January 11, 2021 - 5:23pm
Hamelman Yeast Usage
A Random Question - I am a big fan of Hamelman's BREAD book - this was my first bread book and I find the recipes/bakers percentages a lot easier to work with compared to other books I have come across
I do have one question - does anyone find that Hamelman uses far less yeast than most other books i.e. Reinhart, Field, etc. In his Yeasted recipes, he rarely goes above 0.6% IY where as most other books I see range from 1 to 2%. I prefer less yeast so I am happy with it, but it is interesting. What level do Yeast users typically stay at on the forum?
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Can you give two recipes to compare?
As long as the dough is given enough time taking into account the % of yeast it's up to the baker how much to use. If using more yeast there'll be a shorter ferment time, and vice versa, all else being equal.
For example - Hammelmans Biga Ciabatta calls for 0.40% Total Instant Yeast (Biga and Final Dough included) while Reinhart in Apprentice calls for 1.1% Total Instant Yeast.
And according to my book the Ciabatta with stiff biga recipe has 1.2% total yeast.
Abe, if you divide the yeast weight by the flour weight, you can see that 1.2% is the fresh yeast used under the US and Metric columns.
If you divide the .13 oz instant dry yeast by 32 oz (2 pounds) under the Home column, it is .40625%.
It's 1.2% fresh and 0.4% dried. However unasked for the two recipes to compare and all I got was Hamelman uses this much and Reinhardt uses that much which we've already established. I cannot compare until I see the recipes.
He named the two recipes, Hamelman's Ciabatta with biga, (page 105 of 1st edition) and Reinhart's Ciabatta with biga, in "Apprentice" (The Bread Baker's Apprentice, page 140 of 1st edition).
Reinhart's is difficult to compute total formula percentages because be uses only 16 oz of an 18.805 biga (page 107). That works out to 85%. So mutliplying the ingredient weights from page 107 by .85 will give the ingredient weights of the biga as used on page 140. Which are (for 16 oz of biga): 9.56 oz flour, 6.375 oz water, and .04675 oz instant yeast.
Add the .04675 oz yeast from the biga to the .17 oz yeast in the final dough, to get .21675 oz total yeast. Total flour = 9 + 9.56 = 18.56 oz.
.21675 / 18.56 = 1.17 % instant yeast in _overall_ formula.
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Reinhart's bulk is 2 to 2.5 hours, and proof is .75 to 1 hour.
Hamelman's bulk is 3 hours, and proof is 1.5 hours.
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BTW, the 66.7 water baker's % on page 107 works out to 7.5 oz water. (In the formula he says "7 to 8 ounces".)
And on page 140, the "7 to 9 ounces" water works out to 7.5 ounces using the 83.3 baker's percent from the side-bar.
Thanks idaveindy - at the end I guess its just about amount vs bulk ferment and proofing times
If you have the first edition of Hamelman's Bread, get the errata sheet at:
http://mellowbakers.com/ErrataSheetFeb2011.pdf
or:
http://mellowbakers.com/HB/index.php/topic,242.msg1129.html#msg1129
or: www.bit.ly/BreadErrata
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Some of the corrections have to do with yeast.
For quicker breads like rolls and stuff, I will use around 2% but when I want more flavor I use 1% or less.
PizzaCal, I wonder if you are going by the home bakers weights, or are you using the Baker's Percentages. I ask because the Baker's Percentages are shown in a single column. But the commercial weights use Fresh Yeast and most home bakers use Instant Yeast. If using the Baker's Percentages and you use Instant Yeast, you'll want to multiply the percentage by 0.33 to get the corrected percentage.
Fresh Yeast vs Instant Yeast is 3 to 1.
But considering your post, that would mean he is using even less IY than most people calculate.
Hamelman's book, Bread is probably the most favored book on our forum.
Danny
Yes it is for sure my favorite - confirmed on the instant yeast
I find the Hamelman yeast amounts to be spot-on. In his formulas, the per cent is for commercial bakers using fresh yeast. Home bakers using instant dry yeast have to multiply by 0.33, or active dry yeast by 0.4.
Oh don’t get me wrong , I think it’s great - sometimes I do have to extend my bulk ferment a little bit with the small amount of yeast, but I would rather do that than add more yeast
confirmed on the fact that I have to lower his yeast amount to be instant
It takes the same amount of leavening power to raise the same dough and bake the same loaf. After that it all depends on the size of preferment, time, and temperature, that's what defines the amount of added yeast.. How a particular person/author does it depends on his baking style and preference.