Does anyone know of a video of a finger dent test showing good final proof, ie the dough indentation not filling back too quickly, but quickly enough, to confirm readiness to bake?
What I've learnt from a professional baker: don't use your finger like a stick or arrow. You don't want to drill a whole in the dough. Do it like on the first picture on top of the page in the link above. You could use also 2 fingers (index and middle finger) for more surface.
With high hydration doughs the poke test is increasingly unreliable. With cold final proof the poke test doesn't work at all.
I agree, loaves that have been retarded are a major problem. Sometimes you put them in the oven and get fantastic ears and oven spring; other times you only realise too late that the final proof has not developed sufficiently and you end up with low loft "solid" loaves.
The trouble is there don't seem to be too many obvious differences in appearance between the two extremes. At least if you knew, you could do some ambient proofing before putting the loaves in the oven - not ideal but better han the alternative.
So I lowered ADY to 0.7%, reduced hydration to 65%, placed a sauce pan on each side of my baking plate, and tried to be conscientious of surface tension while forming. And I also tried to use the above poke test tutorial.
Results: I got ears and there were no depressions, but the crumb is less open than before. Grrrr. I had originally raised hydration to 67% in an attempt to increase openness (and it may have worked), so now I need to work on openness again.
Here's a page about the finger test and proper proofing, including a video -
https://www.theperfectloaf.com/how-to-use-the-dough-poke-test/
You won't find better than this one.
TomP
Just some advice - get away from that "test". The size of the dough is really what you want - ie - the doubling in size (or close to it). Enjoy!
I poke the end of my finger into the dough, but he just presses the pad of his finger, so I learned something.
Same here.
What I've learnt from a professional baker: don't use your finger like a stick or arrow. You don't want to drill a whole in the dough. Do it like on the first picture on top of the page in the link above. You could use also 2 fingers (index and middle finger) for more surface.
With high hydration doughs the poke test is increasingly unreliable. With cold final proof the poke test doesn't work at all.
I agree, loaves that have been retarded are a major problem. Sometimes you put them in the oven and get fantastic ears and oven spring; other times you only realise too late that the final proof has not developed sufficiently and you end up with low loft "solid" loaves.
The trouble is there don't seem to be too many obvious differences in appearance between the two extremes. At least if you knew, you could do some ambient proofing before putting the loaves in the oven - not ideal but better han the alternative.
Lance
That was really informative. Thank you Tom! I need to watch a couple dozen times!
So I lowered ADY to 0.7%, reduced hydration to 65%, placed a sauce pan on each side of my baking plate, and tried to be conscientious of surface tension while forming. And I also tried to use the above poke test tutorial.
Results: I got ears and there were no depressions, but the crumb is less open than before. Grrrr. I had originally raised hydration to 67% in an attempt to increase openness (and it may have worked), so now I need to work on openness again.
But I love the crust with this batch!!!
Darn good results! If it were me, I wouldn't need to get the crumb any more open.