Better oven-spring?
Hi,
I would like to ask for help some more experienced bakers. I started baking bread in the oven only 2 months ago and the results are inconsistent.
One of my problems is the oven spring - especially with high hydration doughs. For example the bread bellow was about 65% hydration but when I added minced garlic (request form my husband :-) the dough got much wetter.
However after the proofing in a banneton, it looked very nice, even immedietaly after the turn-over. But in the few seconds when I scored it, the bread split and did not catch the high in the oven.
Formula:
320g flour (50% whole wheat)
1tbsp Vital Gluten
180g water
160g sourdough (100% hydration, 50% rye)
1/2 tsp instant yeast
1 tsp sugar
15g butter
3/4 tsp salt
6 cloves minced garlic
The dough was made in a BM with dough program.
I would appreciate any comments.
zdenka
What are the procedures in the recipe? Did you follow them? What was the temperature of the oven? How long was it preheated? Did you bake on a stone? Did you steam the oven?
Properly answering your question is difficult without knowing exactly what you did.
Jeff
You might also want to post this on the bread machine forum.
Sorry I am not familiar with the measurement what is a PL ?
I forgot to translate... 1 table spoon. Thank you for alerting me!
zdenka
This was a kind of universal recipe I got from somebody and use quite often. Originally it was made only with 1tsp of instant yeast, but now I also recalculate it for using the discard of my sourdough starter.
Last Friday I followed the same recipe, but without garlic, so the dough did not get so wet and the oven spring was appropriate. But even a wetter dough (once I added onions) turns out very well sometimes, sometimes not.
I do not have a baking stone, so I use a sheet with parchment, bake 15min on 450°F (my oven take about 15min to preheat) with steam (I spray water into the oven every 4 minutes) and then 35min on 392°F.
I always bake the same way (and always make the dough in the bread machine - as KA is really very, very expensive in central Europe. Well I know, most bakers here do not like the mread machine...) - but sometimes the bread is nice, sometimes flat like the one above.
Here is another I have made the same way, same recipe (but without garlic)
Your picture looks like a loaf that was underproofed. When it hit the hot oven it sprang, not up, but apart.
Learning when dough is properly proofed and ready for the oven is absolutely essential to good baking. Spend some time researching the subject and then pay very close attention as your dough rises. The dough is fully proofed when it is fully proofed. Dough cannot read the clock and it has no use for minutes and hours. The time necessary will vary for many reasons and you must "know" when it is ready.
Jeff
The pictures below look like Jeff described exactly, but what happened to the other pics from earlier, which appeared totally opposite?
does one recognize whether the dough is under or overproofed - both when the loaf is still in the banneton and from the photo of baked bread?
The loaf in the banneton definitely was at least double volume (difficult to measure exactly in a rounded form. And I forgot to try Mike´s Avery suggestion to put 1/4 cup of the dough into a measuring cup apart). When I pushed my finger into the dough, there was just a little and slow "come back". The proofing took about 1hour at about 70°F
...hard time for a beginner. But thank you very much for your comment
zdenka
Zdenka,
As the dough proofs it expands. During this expansion there is a peak of activity much like the peak that occurs in ripening sourdough. You are looking for that peak or actually just a bit before that peak.
When the dough is close to what you think is fully proofed you want to push down gently on the surface of the dough with the pad of your finger. This is a push with the pad not a poke with the tip. If the dough is ready, the indentation that you make with your finger will come back ever so slowly. If the dough is not ready (under proofed) the dough will spring back to fill your indentation and if the dough is over proofed the indentation will simply stay there with no return. All doughs are different and a yeasted dough feels different than a sourdough but this is a good general guideline for any dough.
In the oven the underproofed dough will spring up with vigor and likely break open the surface of the loaf much like the picture that you posted. The overproofed loaf will spring up slightly before collapsing back onto itself. The perfectly proofed loaf will do everything that you want it to do.
As a new baker there is a lot to learn but this is a very important element and I would suggest that you give it ample attention so that you and the dough might become the best of friends. Do not get to lost on the idea of a dough doubling in size as that is only one indicator and certainly not the most important. In your recipe it is a good indicator of when the dough might be near fully proofed but the finger test is the final test for deciding. This topic has been discussed many times on this forum and a search will likely lead you to the good advice of others. Also many books on bread give this subject at least some coverage to help you learn.
I hope this helps,
Jeff
your comments are very helpful.
I think that a video showing how to test the dough after proofing, and what under-, over- and correct- proofed dough look like would be very helpful for every beginner here - just a suggestion for experienced bakers
Thanks once again
zdenka
I've found that an overproofed loaf will avoid collapsing if there sufficient gluten development.
It all goes back to the understand of the interrelationships between each and every step in the baking process.
You guys are forgetting the garlic and the role it played. The Garlic has made all the difference, keenly noted in the question.
Read this older thread as found by quickly using the search box:
http://www.thefreshloaf.com/node/11172/defeated-garlic
Mini
even if the antibacterial, antimicrobial properties of garlic are well known. I wonder if this would be similar for onions - but my onions bread were a bit higher than the garlic one.
I recieved the Hamelman´s book from Amazon just this morning, so I will certainly read his comments about the use of garlic
Thanks for the idea!
zdenka
crushed or sliced.