The Fresh Loaf

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Soaker Calculator -- Adding a Soaker to an Existing Bread Recipe

Steve Petermann's picture
Steve Petermann

Soaker Calculator -- Adding a Soaker to an Existing Bread Recipe

A few years back I created a bread recipe calculator that included a section for calculating a soaker for the bread. If you might be interested in the full blown calculator, here’s a link to the post with the latest version of that: https://www.thefreshloaf.com/comment/509232#comment-509232

However, I recently got back into some Excel development and thought it would be nice to have a standalone calculator for soakers where a soaker could be easily added to an existing bread recipe. So, I created both an online version and a local version for those who have the Excel app on their computer. Here's snapshot of the online version:

Soaker Calculator Snap Shot

For those who are not familiar with soakers, they are an extra batch of ingredients (grains, seeds, etc.) that are soaked to get hydrated and then added to the final dough. They can offer some interesting new tastes and textures to the bread.

The online version utilizes Excel online, so you don’t have to have the Excel app. The local Excel app version has some extra features for those who might want to add or edit the soaker data.

I’ve created a video tutorial that demonstrates how to use the spreadsheet. Here’s the link to that:

https://youtu.be/lKcgUYw9d2E

Here’s a link to the portion of that video that covers how to access the spreadsheets:

https://youtu.be/lKcgUYw9d2E?t=958

And here's the link to the folder with the online spreadsheets:

Online Soaker Calculator - OneDrive (live.com)

Also supplementing that tutorial is a video that covers the additional features for those who can download the spreadsheet and use their local Excel app:

https://youtu.be/c5gbCBWV2xk

Here's the direct download link for using the local Excel app: 

Excel App Download

Also, if you are interested in how I came up with the soaker hydration data here’s the post where I explain that: Soaker Ingredient Hydration Percents -- Some Data | The Fresh Loaf

I’ve really enjoyed adding soakers to my bread over the years so hopefully this will make them accessible to anyone who is interested. If you have any suggestions or criticisms about the spreadsheets, they are very welcome.

Steve Petermann's picture
Steve Petermann

The link to the online soaker sheets is in the video description but here's also the link:

Online Soaker Calculator - OneDrive (live.com)