Confusion About Yeast and Salt %
Hi All,
My wife and I did a large bake of Maggie Glezer's Slow Rise WW Challah about 2 weeks ago (documented here [1]). We froze the challahs after cooling but only got around to eating them this past weekend. To say I was disappointed is an understatment. The challahs looked and smelled delicious but they were quite dense (more than 100% WW I've made in the past), a little dry, and had the wrong kind of sour note. I expected some "tang" due to the long rise times and firm preferment but my wife and I both agreed that this just didn't tatse right.
I went back to the recipe to see if I had messed up the procedure and noticed something interesting: In her recipe for two loaves of this challah she calls for Bread Flour in the preferment and WW flour in the final dough. In the expanded recipe for 5 lbs of flour she calls for WW flour in both the preferment and final dough. In addition, in the smaller recipe the % of yeast is about 0.1%, while the % yeast in the larger (all WW) recipe is 0.05%. In both recipes the % salt is about 2%.
Do these percentages seem reasonable? I understand that less yeast as well as a greater salt to yeast ratio will lead to a slower rise, but I'm confused about why the recipe with the WW preferment calls for less yeast than the BF preferment. If anything I would think it would be the opposite.
Thanks!
Sruly