The Fresh Loaf

A Community of Amateur Bakers and Artisan Bread Enthusiasts.

Rapid Bread

KazaKhan's picture
KazaKhan

Rapid Bread

Rapid BreadI started making bread about six months ago, I've been enjoying making bread so much that I've started TAFE to become a baker. My goal when I started was to produce a soft white sandwich bread in as short a time as possible. Now that I can do that I'll share what I've learnt. The first thing that I think is important is to use percentages and weight I do not measure by cups etc, I also keep an eye on time and temperature. Since approaching breadmaking with an engineers hat on so to speak my bread has improved considerably. So here is how I make a rapid bread from start to finish in about two hours. First I work out how much dough I need, today I'm going to do two baguettes at 450g and a lunch loaf at 550g which is about the maximum capacity of my oven, using two oven shelves never seems to work. So I need a dough of 1450g and I'm using the following formula.

  • 100% Flour
  • 58% Water
  • 2% Salt
  • 2% Olive Oil
  • 1% Sugar
  • 1% Yeast
  • Total -- 164%

PreparationI would usually use bakers flour and 1% bread improver however I wanted to test a cheap all-purpose flour with a protein content of 10.8% (Savings Brand in Austraila) and to see the result of no improver.

For my weights I do the following.
  • 1450g / 1.64 = 884g -- dough weight divided by our 164% gives the required flour weight.
  • 884 * 58% = 513g -- All other percentages are relative to the flour.
  • 884 * 2% = 18g -- Salt
  • 884 * 2% = 18g -- Olive Oil
  • 884 * 1% = 9g -- Sugar
  • 884 * 1% = 9g -- Yeast
Dry Ingredients I weigh my flour then add other dry ingredients to the flour and give it a good mix with a spoon. Next I start mixing slowly with a stand mixer whilst adding the liquids, once all is mixed I let it sit for anywhere from 2 to 10 minutes to let the dough relax.

Mixed Dough On a higher speed I work the dough for roughly 8-10 minutes. At this point I want a dough with temperature of about 28°C, I usually get the water temperature(20-22°C with the current warm weather) set by adding a couple of ice cubes(tap water is about 26°C here) to a jug of water before weighing the water off. Kneading the dough will warm it up a bit which is allowed for in the water temperature.

Window CheckHand WorkI pull the dough out and give it a "window check" if it's not up to scratch I'll give the dough some hand work. I've seen mentioned here somewhere not to tear the dough but this is exactly what I've been taught at TAFE and hence what I do which rapidly develops the gluten. I suppose there are many schools of thought on kneading :-)

TinnedI then let the dough sit again for 10 minutes to again relax the dough before shaping. I split the dough into the required weights and shape. For the lunch loaf I would usually punch down and roll a baguette shape, cut in half and put in the tin with pointy ends in the middle. But today I tried splitting the dough in half and putting 2 balls in, my loaf suffered as I didn't degas it before balling it (almost no oven spring).

For the baguettes I punched down the dough folded the sides in and then rolled it whilst maintaining tension. I slice the baguettes before prooving as doing so afterwards can be difficult.
Punch DownFoldRollFinished RollSlice
ProoverFor prooving I use a plastice storage container to which I add boiling water for steam. The rise takes about 30-60 minutes and may sometimes need more boiling water added to keep the heat up if the weather is cooler.

Ready To GoA spray of water and some seeds and into the oven at 220°C. I pour some water onto an oven tray on the bottom of the oven for steam. I turn the temperature down to 210°C and bake for approximately 25 minutes, a bit shorter for baguettes and rolls sometimes and usually a bit longer for loaves.

From todays effort I can say I rushed a bit and should have left the dough in the proover longer and the gluten was a little under developed. But not a bad result considering my mistakes and cheap flour and it still tasted good with some brie ;-)
Ready To GoReady To GoReady To Go

Comments

shi's picture
shi

LOVELY! I saw all of you flickr photos grrrrrrrrrrrrrreat. I have been looking for a good white bread recipe without egg and yours seems good. Think i'll try the white bread recipe. can u add some flickr photos on how to roll/shape a bread dough.
thanx
shi

KazaKhan's picture
KazaKhan

I'll explain the photos above :-


  1. Punching down \ degassing. How much if any depends on the style of bread.

  2. Fold the side edges in to create subtle triangular shape. Fold the top edge in.

  3. Start with the backside of the thumbs to roll the dough from the top and push thumbs into seam (pic) to create surface tension.

  4. Finished dough piece

  5. Tinned


I use this method for most of the tinned bread I bake. Knowing how to ball a dough piece is important too and is generally achieved by pushing and pulling the dough towards the bottom centre of the dough using one hand or two. These are not the only methods it depends on the type of bread being baked and the final shape required. Of course the above will not work very well with wet or sticky dough. I hope that helps?
shi's picture
shi

I think i have got a hang of it but kaza for baguettes you have left the ends as they are, is it the same for the bread or do you tuck in the ends.Can you give a percentage chart for a sweet bread like currant bread
shi

KazaKhan's picture
KazaKhan

Yes, I leave the ends as they are and I've never tucked them in. For a baguette the dough gets rolled out to length and sometimes I roll the just the ends to tidy it up. I use this method for tinned loaves as well. Sometimes I just put the whole dough piece in for a standard hi-top and sometimes I cut it in half and point the outer ends towards the middle in the tin for a half married hi-top which can also be done with two balls of dough as in the picture above. Again there are other methods of shaping, the important thing is to create surface tension so the dough will hold it's expected shape when baking. For wet doughs folding is often used but I haven't really made any wet doughs at least not by design :-)
My easter bun formula :-


  • 100% -- Bakers Flour

  • 53% -- Water

  • 20% -- Currants and\or sultanas

  • 10% -- Sugar

  • 4% -- Malt

  • 4% -- Milk Powder

  • 3% -- Instant Yeast

  • 1% -- Olive Oil


The percentage of fruit can of course be changed to taste.
shi's picture
shi

Kaza do you think i can use non-branded all purpose flour for the buns. The thing is that where I live(India) I have access only to whole wheat flour and all purpose flour. And is this instant milk powder cause thats all I have. Hope you'll bear with all the queries as I am a novice so far as bread making is concerned and am also handicapped by the non-availability of most ingrediants that are easily available abroad.
thanx
shi

KazaKhan's picture
KazaKhan

All purpose flour will be fine, bakers flour has a higher protein content. Dry gluten can be added at 2-4% when using all purose flour but it is not necessary. Instant milk powder is fine. And I'm only a novice myself...

shi's picture
shi

thanx kaza. now I am off to home two days holidays :) will bake your white bread tomorrow:( but i dont have the facility to upload picutres like you. Your pictures are inspirational.
shi

KazaKhan's picture
KazaKhan

Thank you. I use Flickr to upload photos, it's free of course. Good luck I hope it goes well.

shi's picture
shi

I am on top of the world. I have baked one whole wheat bread, one all-purpose flour, one sweet bread and then one stufed bred!!!!!!!!!!!!! and one week back I had never baked bread in my life. I am so happy n hubby dear too. I dont have bread pans( but am sure will be able to convience hubby to get them on his next trip)so i shape my breads into rounds or long shapes(i am sure there is a better word for this). I wish I had could upload the pictures well lets hope i get my own PC soon.
Thanx for all the advise.
shi

shi's picture
shi

hi Kaza
have seen no postings from you of late seems u are busy.
shi