optimum proof? When do I know I've overprooved vs underprooved?
The finger test is the standard. However, a little underproofing isn't a bad thing, because it accentuates oven spring.
Flour,water,yeast,salt. Enriched bread has sweetener and fat. Fermented fast or slow, flat or fluffy, rich or lean. Yet it is all bread.
When I first started posting, there was a push to make a "Wonder bread" clone. Many family members did not appreciate the chewiness and crustiness of artisan style lean breads or the density of whole grain. At least they were getting bread with authentic ingredients.
Here is your recipe in Baker's Percentage and it does tell a story about the flavor and production timing. Both the yeast and the salt are a little on the high side. That will make for a fast fermentation and a salty flavor. The faster the fermentation, the fewer aromatics are produced and the less fermentation flavor is in the final loaf. Also affecting the flavor is the yeast. Because of the higher amount of yeast, the yeast acts like a flavorant. Both fermentation flavor and salt taste are personal preferences so if you and your family like your bread then you are successful.
Flour 844g 100%
Water 550g 65%
Yeast 24g 2.8% H (1-1.4% is more typical)
Salt 21g 2.4% H (1-2% is more typical)
Oil/Fat 25g 2.3%
Sugar 43g 5% (totally personal preference)
Total dough weight 1507g
2 loaves 753g each
10% increase as suggested would be 828g/loaf. (Just increase the ingredients by 10%-the beauty of using weight measurements!)
I do concur with increasing the dough amount by 6-8% for 800g/loaf.
If you are using bleached flour, switch to unbleached AP.
Try adding all or half bread flour and seeing what happens.
Have fun! Carry on!
This comment is top quality, thank you!! I can't wait to implement many of these tips.
Can you tell me the difference between bleached and unbleached AP flour? I'm simply using bleached atm because it's what's always been in my kitchen, haha! Does the bleached quality really make such a difference in baking, or is it simply a matter of health?
Bleached has an unpleasant flavor. It's more noticeable in products that have few ingredients, such as bread.
In addition to previous comments, you will never get tall loaves if your bread pans are 2.75" high.
Lance
Lance- I appreciate this comment so much. This is *exactly* the information I was hoping for.
As for increasing gluten amount, I've had a few wonderings on this subject. Can I add VWG to my loaves to account for the difference or is that simply for WW breads?
Why does simply having a taller pan matter so drastically? Is it just the support factor?
I originally increased my yeast before I had a concept of true gluten development, when my breads were coming out short and dry, no matter how long the bulk rise and proof were. Decreasing my yeast is definitely in the future. :)
I've said this in a few other comments too, but I'm happy to repeat! This is simply a "mile marker" for me. I'm doing this to gauge my technique and understanding. Once I can reproduce any size of loaf I want, with the texture and crumb I declare that I want for this simple bread, I believe I'll have a firmer grasp of concepts that will help me expand! This is just my practice recipe, if you will. I'll be using it as a measuring stick for when I start substituting ingredients- honey, oils vs butter, milks, different flowers. I just want a solid foundation for comparison as I try new things! Thank you for your respectful question!
Final question, what exactly makes a pan de mie special, aside from a square baking pan?
Thank you again for your quality help!!
Yes, I'm sure you could add some wheat gluten to increase loaf loft - there's no reason why it should be reserved for wholewheat doughs.
Regarding pan height, in the UK commercial sandwich loaves are probably about 5.5" tall, so your loaf would have to be double the height of your pan. So if you put your loaf in the oven when the dough was at the top of the pan at 2.75", you would need incredible oven spring to get a 5.5" loaf.
Alternatively you could let the dough rise above the pan before baking, but then you risk it going sideways as well as up, with the likelyhood of the dreaded muffin top.
Pain de mie is a moderately enriched dough, with well developed gluten and baked in a big tall tin, often with cover, but this is optional. Txfarmers is a great example. It uses sour dough, but could be yeasted.
Lance
I have searched for years for a higher pan and finally went to a rectangular Corningware casserole for a widepan-style loaf.
The only other tall bread pan I ever found was this one. I don't like a loaf with "shoulders" so I need taller pans.
How interesting! Can you tell me the dimensions? Do you notice a difference in your bake? Do you have a picture of a typical loaf balke in this pan?
I understand learning curves-you have to start somewhere. But you also have to evaluate the assumptions you are making. You are assuming that the tools available to you CAN result in a loaf IDENTICAL to theirs in measureable ways (length, width, height, weight, texture). You may have to settle for a loaf "similar" in many characteristics ( length, width, height, texture). The weight is deceiving-they incorporate a lot of air in an artificial way which affects weight. You are not comparing "apples to apples". Your dough has to "aerate" by the production of CO2 from the yeast. Their dough incorporates actual air (not all their bubbles start with CO2) that are pumped in and held by chemically strengthened gluten bonds and sometimes additional gums. Most of those chemicals additives are available to you but that is a different learning curve-how to make mass produced bread at home. I don't think that is exactly what you are looking to do.
So re-evaluate your working goal. Adjust it a bit. It looks to me like you are very close to making a loaf of bread that you can substitute, slice for slice, for a commercial loaf. Similar size (working on but close), similar texture, consistent production, taste? ( I don't believe you ever mentioned taste) but with genuine ingredients.
What is the next step? Tweaking the size? Tweaking current ingredients? Exploring other ingredient changes?
RE: Other ingredients- assumptions for your learning curve
No ingredient substitutes directly for another. There are always trade-offs or tweaks necessary. They are all different learning curves. But don't despair. Each learning curve is helped by the last- especially if you stay focused, track what you do and go on. It is the most efficient way to learn.
Bleached/unbleached flour behaves differently. Whole grain flour is a whole different learning curve as is rye. Honey,agave and sugar behave differently. Adding baking soda, vitamin c, ginger,gums, all affect the texture or taste. So if you get a nice recipe going with a set of ingredients, you cannot sub. a different ingredient and expect it to work 100% without some tradeoff in texture, taste or technique. Experiment and keep track.
Re: Bleached vs unbleached AP flour
Bleached doesn't absorb water the same and behaves a little differently in a dough than unbleached. It also does not release a nice starchy gel like unbleached flour does. This is what helps form the bubbles and windowpane. Try a batch with unbleached and see the difference. Bleached does have a different taste-metallic to me (and others). Unpleasant.
Re: high gluten flour or VWG
Gluten is the netting that holds the bubbles in place. The more bubbles that can't escape, the higher the loft as it rises. But at a price. The netting definitely adds a chewiness to the texture-gone is the melt-in-the-mouth feel. OTOH, I remember wadding the Wonder bread into a dough ball and chewing it up. That may be a desirable characteristic to you and you may to design it into your bread. I vote for adding bread flour vs making your own by adding VWG. Seems easier to control the texture consistently to me.
Txfarmers milk bread is marvelous (all her posts are). Pain de mie is simply a fine textured bread in a square mold. The dough makes a fine loaf in a regular pan.
Old pic- my multigrain loaf so it is usually a little smaller but still quite soft. I'm assuming it is about 800 g loaf as that is about what I usually do.
INSIDE BOTTOM measurements (the pan tapers up slightly): 4.5 in. x 6 in x 7.6 in. tall or 12cm x 15 cm x 8 cm tall
INSIDE TOP measurements: 5.5 in x 7 in. x 3 in. tall or 14cm x 18cm x 8 cm tall.
It is marked as "1 1/2 quart" which is 1.4 liters (metric may be helpful with calculations)
Have fun! Keep posting!
Your bread looks good. Like MonkeyDaddy said, you're smart to concentrate on one recipe. That's because that's the way I did it! :-) Made loaf after loaf of white pan bread.
Baking is part art, part science. There are some good books that tech the theory of baking, what the various steps are and how adjustments to these steps affect your finished product. A good start might be The Bread Baker's Apprentice. Your local library probably has a copy. It will answer a lot of your questions, you'll find it fascinating.
It also has three good plain old white pan bread recipes. The one I chose to learn to home bake with was the variation 3, which uses a sponge. It produces a nice tall loaf for me, in a 8.5 by 4.5 pan.