October 11, 2023 - 1:31pm
Stitching dough a second time?
Hi, has anyone tried stitching shaped dough in the banneton a second time some time after starting final proof? I am making some bread with spelt flour in it, and spelt makes the dough so extensible, it nearly always pancakes during baking if I bake it free standing... This time I was proofing overnight in the fridge and thought, why not stitch the top of the dough (bottom of the bread) after it appears to have relaxed in the banneton, to hopefully strengthen the structure of the loaf? I'll see how it bakes tomorrow... Has anyone tried this?
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You will have to try it, of course, but I think that each tab you pull out to stitch will just pull out by itself without having much effect on the rest of the loaf. If 100% spelt is as extensible as I think it is (I've only used 50% spelt so far), that's what I expect. OTOH, doing it while the dough is still cold, and baking it from near-cold, might just work.
TomP
It's not even 100% spelt... Just about 1/3. 100% spelt I wouldn't even try to bake free standing, only in a tin! Or maybe with very low hydration.
Thanks, let's see... I think it seemed like the whole loaf tightened up, don't know really. Side by side experiment would be needed to know for sure.
Oh, 30%. I proofed and baked my loaf of 50% spelt free-standing and without a retard period, so it probably should work:
https://www.thefreshloaf.com/node/72889/50-spelt
I think I should have reduced the water more... Or perhaps it's the difference in the bread flour, NA flour is famously stronger than European, maybe it makes the difference... But the dough was quite extensible, and from experience that's what happens even with this amount of spelt.
Yes, being in the US, I used King Arthur's Bread flour for the 50% white flour part. The spelt was stone-ground. When I formed the loaf, I worked the dough hard to try to trade some of that extensibility for elasticity. I stretched it out into a wide rectangle, folded it over on itself, rolled it up, then turned the log 90 deg and rolled it up on itself again. At that point I thought or hoped that the loaf had enough elasticity to keep its shape, and it did.
I actually realized I made a mistake in hydration, and instead of 75% it was more like 80%! And just baked it - a bit flat, but not a pancake. Doesn't look too bad anyway, and I am sure the spelt will make it tasty... Thanks for sharing the tips that helped you, I will try shaping like that next time, and will be more careful with the water!
I'm sure it will taste good. I checked my notes and for the loaf I mentioned I used 70% hydration including the starter.
Hi Ilya. I have done this, once I even re-stitched at the end of final proof right before I turned it out of the banneton. Very gently, of course – not like a full stitching, just enough to give a spreading dough a bit of tension. I've done all manner of ill-advised fixes and hardly have been fatal to the bread. –AG