Bread is too light and fluffy
Hello from a newbie to The Fresh Loaf and apologies if this is not posted in the correct place.
I am not new to bread making but decided to see if I could make my life easier by purchasing a bread maker. We bought an entry level Panasonic and I have to say I am amazed at the way it effortlessly produces quite a reasonable loaf. That said, I do like the firmness of my hand made bread and the machine output is too light and fluffy for my taste.
I am a non-technical baker but Googled around and one suggestion I found was reducing the water; this I tried but got a light and fluffy loaf that was decidedly lop-sided. Some more Googling and I found something on the Panasonic site that said a lop-sided loaf was often caused by too little water! So ... I am now seeking other ways to make the bread a little less fluffy.
I am using good quality flour (50% wholemeal and 50% strong white), 360 grammes of water, 1 teaspoon of yeast, 1 teaspoon of sugar, 1 tablespoon of oil, 1.5 teaspoons of salt. I use a wholemeal rapid programme that takes 3 hours in total. I got this recipe from Doves who make the yeast I use (albeit that I have increased the salt slightly) and they specified this programme.
I guess I could add less yeast but wonder if anyone can offer any other suggestions that might achieved the desired result.
Many thanks.
We really need more information to help. If you have images, please post them.
What is the total weight of your white flour and also whole wheat flour?
Can you provide the web link or the source of the bread you are working with?
We need more info.
Danny
Thanks for the post Danny - it would have been sensible if I had posted the amount of flour. Apologies. Anyway, I am using 250 grammes each of strong white and wholemeal. I am not sure if the makes are relevant but they are quality bread-making flours that I have used for years. The recipe is at https://www.dovesfarm.co.uk/recipes/bread-machine-wholemeal-loaf but is (quantity-wise) much the same as I was using for handmade bread except that I used 325 grammes / ml of water.
Wasn't sure what you meant by "Can you provide the web link or the source of the bread you are working with?"
Herewith photo of the inside of second loaf.
Thanks again
Uplander
Thanks for the extra info.
Your loaf doesn’t look much different from the pictured loaf in the recipe. See theirs below.
The percentage of salt in the recipe looks a little low low. 1 teaspoon of table salt is 5.7 grams. Typically ~2% salt is used, which would come to 10 grams. I see that you raised the salt to 1.5 teaspoons (1.7%). Good idea, you could go slightly less than 2 teaspoons for additional flavor. But that had no affect on the rise of your bread and it’s crumb structure.
Your bread looks pretty good to me for a 50% whole wheat.
Danny
By the way - I have no experience with bread machines, maybe others who do can shed more light.
Thanks for that Danny, I'll see if anybody else can offer some thoughts. Like I mentioned, there's nothing wrong with the bread as such, it's just that I would just like it to be a bit more solid. To this end I have decided that with the next loaf I will increase the flour and water by 10% but leave the sugar and yeast the same as original and see what happens!
“ it's just that I would just like it to be a bit more solid”
Please describe the (more solid) a little more. I need more to understand.
By “less fluffy” do you mean more dense? More substance? More chew?
When you wrote “a bit more solid”, a portion of rye flour comes to mind as an easy fix. You could also forget the rye and increase the percentage of whole wheat.
try leaving out the oil. Or cut it back. Sounds like the machine is doing a good job at gluten development which is giving lots of volume, maybe too much if the crumb tends to shread even while cutting carefully.
Reducing the amount of yeast by just a smidgeon might be worth a try. Remenber to keep notes and try only one change at a time.
I only saw "leaving out oil" before. I really appreciate people posting so a quick addition from me. I agree on the one change at a time and notes - I am quite fanatical in keeping a record whether hand or machine. I had wondered about easing back on the yeast ever so slightly but (my latest thinking) I think firstly I will try adding a little spelt. I have some spelt flour so it will be interesting to see what happens, whether it just reduces the rise a little. Reducing the oil or yeast remain options. I am very used to tweaking my non-machine bread and seeing what happens, so will apply the same to the Panasonic. Anyway, thanks again for the post.
Thanks for the recent posts, not sure on the protocols regarding reply or comment! Anyway thanks both.
More solid ... my wife and I are sitting here trying to find the right words to expand on this. Given that this (by chance really) is much the same recipe that I would use for hand-made bread, the machine loaf is much taller and therefore less dense. I imagine most would say it is a good texture. However, when I make bread by hand there is more substance and more chewing is required.
The current machine offering is what I would describe as the typical texture of an uncut shop loaf in a good bakers (in the UK) - fluffy and lacking substance. When you cut it there is a slight tendency to tear if you are not careful. I am sure for many this would be a really good loaf. Given the minimal effort I am impressed but I would like something more ... errr, solid! Please excuse the lack of artisan understanding - I am something of an amateur baker.
The addition of Rye is one I would like to try. I could also add a small extra amount of wholemeal but not increase the white. I hadn't thought of that.
Leaving out the oil is an interesting thought - I have always added some form of fat to my bread and wonder if it might be a bit dry without it.
Anyway, I shall experiment in due course and will post an update.
Fluffy wheat bread is actually what many people want to achieve! I've never had to give advice on how to make a loaf more dense.
It does look as if the machine is getting a pretty good gluten development. One thing you can try is shifting the protein content down a bit. It looks like you are using a strong bread flour as part of your ingredients. Replace half or all of that with regular AP flour. That might do the trick. But,honestly, your loaf looks great as it is.
My first thought was, "put a pile of books on it." :) Sorry. But I knew there would be more to it and honestly that would be too easy. I predict the spelt, could make the crumb more delicate. Love the natural sweet flavour of spelt. Spelt takes a little longer to hydrate and that could weigh things down given the short working time. Mmmm, could be interesting.
Another thought. What happens when the bread is placed into the refrigerator? Try a few slices overnight and check on them the following day.
I always think that having started a thread, it is good to keep up the flow. However, the notifications do not seem to be coming through to me - presumably a setting I have omitted. Anyway, thanks for the last two posts.
clazar123 - I understand what you are saying about "light and fluffy" and on those criteria the machine is working well. My desire to change things a little is down to my personal preference - my liking is for a bit more body / chewiness in a loaf. Being new to bread machines I was not sure which direction to head in; that said, I have a list of things to try and I will add your idea of reducing the protein content to that list.
mini oven - was wondering whether the pile of books was during baking or afterwards?! Anyway, spelt is on the list to try so I will do an update when that has happened. It's a bit ironic but we actually try to not eat too much wheat bread (I do a nice but solid buckwheat and quinoa loaf - see below) so it will be a few days until I post an update.
Regarding the light and fluffy loaf being in the fridge, we have decided that it is much better a day or so later - easier to cut and nicer in the mouth. But of course it is still has that lightness.
One thing I will try is changing the settings for small / medium / large loaves. Depending on which you choose the ingredients increase and that makes sense but the overall programme time is the same which seems odd. I cannot figure out what changes within the programme depending on which loaf you select. If the overall time was longer the bigger the loaf selected, well that would make sense to me but that isn't the case. So, I am going to use the ingredients for the medium loaf on the small setting and see what happens. Might be one for the birds!
Thanks again.
Can you remove the bread from the Bread Machine once the proof is finished, then bake it in a oven?
Reply notification -
If you hit reply you will see a place below that says, “Replies to my comments”.
You can also set the global settings for that in your user profile.
... but I bought the machine because I am getting lazy in my senior years!
🥱
I have a family member that wants Only light and fluffy bread. ;), but not me. Well, I'm probably not adding anything here but:
Good luck!
Or switching some of the wheat out for quinoa or barley flour would give a denser loaf. Go with that first. Recommended is not to exceed 30% of the total flour weight so that might be a good place to start
Thanks for the recent posts. I have been experimenting and will update this now and then just in case anyone down the line finds it useful. So far I have tried reducing the water (no effect on the output) and changing the loaf size (this you select on the machine before starting) and again with no effect.
So today's effort was to add 50g of organic wholemeal spelt - meaning I used 250g strong white, 250g of wholemeal bread flour plus the spelt (total 550g). I also increased the water from 360g to 396g i.e. flour and water up by 10%. I thought that this, by increasing the raio of flour to yeast, would achieve something. In fact this has had no effect at least judging by appearance - we haven't eaten any yet but it is the same size and still light in texture.
I intend to try adding 100g of spelt next time then will experiment with something like quinoa or barley flour.
I am not keen on eliminating one of the proof/rises or any other maual intervention because this is all about lazy bread!
I am intrigued as to the effect of not adding oil, I thought that was good for the texture? Also, is it not the case that the quick dried yeast needs sugar to activate same?
Thanks again.
So ... it would seem we are in for the long haul.
I increased the flour to 600 grammes (250 wholemeal, 250 strong white, 100 spelt) but there was no real difference - maybe it was a tad more dense but still too light for our taste. This amount of flour is the maximum that the machine will cope with so my next experiment was inevitably going to be reducing the yeast and sugar in ratio to the 600 grammes of flour.
Meanwhile, and to answer my own question above about leaving out sugar, the following is courtesy of Loren McCune on Quora:
Yeast eat sugars; however, flour is primarily starch. And, starch is made of sugars all linked together. The flour alone is sufficient food for yeast. When instant yeast meets water and flour, the yeasts wake up hungry. Enzymes in the flour go to work unlinking the sugars and the yeast are lined up behind them for breakfast. Everybody is happy and added sugar is not necessary.
Most of you already knew that but I didn't. So I then reduced the yeast by 25% and the sugar by 50% (I used 3/4 teaspoon and 1/2 teaspoon respectively). This produced a loaf that is more dense but maybe we are veering towards it getting a little doughy. Ho hum. I am going to leave the yeast at 3/4 teaspoon but carry on reducing the sugar and we will see what happens.
I think I know exactly what you are talking about and I too would like to get a chewier crumb from my bread machine. Have you had any success with your experiments?
Hi. Well reasonable success I guess. I had made bread by hand for years and was used to a pleasantly solid load - not a brick at all but more firm and less fluffy than shop bread. I was blown away by the ease of the breadmaker but it did seem a tad too light.
Since then I have experimented with the ingredients, the order of using them in the programme and indeed by using different programmes. When I used the full length wholemeal programme the bread was lighter so that didn't work.
Anyway, we have settled on a formula that we like, making a loaf that is still lighter than was the case when making by hand but firm enough to be enjoyable. Being lazy, I cannot imagine ever not using the machine so I suppose a degree of compromise is inevitable but that said, we enjoy what we regard as our standard recipe.
I use the quick wholemeal programme (3 hours) and I add the ingredients in the order that Panasonic states (yeast in first). I use 3/4 teaspoon of dried yeast, then add the flour well-mixed (250 grammes of strong white and 350 grammes of strong wholemeal), followed by 450 grammes of water, then 1 tablespoon olive oil and 1 3/4 teaspoons of salt. Sometimes I replace part of the wholemeal wheat with spelt (100 grammes). I do not use any sugar at all.
There's no doubt that varying the brand of flour makes quite a difference so we have our favourites. That said, with all that has been going on we have sometimes had to accept what we can get.
Hope that helps.