July 4, 2018 - 3:29am
Micro Bakery - Do I need a mixer?
Hi everyone,
I'm new to this site and looking forward to reading some great threads and hopefully I can contribute. I'm starting a small sourdough bakery in the loft of an organic mill in Ireland. My budget getting started is tight, I have ordered a Rofco B40 so in the beginning plan on producing 24 loaves per day. My question is, is there any members in a simular position that are simply using the stretch and fold method instead of the additional expense of a dough mixer. What do you find are the main advantages and disadvantages?
Thanks for reading.
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I know a number of other micro-bakers without mixers making really great bread. Obviously, it is more work, but for 24 loaves/day, wouldn't be that bad. Talking to some of them, they say that by the end of their bulk with stretch and folds, there is plenty of strength in their dough. You will certainly get a good feel for dough characteristics in the process (and gain some strength yourself).
Chad Robertson talks about his first bakery in the early chapters of the Tartine Bread book. He had no mixer. He worked with hundreds of pounds of dough by himself each day. This was because of the ease of working with wet dough, he said. It can be done. Good luck.
im baking bread in Ireland too - where are you based? im in Cork. Luckily i have access to a mixer but often just use my hands...im now using mixer and then S+F etc...my problem is ovem. i have access to pro kitchen but it has rational combi oven which isnt ideal for bread (pretty good oven though) - the cork county council have built a bakery start up kitchen which has an incredible zanolli deck oven and bakes the most fantastic bread but i simply cant afford it as its €15/hour - ill stick with the free rational oven until i win the lottery and buy as space for a zanolli and mixer