96.5% Hydration.
Good morning, friends. I hope your bakes are turning out well. Last night I took some time and converted the W.W. sourdough English muffin formula I used, (J.Monkey) from volumetric to mass. If my calculations are correct, this formula works out to 96.5% hydration. I knew this was a high hydration dough however, I had no idea it could be this high. I am now very surprised I was able to cut out the miss-shapen muffins at all! Here is my problem with this formula, (J.Monkey,) calls for holding back the honey, salt and baking powder until after the overnight fermentolyse. I had a heck of a time to incorporate the honey, it made the dough so slimy it was almost impossible to work with. My possible solutions, 1. mix all the ingredients at the start. (preferred) 2. switch from honey to sugar. What would you do? Thanks for any input and suggestions.
Sourdough starter | 120 G @ 100% | 37.6% |
Milk | 227 G | 71% |
Whole wheat flour | 259 G | 81% |
Honey | 21 G | 6.6% |
Salt | 3.5 G | 1% |
Baking powder | 5 G | 1.6% |
Flour | 319 G | 100% |
Milk/Honey/starter | 308 G | 96.5% |
Your hydration is a little lower than that. Milk is about 87% water, and honey about 17% water.
That would make your milk/honey/starter combo 261.1g, which gives you 319g/261.1 = 81.8% total hydration.
that has the water content of liquid ingredients? That would be very helpful. Thanks so much for taking the time to recalculate my hydration. Very much appreciated.
Kind regards,
Will F.
Will, closest I found to a chart was on the KAF website https://blog.kingarthurflour.com/2018/07/23/how-to-convert-a-bread-recipe-to-tangzhong/
The article is about tangzhong but lists the water content of some popular ingredients about 3/4 down the page. If something is not listed I just Google it.
Bear in mind that your ingredient weights stay the same for the recipe. Just use the water content to figure your total (true) hydration.
Here is what's listed:
Jeff...
Thanks a lot Jeff, very helpful!
to stop some enzymes. Also if the honey is close or has "sugared" the amount of water in the honey will be lower in hydration. Adding a few drops of water until it is thinner should help.
bound and determined, not to burn this test batch. I have to say I really dislike this dough. Once I add the honey it breaks down.
PK, are you planning to bake on the silicone mat? That might prevent the burnt bottoms. As you probably know, the sugar burns easily.
Dry grill and temperature control. 8 minutes on each side as Dwayne, recommended. Thanks to you Dwayne, for the temp and timing! On the money!
Now I need to get this dough sorted out! Sandwich size!
I don't know about that I have always felt welcome. However, that could be due to my magnetic personality. He, he I am a Legend in my own mind. Be that as it may, here is what I did, I broke out the Bosch and mixed the complete English muffin dough from the get go. After which I gave it a 5 minute ride in the Bosch at #2. Smile.... The dough has been resting comfortably for 4 hours now. I am trying for an 8 hr. at 80F fermentation. See you'll later.
Why oh why are vacations always too short?
Top: Final English muffin dough - Test bake # 3
Bottom left: Double Levain build for two turmeric boules.
Bottom right: Starter for English muffin bake #4
As expected the dough is much more manageable. After combing though many volumes of technical bread making literature, (I love the information age) I came apone a shaping technique that I am much more comfortable with. The weigh and portion method.
I can't wait to see the crumb!
on digital media.
I've done some research on the water % of ingredients. The problem is that it's unknown if all the water content really represents free water. Some of it may be bound up so adjustments will still have to be made. However, the values are probably pretty close. Oils, even though they may not have any water content, act mostly like water in the dough. Also notice some of the percents are negative, like for vital wheat gluten and dry milk. That means that the ingredient will actually absorb some of the water in the dough. For vital wheat gluten, I've seen data with up to a 200% hydration, but when I adjusted for that amount in some dough, I think it was way too much. Another factor is with regard to soakers. Some seeds have a large oil content so that will contribute to the dough hydration feel. I've been doing some testing with various soaker ingredients to perhaps get some idea of their hydration levels. I'll post that when I'm done.
for your generosity in sharing your research, it is very much appreciated, and will come in very handy!
Kind regards,
Will F.