April 27, 2014 - 1:23am
Diastatic malt - another question for the experts....
I have a desire to see the effect of diastatic malt on my sourdough but would like to know the following:
When do you add diastatic malt - is it supposed to be added to the flour with the other ingredients and then autolysed (with the culture being added later)? Or do you autolyse with all the ingredients including the culture when using diastatic malt?
What happens if you use a Poolish - is it added to the preferment or to the dough flour?
Is the correct 'dosage' 0.5% of the total flour?
Thanks in advance for any response
Cheers
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Hi, Aroma
In principle, you may add diastatic malt to an autolyse without before the levain. Personally , i haven't tried that. Diastatic malt is often used in recipes that require extended fermentation time, as with cold fermentations. It is preferable to add diastatic malt at the rate of 0.1-0.5% of total flour. For a recipe that calls for 500-800 g, use 1/4 - 1/2 tsp of diastatic malt.
Happy baking
khalid
I've usually added it in with the rest of the flour for the final dough. So yes, it's included in the autolyse, but not the preferment. Or at least, it can be. I think when you add it depends on what effect you're going for and what the procedure is. If you're doing a really long autolyse, it might make more sense to add the malt later, but generally I think it's simplest to add it with the rest of the flour.
Khalid's numbers match my experience, too - I don't think I've ever seen anything outside the 0.1 - 0.5% range that was a non-zero amount.