5 Tips: Working With High-Hydration Dough 

This is the only channel where I read ALL the comments -- such great info here, too! Questions I might not have thought of, and always such great replies. Thanks to KA for actually answering and not ignoring comments like most pages... :-)

So exciting !! Love your videos, thank you for elevating my sourdough bread baking to the next level.

Love these tips and this video. Always good to get back to basics! Thank you!

Those fold ideas were great! I'm going to try that next time I make a high-hydration dough. I sometimes have to rely on a bench scraper while I'm working because my dough gets sticky spots, but this should help!

Thank you so much for excellent explanations as well as demos. I struggle with high hydration doughs and have yet to produce a loaf I'm happy with. Now I know why. Can't way to get back to trying. Thanks!

This video is awesome. Best explanation on how to work with high hydration dough I’ve seen. Thanks for making it!

Many thanks Martin for the tips especially tip number 5. Learned a lot here that nobody cared to mention even after viewing so many RU-vid presentations.

Wow, this was a really helpful video! Both the folding and especially the shaping of the dough was eye opening! I am working with 75% hydrated dough making Bloomers and I noticed surface tearing and had challenges shaping the dough to retain tension. Your method, only gently handling the dough and the use of the bench scraper to shape the dough, was a total game changer! Thank you!! :-)

Great Tuition spread the Bread wealth far and wide.

Excellent video series. I watch it over and over and always learn so new. Thank

Great video and advice thanks. Really enjoy your videos

I am working in 80% Hydration and under bulk cold fermentation now. Thank you for sharing this tutorials, it helps me a lot for pre shaped and final shaped. This is very informative video for beginner like me

Thanks so much for reaching out to us, Benjamin, with these suggestions. We will happily pass your thoughts along to Martin. Thanks again, and happy baking! -👨‍🍳Ethan

It's our pleasure! Thanks for being a part of our baking community! -👩‍🍳Morgan

While you can add a tablespoon or 2 of oil to your dough for flavor, it definitely won't ruin the fermentation. Though too much would cause the dough some trouble in coming together. We hope that helps! Thanks for reaching out, and happy baking. -👨‍🍳Ethan

What an AWESOME, very informative & EASY video to follow! Thank you so much!

Excellent teaching! Thank you so much for the tutorial video and tips. I’ve given up baking because the bread never came out right. I’ll try again. Thank you 🙏

With you tube whatever you are trying to learn you have to find your particular teacher. Most times we think it is us, that we are just not getting it. But if we persevere along comes that person who just seems to be on the same wavelength. For me it is Martin. Thank you so much for solving everything.

Thanks Martin, always good to root and ground those basics!

So glad you’re are back ! I learn so much from you .

@KingArthurBaking. Currently, I just completed the second set of COIL folding. Am finding it’s a whole lot of fun and feels rewarding to watch the dough becoming more strengthened as I progress through the steps. Will not divide into all those smaller loaves. I don’t have a baking stone and, at my age of 84+, won’t buy one. It’ll have to be cast iron, of which I have a wide selection. Trying to decide between my double griddle (which is much too heavy and cumbersome) vs. 12 inch Lodge Blacklock skillet. I absolutely love how this video demonstrates the steps so well. Thank you very much for taking the time to make it.

Thanks for the lesson. I grew up with artisan bread made by grandmother which she baked in a large brick oven heated with wood. She used 8 kilos of flour kneading it all by hand in a large terracotta pan. It was a tough task that would take a whole night and part of the day.

Is good tips from the basics of folding the dough. Last tips is important, man Love to learn more about last tips. Awesome. Thank you . From Borneo.

Super insightful video!! Hope I can achieve the elusive bread burrito. Recently added too much hydration by accident and loved the result, sure I will be referencing this for many loaves to come!

Excellent! Thank you, I appreciate this video and I believe it is going to help me improve my sourdough process.

Thank you, Martin! 👍👍👍

Something Martin should mention - whole grain doughs need more hydration, thus his comment that he could have gone to 100% hydration instead of 90%. A white flour at 90% hydration is very, very difficult to work. The lamination fold helps a lot to give this kind of dough more strength.

This is such a wonderful way to put it, and we can't wait to share it with Martin. Thanks so much for joining and learning with us. It's a pleasure and an honor. Lots of loaf and happy baking to you. -👨‍🍳Ethan

Thank you for showing how to work with the dough although I am still extremely new to baking.

I've been baking bread for over forty years, and I learned something today. I've not worked with such high hydration doughs much. Thank you!

Great content! Really thanks for the tips!

Thanks for this video. Very helpful!

Agree with all the others: very helpful!! Thank you!

Tip number 6: use a non-porous working surface such as stainless steel or marble cause you don't need to add flour while working with a well kneaded hi-hydro dough. The roughness of wood can easily tear the dough.

I love this new show Cooking with Malkovich!

Hi Raul! You're looking for somewhere between 40-54°F (4-12 ºC). Or, the average temperature of your fridge should work great too. Thanks so much for reaching out, and happy baking! -👨‍🍳Ethan

Perfect video thanks 👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻

I needed this yesterday!

Thank you!

Thank you so much 💝

great! Thanks

This is so perfect. I have been trying, not succeeding, and wondering why I couldn't get a crustier loaf. Following a new recipe this morning, I pulled the loaf from the fridge, after about ten hours. The scoring was so much easier. I put it straight into the oven. Voila! I finally got my crustier loaf. Then I found your video that solidified my hunch that the bread needed to finish the final stage, after it's last shaping, in the fridge before going into the oven for the crustier loaf. Thank you!

We're glad you enjoyed this video, Mauro! You can use the cold fermentation method for flours with a lower protein content. Happy baking! -👩‍🍳Morgan

Thank you.

Hi there, Rick! There are times when you can save an over-proofed dough, this is easiest to do during the first rise but if your shaped loaf over-proofs you can deflate it and shape it again. You can learn more about this in our How to save over-proofed dough blog article: bakewith.us/752f89 We hope this can help and happy baking! -👩‍🍳Morgan

Thankyou for your tips- from korea

Excellent video

This Flour makes the best bread and pizza dough. That Barley flour protein helps.

Thankyou for your tutorials! Can I ask if all 3 types of folds can be done during one baking process or just choose any one?

Wow ! You read my mind, before I even had the thought -- now that's prescience ! On the strength of some of your other videos, I ordered the Emile Henry baker, and started with the basic recipe in the enclosed booklet. Wow, it was high hydration, and I didn't realize it -- thinking there was a typo, I kept adding flour -- and the loaf out of the oven was really disappointing. With this video, may try again - or to heck with it, and just follow one of your recipes.

Martin you have some of the greatest teaching videos about bread baking. Your focaccia video was wonderful. I love how you had your son working with you and it was a family affair. What are your thoughts on keeping the dough on a granite counter top during stretch and folds? I was using a bowl and a Pyrex but I found that my dough continued to be sticky. I started working on the granite and it’s worked much better. This is sourdough I’m working with. My dough just wouldn’t come together till I switched. My only worry is that because the counter stays so cold that it will make the fermentation take much longer.

Thanks for your tips!! Would you recommend cold fermentation also for weaker flours?

A lot of people do videos with high hydration videos but do not show the necessary steps to make it work well. If you follow some youtubers closely your dough will look more like cake batter than bread. It is great that you are cleaning up some of these errors

My first try with a sour dough/ high hydration caused me to panic big time. How do you shape bread soup? Lots to learn. Thank you and King Arthur for this series.

thanks for the video

Excellent video: quick and to the point. (For a moment I thought you had called yourself the King Alfred Baking Company, which had me wondering whether I should watch...!)😂

Thanks for your tips! I have a question on the cold fermentation, what do I do if I use it on yeast dough and it became over risen and lost strength? Is there a remedy for it?

LOVE IT!

Martin, Thank you so much for your tips; learning new things every time. I am looking for your vdo on the difference of different starter ie Poolish, Biga etc. Could not find it. Please help?

Hello to you in Borneo, and a big HAPPY BAKING! -👨‍🍳Ethan

Thand you.

These tips came just in the nick of time 😰. Thank you!!!

I like to use 80% hydration for my regular white sourdough :D This makes it not too wet but not too tight, and easy to handle.

Awesome stuff, Thank u’…💫🌎❤️🌈

Hi there, John! You can find all of the cookbooks available on our website here: bakewith.us/snt9zs Martin has a book called Breaking Bread: A Baker's Journey Home by Martin Philip, you can find that here: bakewith.us/mty2vd We hope this can help and happy baking! -👩‍🍳Morgan

Great video. As a home pizza baker, high hydration doughs are tough to work with. This certainly helps. I always cold ferment 24-48 hours. I think a higher hydration will help the “fluffyness” of my crust. TY.

Great video to relieve bread making anxiety

Oh yeah. Whole Wheat has a higher protein count, which is another way of measuring the gluten percentage that will develop in the dough. We like to think of it this way: whole wheat flour is much thirstier than something like all-purpose, so it'll absorb more moisture, and your dough will feel heftier and tighter. It's all part of the fun science of baking! -👨‍🍳Ethan

Do you recommend a thermometer? What percentage hydration did you use in the example?

Appreciate it

Thank you for this! I always think soirsoigh recipes, even ones for beginners are light on advice when it comes to shaping, and I think thats where I've been going wrong. Hoping this helps!

Hi Martin, can I ask, USA always in their baking suggest using All Purpose - plain flour for bread and pizzas yet in the UK it is Strong flour/ bread so what do you suggest?

Martin, your videos taught me how to bake bread - thank you! Does anyone know whether the shaped loaves need to warm up after cold fermentation, or do they go straight from refrigerator to hot oven?

I love my 97% overnight no knead bread, no stretch and folds if I ferment overnight with starter in it can I use any of these 5 folds after the long ferment. Sometimes it hasn’t doubled yet because my kitchen is about 68 F at night.

That sounds so awesome! Let us know if we can help in any way, and happy baking! -👨‍🍳Ethan

After cold fermentation, when ready to bake, do you take the loaf out of the fridge while the oven is heating up? That is what I do and it seems to work well enough. Sometimes I will let the loaf sit for an hour (int he banneton) before putting in the fridge.

What is the hydration percentage of the dough you're working with in this video? (Never mind - I just heard you say it was 90 percent.)

Thank you for sharing this useful information if you kindly can you can you help me ...? Is the high hydration .. only with sourdough? Or it is ok with other kinds..thank you for your time

What temperatures do you recommend for sourdough fermentation? I think getting the dough strong enough during bulk fermentation is the most important thing but I only go to 85% on some doughs so I'm not an expert ;)

Wonderful recipe. Thank you. I've now made it twice. I love it but my crust is not crunchy but it looks great. Am I doing something wrong?

cold fermentation is really nice and i will try it today. Can i make it longer say 24hrs or 36hrs?

I'm in!

I hope that he is still making videos!

Do you let your ready to bake dough sit at room temperature a little bit before baking or just go directly to the oven to bake? Love the video. Thank you!

Hi there! You'll want to go by the indicators given in your recipe, some doughs might need to double in bulk, while others might just need to become puffy but not quite doubled. Using desired dough temperature and ensuring that your culture (if you're using one) is healthy will help make for a successful rise. Kindly, -👩‍🍳Morgan

Outstanding!!!! I have a question after the dough has proofed over night, it goes directly into the oven? Or I have to let it come to room temperature first? Thanks for all of these great classes, keep it comming, pelase. Love from Argentina ❤️❤️

How do you ferment it overnight in banneton without it all sticking????? Yours, mr sticky situation, from sticksville.

Hello. my question is. How long the bread after baking is still good. And how to maintain it after baking. Thank you

How long we can use the final shaped pizza dough balls. I mean how many days/hrs they stay good to make pizza

Tip number 6: Water is the liquid ingredients and flour is the dusty dry ingredients. nice tips.

Great video. Thanks for the useful tips. I make a high hydration harvest loaf and want to laminate, but I also put in some ground flaxseed and sesame seeds (mixed with the dry ingredients early on). These sharp little things can tear the dough if I'm not careful. Any tips for us seeders?

Just subscribed to your channel I really liked your tips about the dough can you explain the hydration of dough in detail what is the ratio of liquid and the flour and the hydration it has please .I mean how do you determine the hydration of a dough ? Thank you .

Sweet

So if my dough is still sticky at the shaping stage, does that mean it requires longer fermentation? The obvious is more flour to bring down hydration but not sure would that restart the process?

Thankful for these tips, but....what is the threshold (%) for high hydration dough?

When I get over 75% hydration, my dough always wants to stick in the bowl when I'm folding or kneading. Like in the bowl fold, the dough is picking up cleanly (nearly so from the bowl), my dough wants to stick and peel off leaving bits stuck, what mistake making that causes this issue?

Idk if you'll see this but is cold fermentation good before shaping? Just mix and create the dough and then put it in the fridge, then come back the other day to do the folds and shaping

What percentage is the cutoff for high hydration? My last loaf was 78% and it was very sticky when I shaped it. The makeup was 350 bread flour, 150 whole wheat, 100 rye leven and 370 gr water. I did not cold proof it since , I wanted to complete it in 1 day and it certainly made scoring more difficult,

Hello Martin. Interesting offerings, and I will attempt to incorporate some of the techniques in my products as tests. I'm extremely strong on product R&D, but my weak point is the period and methods from the end of the bulking period through final shaping. This varies with different doughs (I'm using either straight commercial yeast doughs- I'm a SAF Instant or Premium disciple- or reduced commercial yeast with a biga and an autolyse period), and while I've resisted the use of bannetons and cloth (I'm more a chef than a baker), I've had a honey whole wheat loaf sticking in a US Steel loaf pan after incorporating an autolyse. Perhaps one of these techniques could help build enough strength to solve this issue. However, for each of these techniques in your video, you neglected to mention AT WHAT POINT IN THE DOUGH DEVELOPMENT to do the stretching, and there's no discussion about the timing of the stage development optimal to the stretching. I feel that this area is one of the least noticed and appreciated areas of yeast bread baking, and would genuinely appreciate some discussion of this- even from a theoretical basis if there's no hard core guidelines known.

Hello: I've been making pretty decent baguettes but have yet to attain the beautiful, full-of-holes crumb. The hydration has been around 70%. So, would you recommend going higher with the hydration?...and, am I understanding your 5th tip that I should cold-ferment AFTER forming the baguettes and before proofing them in the couch? Your help and guidance would be so very much appreciated. Thank you. Mac A. P.S. we are at 7100 ft. altitude in N. M.