3rd Insanely sticky dough in a row, help!
I'm an intermediate breadmaker, have done high hydration doughs without issue, and have never previously had any issue with my hand kneading or using a stand mixer. But for some reason, my last 3 doughs have been sticky to the point of 20 minutes of slap and fold, and adding upwards of half a cup of flour still leaves an insanely sticky dough. I'm at a loss for why.
The three doughs have been very different recipes (cinnamon roll, English muffin, and peasant bread). The cinnamon buns and English muffin recipes have been fairly low hydration too (60%). I have double-checked and followed the recipe correctly and use gram measurements for all my ingredients. I tested my scale and it is accurate to within 1g weighing 20 nickels. The temperature of my liquid has been between 100 and 110F. The dough once I've given up and just let it rise, has risen without issue. Even after bulk, it has been unworkably sticky. It also passes window pain well before I give up and just slop it in a bowl for bulk.
Here is what I can think of they have in common:
1. The same bag of flour (gold medal)
2. I've used some amount of almond milk in each. EM and PB were lower amounts, about a quarter of the liquid, the cinnamon buns were mainly almond milk for the liquid.
3. I started off in stand mixer with the dough hook on the lowest setting, after about 10 minutes of the dough not coming together I have switched to hand kneading to no avail. I have limited counter space and I'm usually multitasking so I prefer to stand mixer so I don't have a huge cleanup.
4. All used the same bottle of active dry yeast (some also had a sourdough starter in addition)
Things that were different:
1. Some were autolyzed, some were not, so I don't think it's not giving time for hydration
2. PB and EM used a sourdough starter, Cinnamon buns were just the AD yeast. The starter was always fed the night before and is 100% hydration and I have made many things with it previously without issue.
3. Some called for butter, and I used Earth Balance. After the cinnamon bun disaster, I held off on adding until I made sure the dough came together and smoothed out, but this ever happened.
I'm just struggling to figure out what the problem is and it is driving me insane, and now I feel like my bread can smell my fear so it is only going to go downhill from here. Open to any suggestions.
Only you can solve it. Make two small doughs, one with Almond milk and ady, one with water or cow milk and ady. Use the same percent hydration, yeast, and salt in each. Observe the results.
If they both handle in this odd way, its your flour.
angelofdef,
- sugar doughs and enriched doughs (milk, butter, eggs) can be sticky. 2 of your 3 examples are enriched. To be sure, can you please post the full formulae for each of the three doughs?
- ambient temperature and humidity (room and outside temp) make a difference. You mentioned "nickels". I take this to mean you are in the USA. Weather is generally getting warmer and more humid in the US now. Don't rule this out of the situation.
- you noted several differences in the bottom of your post. Look at these.
Conduct a controlled experiment, changing nothing between two doughs. What is the result? If no change in result, then the source of any undesired effect is in the recipe (ingredients and quantities) or method (sequence of adding ingredients and procedure for working them together).
My feeling is the ingredients and quantities, aka the recipe, combined with ambient temperature and humidity are playing factors.
an ingredient that keeps the almond particles afloat so they don"t settle. I had drink yogurt once that had something in it to keep it flowing. It was not good to cook with!
Is your weather changing? Is the humidity level different? Your flour could simply be holding in more moisture to begin with so your hydration levels could be all messed up.
My dough can fluctuate a lot. And I mean a lot. A month ago, I had to decrease flour on every recipe and now I have to increase it. I'm going to start keeping a humidity log to see if I can nail it down.
Has anything changed there?