The Fresh Loaf

A Community of Amateur Bakers and Artisan Bread Enthusiasts.

Stretch and folds

Pizzafreak's picture
Pizzafreak

Stretch and folds

Hello!

If I stretch and fold by refrigerating the sourdough after each fold and give a final rise of 4-5 hours before baking, will it affect the final product. Want to refrigerate it because I want the Bread at a particular time. Will be out for the time of final rise. Is that ok? 

Dan_In_Sydney's picture
Dan_In_Sydney

As always, others with more experience can likely offer a more complete picture but my view is not to refrigerate until after you have finished your stretch+folds.

The reason is that the gluten will tighten up as it cools, making it less extensible and thus you won't be able to stretch as far (or as easily) and will risk tearing the dough.

The whole part about stretching/folding and then waiting is to let the dough relax so it is good and extensible and ready for the the next stretch. It's not really any different than exercise - you want to bring the muscles up to temp and then do the harder work and, once that's done, you rest, allowing the muscle fibres to repair and relax. The process is then repeated: warm-up, work, rest and, through that repetition, strength is gradually and safely built without injury.

Based on your username and profile image, I am assuming you make some pizza dough - if you've ever tried stretching a lean pizza dough from cold, you might have found that it 'snaps back' - same idea.

Of course, this all depends on the dough composition and the temperature. Going back to pizza dough, if you are using a highly enriched dough (i.e. lots of oil,) that will weaken the gluten anyway so having it chill a little may make it easier to work - especially if your kitchen is also quite hot at the time. While an extreme case, this is something that was made apparent during the recent babka community bake.

In such instance, you may find that working the dough in a hot room raises the temp enough that chilling for half an hour just ends up bringing it back to a 'normal' temp. And, of course, that calculation will change with just how cold your fridge is and how large the dough mass is, as the larger the mass, the more retained heat.

However, for a 'standard' lean - or at least not overly enriched - dough, of a size normal for home bakers, being worked at a 'normal' range of temperatures, you're likely better waiting until your stretches are complete before refrigerating or look to develop the dough more fully early in the piece.

d.

Pizzafreak's picture
Pizzafreak

This is a very valuable info. Tnks so much Dan! I will try it this way now. Can I stretch and fold my ciabatta the earlier day, and retard it in refrigerator and bake it next day?

Dan_In_Sydney's picture
Dan_In_Sydney

I don't see why not. 'All' you need to do is ensure adequate fermentation time.

I've written another post below as the one above - for all its verbiage - was really only concerned with the mechanical (as oposed to chemical) action of gluten development.

For a regular, leavened bread - such as ciabatta -  fermentation is the KEY to turning a boring mass of flour and water into something interesting that, once cooked, you might enjoy eating.

What needs to be kept in mind, however, is that the fermentation starts when yeast and water and flour mix. It is occuring as you are mixing, when (if) you rest after mixing and it continues as you proceed to develop the gluten - it is not something that only starts once you are done kneading and slapping and stretching and folding!

Depending on the amount of yeast (in whatever form) added, the number of folds and the spacing between them, your dough may have already reached a desirable level of fermentation at the end of the folding iterations (or before).

This is why stretch/fold style development, where you build strength gently and gradually over time is best suited to dough that, due to yeast level or being a sourdough, you intend to allow a relatively long fermentation time. If you are making a yeasted bread that you expect to be ready after 2 hours of fermentation then 'folding' is ill suited and those recipes will generally involve all the development up front - in a machine or via manual, old-fashioned kneading.

Ignoring all other processes that are occuring in order to focus on fermentation, yeast is most active between ~30-35°C (85-95°F) and activity drops as with the temperature until, at around 4°C (39°F) it is mostly inactive. I am not sure exactly at what point it becomes completely but it is somewhere between fridge and freezer temperature. (Given yeast needs water to do its thing, one assumes that temps below freezing would be enough but don't know.)

There are, however, two very important points to note here:

  1. Yeast will still be minimally active at standard fridge temps. Not much but a dough WILL rise in the fridge, though slowly.
  2. What matters is the temperature of the DOUGH and the dough - like any mass - retains heat and so the interior of the dough will remain above the surrounding fridge temperature a period of time after putting it in the fridge. The larger the dough mass, the warmer it is to start with and the warmer your fridge (or the worse the airflow!), the longer that cooling process will take.

What that amounts to is that you may find that fermentation has reached the desired point by morning, even though the dough has spent overnight in the fridge.

To give you an idea, I started a dough late last night, using 0.6% instant dry yeast, with the plan to leave it out to ferment overnight, with a predicted temp ambient temp of 10°C. When I got up at 4am I found that it was WELL risen. I punched it down with some prejudice and gave it a solid knead before placing it back in the bowl and then leaving it in the fridge until I got up again at 7am (working from home has its benefits!). The dough was cold to the touch but, in those 3 hours it had risen back up to nearly the same height!

If this is something you plan on doing as a 'go-to' bake, it worth experimenting to get a workable process and schedule down. Check the level of rise in the morning, straight out of the fridge as it may not even need further dedicated fermentation time beyond that required to pre-heat the oven and divide, shape and rest to dough.

And just adjust from there.

 

and bake them an hour apart to see what happens.

alfanso's picture
alfanso

prior to retarding the dough.  You can still take the dough out from retard when you want to divide & shape, and if you wish to return to retard until you are ready to bake.  Then pre-heat the oven, remove the dough and bake.

You can divide and shape cold dough, but I wouldn't recommend chilling a dough that is still being bulk fermented and manipulated.  Of course there is a way to find out if your proposed method works...

Pizzafreak's picture
Pizzafreak

Thank you Al for that info!

phaz's picture
phaz

Doesn't matter. Enjoy!

Pizzafreak's picture
Pizzafreak

Tnks!😀

Pizzafreak's picture
Pizzafreak

Tnks!😀

Benito's picture
Benito

I agree with Alan, I would do bulk fermentation and stretch and folds warm, then do the cold retard.  The cold retard if done 4*c or cooler will hold your dough without over fermentation for quite some time even more than 24 hours so that is a better way of getting your bread baked at a certain time.

Benny

Pizzafreak's picture
Pizzafreak

Thank you Benito! 

Pizzafreak's picture
Pizzafreak

Thank you Benito! 

Pizzafreak's picture
Pizzafreak

After 1 hour of baking I find that ciabatta crust turns soft.. how to keep the crust crackling forever?

Dan_In_Sydney's picture
Dan_In_Sydney

With respect to Phaz, it does matter.

Stretching and folding is a mechanical* process and thus the physical propeties of the dough matter and those properties change upon cooling.

Again, that's purely the mechanical process of the stretching/folding.

Of those people who actually provided an answer, if you are unfamiliar with either Al or Benny, half a minute looking at the enviable selection and quality of their bakes should convince you that their results speak for themselves.

I am not a shadow of them in either depth or breadth of experience and certainly not in the quality and consistency of end product. For whatever it is worth (probably not much,) I have found that there is very little in baking bread that is absolutely 'right' or 'wrong' as bread is a nearly universal food and even the most knowledgeable and experienced bakers and lovers of baked good find previously-unknown breads all the time. (And indeed this is a great source of joy - who doesn't love the discovery of a new, delicious bread?!)

My own perspective is that most breads - and especially 'regional' styles - are evolved items, which came about as a result of bakers combining the ingredients available with the tools and aparatuses to hand and the existing knowledge they posessed. What is promising gets refined and, at some point, a 'benchmark' version of that exists and, to an extent, detailed and rigorous recipes and procedures are almost a post-hoc reverse-engineering to find out what the specific ingredients and processes contribute. (Whereupon further 'refinement' or codification may be undertaken.)

New breads are then created - again, in the manner of evolution - as people and cultures intermix, introducing each other to different ingredients and tools and techniques. If we reference your username and profile image again, imagine what a world this might be, had Italian immigrant to the US not attempted to combine their baking knowledge and dietary preferences with the available ingredients and tools of their new home in the US!

All of that is a perhaps philosphical - but definitely long-winded - way of trying to reinforce my point that no process is inherently correct or incorrect for 'bread' as there is no correct form that 'bread' must take and, if changing the process or ingredients changes the outcome dramatically, you have not failed to create bread so much as you have simply created a new bread! Whether that end result is to your liking or not is another question and a purely personal one.

With that all done, the question must be: what are you trying to achieve as a finished finished product?

So far as gluten development is concerned, working the dough while it is at (normal) room temperature will provide the
greatest ability to do this with the minimum risk of damage to the gluten network. Working the dough while cold, however, will require a gentler approach, which may then equate to more iterations and more 'hands-on' time, all up.

That said, there is nothing that dictates that all 'bread' must have a strong gluten network. Some breads, by virtue of their ingredients don't even contain gluten (as a combination of gliadin and glutenin). Others have their gluten networks deliberately disrupted through the addition of fats. Still others may have strong gluten but are deliberately worked in such a way as to minimize rising - or elimitate it altogether by not using any leavening agents.

What I can say is: if your aim is to develop the gluten while avoing damage to the dough, you are better off doing that at room temp and finishind that process before refrigeration. From there, fermentation is a matter of time and temperature (coupled with starting qty of yeast) and nothing prescribes or proscribes any specific sequence or schedule.

However, while you have free-reign to do this however you like and nothing is to say whether it is 'right' or 'wrong', that, again, does not mean that it "doesn't matter". (Well, cosmically . . .)

When a dough is left for a period of time - warm or cold, leavened or unleavened, sourdough or yeasted, etc . . . - various chemical processes are occurring and the rates of these, and thus their impact on structure and flavour, will not only vary individually with temperature (and acidit,), they will also affect each other in a complex interplay. At different temperature ranges, different processes come to the fore and so manipulation of time and temperature are great tools to select for those reactions you want and the effects they contribute.

It's entirely possible for bread to be made by mixing a dough in the evening and then putting it in the fridge overnight, taking it out when you get up the next day, leaving it to come to temp while you get ready for work, giving it a stretch and fold and putting it back in the fridge before you leave, then taking it out in the evening, letting it come up to temp and giving it another S+F and back into the fridge, repeating again for another day or two, before bringing it out for a final ferment/proof/shaping and baking when you're ready.

I can't say what the result will be but it will indeed be bread, providing, of course the dough still has any integrity left, which it should. It may be that there are other breads out there that use the same method but, regardless, you may find that the end result is uniquely to your liking!

In which case, I must here agree with Phaz's perennial sign-off: "enjoy".

* - by 'mechanical', I mean concerned with the application of forces on objects at a purely physical, as opponsed to chemical level.

Pizzafreak's picture
Pizzafreak

Tnks Dan!

this again adds  more knowledge to my Bread making. Looks like the learning never stops!! Agree that baking plays less part than the actual process of Bread making. That said my ciabatta does not retain a crispy crackling crust for more than an hour. (I do steam bake on Pizza stone)also keep a bowl full of Water in the Oven. As soon as the ciabatta is out, the crust is crackling and stone hard. But alas! Only for an hour.

I often find baguettes in the supermarket have crispy crust long after I take them home. What’s the secret of keeping crust Crackling for long?

Dan_In_Sydney's picture
Dan_In_Sydney

In short: bake it longer.

In . . . long?

There are myriad process occuring as you bake a bread - the yeast is going into overdrive and pushing the 'spring' before dying, the included gas is expanding, the starches are gelatinising and the structure of the bread is setting. Amongst other . . . things.

As the dough heats up and the >100C temp (i.e. > boiling) in the oven acts on the dough, the water at the outside of the dough starts to evaporate (which, incidentally, is what allows a crust to form).

As the water evaporates at the surface a pressure/temperature differential forms between the outside and inside of the bread, causing water from the cooler, moister interior to move towards the hotter, drier exterior, where it can be evaporated, turning into steam. (Which is why a dutch oven setup doesn't require any extra source of moisture - the evaporating water from inside the bread forms steam that is trapped in the confines of the container.)

One interesting note is that this process is why the temperature you are checking for when testing bread is close to 100°C at the centre of the loaf. While there is still moisture available, the heat energy that is being absorbed goes towards heating the water inside the bread. Once the temperature at the centre gets close to that 100°C mark, we know that the heat has penetrated all the way through and the moisture right in the centre is being baked out.

At any rate, the higher the moisture content ('hydration') of the bread, the longer this process will take as there is simply more moisture! Other factors include the size of the loaf and the shape of the loaf - most importantly: the cross-section or thickness, as bread bakes from the outside in; the further the heat has to 'travel' to get to the inside, the longer it will take.

Ciabattas are generally fairly flat so the cross-section is not too problematic but they are quite high hydration - again, generally - so it might take a bit longer than another bread of similar size.

Of course, you don't want blackened bread (or maybe you do - up to you!) so you'd generally want to lower the temperature a little to go with the increased time to avoid premature crust browning.

For my morning bake - a barbari bread - I have a dough around 73% hydration but the shape of it is quite flat, with grooves that allow a lot of heat penetration. As such, the loaf below was cooked at 250°C for about 10-12 mins.

So, drop the temp a little and bake a little longer. When you see instructions to pre-heat and then, immediately after putting the dough in, to lower the temperature, you get a big burst of heat right off to really drive the 'oven spring' and then the heat reduces until it reaches the new, lower temp and allows for a more 'gentle' bake.

Now, once the bread is done, there will not only still be moisture in the bread (otherwise what you have made is a cracker!) there will also be HEAT in the loaf. As with the baking phase, there is a temperature differential and that seeks to equalise. This time around, however, the exterior is subject to a cooler temperature than the interior so rather than the heat travelling in, it is travelling out.

The moisture in the loaf is also still evaporating and spreading throughout the bread, which is why need to rest the loaf after baking and it's not really any different to a steak or roasted piece of meat. Resting allows the moisture to redistribute, and like the steak or piece of meat, the cooking process is actually still continuing due to all the heat retained by the bread.

Crucially, while this cooling process is occuring, you need to allow adequate airflow all around the bread so that the steam can escape from the crust. If you cover the bread or it is cooling in an overly humid place, the water will tend to stop at the crust, softening it. Of course, with a steak or roast you are likely to cover it in foil while it is resting to trap the liquid and thereby keep it moist. We want the opposite for most bread and hence need to ensure good airflow. (When I make pita, I put them in a freezer bag straight after baking to 'steam' and soften them.)

Back to my breakfast, however, here is the aforementioned barbari. You can see how the shape allows for a quick bake. It was quite nice, incidentally  :  )



So: bake a bit longer and decrease temp as required. The bread is 'done' when the inside is 'properly' cooked, regardless of what the crust looks like. If the crust reaches the desired state before that happens, decrease the temp next time. If the inside cooks before the crust is where you want it increase the temp and decrease the time a little or increase the temp HARD for a few mins at the end for rapid browning, remembering that it's easier to quickly brown the outside that it is to stop the outside burning if it's too hot!

(For rapid browning, I turn on the 'fan-forced' mode in my oven, which is where the rear element around the fan is turned on with the fan thereby blowing very hot air all over the bread. This is a good way to get that quick browning as it will efficiently dry the crust and thereby allow the the temp right on the outside to get good and toasty.)

Pizzafreak's picture
Pizzafreak

So what I need to do is bake at lower temp for a little longer and then let cool down under an fan on the table.. I think that should help.  

this is my 80% hydration ciabatta

Dan_In_Sydney's picture
Dan_In_Sydney

That's some good shape on 80%.

The thing with bake time and temperature is that it's not some arcane, bread-centric magic. Larger, thicker bread doughs take longer to cook because it simply takes longer for the heat to properly get into the centre.

The exterior of the bread, however, is right at the boundary and so there is no need for the heat to take time to reach it. moreover, as the rate of heat transfer is influenced by the difference in temperature of the two areas, where is - especially at the start, a large difference between the adjaced temperatures at that boundary between oven air and bread crust.

As the heat is transferred inwards, the energy avilable to transfer dimishes because each 'layer' retains some heat so the differential diminishes as it gets closer to the centre and thus the rate of transfer also dimishes. All the while, however, the crust is taking all the heat it can get!

You can think of it like being at the back of the room as waiters bring around trays of cocktail food. The people served first will be able to grab a as many tasty pieces as they want and, by the time the plate gets around to you, at the back, you might be greated with crumbs. In the end, you have to grab whatever small morsel they don't eat until more and more people are stuffed full and you finally get a good selection to tuck in to.

That's a dreadful analogy but it iis almost 2:30am and my brain isn't working so well.

Back to reality, the crust has a certain surface area that increases with the size of the loaf but however large the crust is, it's a 2-dimensional 'sheet' forming the exterior, with each area of that exterior recieving the full force of the oven simultaneously. The crust will therefore form and brown as quickly for a smaller loaf as a larger one.

This is why you must bake longer and cooler: to simultaneously provide enough time for the heat to penetrate and reduce the speed of heating the crust.

I just want to make sure I mentioned that cooking 'lower and slower' doesn't directly create a crispier, longer-lasting crust. What it does (most importantly) is provide enough time the ensure adequate water evaporation in the dough.You have to dry the dough out (via baking). If you don't there will still be excess water trapped in the centre of the loaf when you take it out. The crust will be crisp because there's no water there but, as the loaf cools and the water spreads, it will make it's way to the crust, softening it.

The point is that your aim is to remove sufficient water so that it what is left at the end is not enough to wet the crust once it cools.

Pizzafreak's picture
Pizzafreak
Benito's picture
Benito

I have seen some bakers who do a fully cold fermentation, it can take several days in their fridges.  Most of the breads baked using this method have looked underfermented to me.  What I’ve seen them do is mix to full gluten development up front then the rest of bulk for days in the fridge.  Another baker starts bulk at room temperature just allowing enough time for 3 folds so 1.5 hours.  The the dough is placed in the fridge for 72 hours, taken out shaped, given 20 mins at room temperature, then refrigerated again for 11 hours.  https://www.instagram.com/p/CPqgqReJAr9/ That post is an example of the second method.

Pizzafreak's picture
Pizzafreak

So this also is a trick I can use if I get many orders. I can make and store my final dough in refrigerator. 

Pizzafreak's picture
Pizzafreak

So this also is a trick I can use if I get many orders. I can make and store my final dough in refrigerator.