He has given us all to make a cake and bread at home. The latter is very satisfying. But for it to work out, there are some baker’s tips that you must handle.
The Pride (And Pleasure) Of Making Bread At Home
Because the house smells like it feeds but because, really, homemade bread feeds. You will know what you eat. With just water, flour, salt, and yeast -or sourdough- you will have this highly valued gourmet treat. Let’s see tricks so that this simplicity culminates in a bar, baguette, or baker’s trick.
Mathematics In Bakery
Always follow this rule in the proportions of your homemade bread dough: the amount of flour is what serves as a reference as a measure. For one measure of flour, you will need 50-60% water, 2% yeast, and 1.8-2% salt.
Baker’s Tricks: Yeast
Both fresh and dry baker’s yeast is used to make bread without the need to “make” sourdough. During confinement, it seems that fresh yeast is a great treasure (it is usually in the refrigerated area of the supermarket). Dry yeast has a longer expiration date. If you use this, always in a third of the weight of fresh yeast indicated in the recipe you are going to bake, as indicated by Susana from the web Webosfritos.es
How Much Fresh Yeast? What If It’s From A Bakery?
The proportion of both fresh and dry baker’s yeast that you should use to make bread at home is, as we have seen, 2% of the flour contained in the bread recipe you have chosen. For example, for half a kilo of flour, you should use 10 grams of fresh yeast or 3.3 grams of dry yeast.
Do You Have Fresh Frozen Yeast?
You can use it to make your bread at home but you must defrost it first and know that it loses some power, so you will need to add a little more. So you can take advantage of it.
What Flour Do I Use To Make Bread At Home?
Choosing the flour well has a lot of weight in the result. Wheat flour, rye flour, spelled flour, oatmeal, mix… it is the secret of bread. Baker’s trick: keep it safe from light, humidity, and odors. For starters, use wheat flour. The reason: it has more protein. This, when mixed with water, gives gluten and this makes the bread fluffy.
Trick: Strong Flour, If Possible
To start making bread at home, as we have indicated, opt for wheat flour. Normal or force? It can be anyone. The strength has 12% protein. The bakery between 10 and 11%. The normal one less and it will make the crumb somewhat less fluffy.
Baker’s Trick: Don’t Flour The Dough
If you start making bread at home, you must forget to rectify the point of the dough with flour. It is preferable to do it with water. Start kneading with a fair amount of water and add more if you notice it is missing. If you start to rectify with flour, you will load yourself with the proportions.
Fluffier Crumb With Milk
Water is the binder of the ingredients. A fluffier homemade bread crumb can be achieved by adding milk or using milk instead of water. The most used milk in bread recipes is powdered milk. The more hydrated (more liquid) a bread is, the stickier the dough. Mediterranean bread is usually very hydrated.
Baker’s Trick: Kneading
Kneading is used to integrate ingredients (you can do it by hand or with a mixer). Baker’s trick: first mix the dry ingredients -flour, yeast, and salt- and then the wet ones -among which is the sourdough-. Mix a little, rest for 10 minutes covered with a cloth and then knead making folds with the dough on itself.
A Dough Is Ready When…
Once the dough becomes elastic – it doesn’t stick to your hands or the counter too much – and looks smooth, stop kneading. Also when extending it does not break or crack. But beware, there are doughs made with a whole meal or rye flour that will always stick. Forget incorporating the flour until it stops.
Baking With Water, An Essential Trick
Bread needs moisture when baking. A steam oven is perfect. But if you don’t have it, nothing happens. Just introduce an oven-safe container with water from the preheated and keep it during cooking. Put it under the tray. Another way to cover the dough with a glass container is to prevent it from drying out.
Trick: The Oven Stones
The oven stones are sold in specialized stores and help the bread to rise because they accumulate a lot of heat. It is very useful to achieve a crispy crust. It is essential that it is very hot. It is also used for baking pizzas. But it is not essential to embark on the adventure of making bread at home.
The Slices Of Bread
Making cuts on homemade bread is called, in baker’s jargon, scarifying. They have a reason: the carbon dioxide produced during cooking comes out through them. You should make them after fermentation and just before baking the bread. Use a very sharp knife with the blade angled.
And About The Salt?
Adding salt to bread dough not only salts but also improves the crust in brightness and crispness. It also makes the bread have more body. Of course, a dough with salt ferments more slowly than one without it. Salt is usually 2% of the weight of the flour. For 500 g of flour, 10 g will be salt.
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