April 1, 2014 - 12:10am
For a fluffy dough, more rises or longer rises?
I've recently started rising in my fridge, which seems like it takes about ~24 hours for a recipe that is supposed to rise, in room temp, for about 2 hours. This is because my house is about 60 degrees, which doesn't seem to be enough for the bread to rise in time (it takes about 4-8 hours of rising time). Anyways, one thing I'm trying is letting it rise two times before the final rise (in oppose to one rise) to get the fluffiest dough I can (within a reasonable time frame). What would be more important: more rises, or longer rises? Such as if I rose it four times, but gave it only 8 hours to rise each time, or give 2 rises, but 16 hours each time.
I really don't know how much longer or more risings have to do with fluffy dough. I believe it is the long term kneading and/or the enrichments that are more likely to accomplish that. More knowledgeable voices could explain better. It does seem that you would be benefitted by looking up Floyd's post on "Hokkaido Milk Bread with Tangzhong." That has an excellent discussion of fluffy, shreddable loaves.