100% Whole Wheat: Retard in Fridge Ruins Dough
Aloha Everyone,
I have been baking SD loaves every week for a few months now and so far it has gone well. This site has been great. However I am perplexed at a certain scenario that I get into sometimes.
When my baking cycle goes undisturbed and I am able to bulk ferment, shape, proof etc without retarding the dough, my loaves have a good rise, nice crumb and crust and all, but when I have to slow the bulk ferment down in the fridge(39F) to avoid over-fermenting, my dough gets ruined.
After only about 5 hours, it comes out soggy and the gluten structure is destroyed. Shaping is extremely difficult and the dough never gets back to where it was before going in the fridge. There is a layer of water that collects on top and instead of gas shooting out, water does. Before retarding, the dough is pillowy with a strong, un-tearable skin.
Anyone experienced this? Or have heard of this? Im leaning towards bulk fermenting for up to 12-18 hours at room temp from now on to try and avoid this issue.
My basic recipe is 3500g bobs red mill whole wheat, 500g starter(very dry), with a two hour autolyse to break down bran in flour. 80g salt. The water addition is just enough to get all the flour mixed comfortably.
Thanks for your time. Natyam Raj.
Sounds like you went past making bread into making beer.
With that quantity of dough, it will take hours and hours to cool down the interior, so the middle of the dough is still at elevated temperatures, the yeasts are still working and the gluten is getting weaker... and weaker and welcome to the world of goo.
You will improve things if you scale and shape then retard individual tins/bannetons/etc. rather than one big blob. (assuming that's what you're doing here)
-Gordon
Drogon that makes alot of sense. The batch does feel hot when i do a fold on it.
So, since i make big batches, i should buk ferment quickly at room temp and divide and shape before ever retarding, do i understand that right?
If you can manage it, time wise - ie. mix/kead/bulk ferment, then scale/shape then you can retard the shaped loaves - in tins, bannetons, etc.
The down-side is that it will take more fridge space and more time at the front-end of the overall process.
There's an interesting analogy in the commercial catering world to do with chilling cooked products where you should be looking to get cook-chill things down to fridge temperature (< 8C) in under 90 minutes. Something like a large joint of cooked ham takes hours to chill ... the general recommendation is to portion then chill - similar situation to your dough. I've also experienced that myself - I've made up rolled "logs" of filled dough (think pizza pinwheels, Chelsea buns) and they've carried on proofing in the fridge, so now I cut them into slices and chill on trays to retard them overnight.
-Gordon
Thanks so much Gordon
No wonder everything works out better when i dont retard. When things go best and my schedule isnt busy i only bulk ferment for about two hours, batch rises significantly and i move on to shaping.
I bake regularly for our local natural food store, and bulk retard most of my doughs, to do most of the work the day before baking, and to achieve a better flavor.
I always divide the dough into individual portions, placing those in stackable square containers, so that they need less room. This works great, whether with 100% whole grain doughs or others.
Drogon is certainly right, with a dough portion of that size the yeasts will continue working at a fast pace for quite a time, before they are cold enough to slow down.
Happy baking,
Karin
because of the sharp edges of the bran. You err in stating that autolyses breaks down the bran, it does not. It only helps to degrade some of the starch into smaller sugars that can be used by LAB and yeast. Bulk fermenting for 12-18 hours at room temperature is a recipe for disaster! If anything this will be worse than what you are doing with the refrigerated portions.
I've done the San Joaquin sourdough recipe (do a search on this site to find it) on 2000g of dough with a bulk retard of 21 hours and there is absolutely no problem at all. Of course this is 10% rye and 90% AP flour so there is less bran than in your recipe.
Yes looks like my workflow will be to work in one shot with a few quick rises and bake.
Thanks everyone.
Reduce desired dough temp to about 70 F or so. Secondly be sure it's in a container where the mass of dough is relatively thin (a few inches at most) This will allow the dough to cool down quickly and not continue fermenting. If it's warm I'll put dough in fridge right after mix and pull out for a few early folds, placing back in fridge each time. If it's cool I'll keep it at room temp for about an hour and do my 3 folds before the 12-18 hour cold rest.
You should find a dough that is incredibly easy to handle the next day. Preshape straight from the cold and rest an hour. Shape and then proof 2-3 hours. Bake em hot and dark. With 100% wheat loaves this is my ideal method.
Josh
Josh
Thanks Josh.
Dough gets hot here in Kauai! Fermenting dough in our kitchen is usually around 80.
Whole wheat is tough to work with but im getting the hang of it.
thanks for the help everyone. My first whole wheat Ciabatta worked well with all the replies. i think this was a real turning point in my baking.
cut them open too early but was just messing around anyway and i got the largest craters yet. Thanks and cheers. (Posting photo not working so well, library not seeing photos)