Moin and Gluten Tag. What are your best tips for handling a sticky dough? Please drop a comment. If your dough suddenly becomes sticky during bulk fermentation you likely have overfermented your dough. I have a video on this here: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-P59OfgJ4Dps.html. I'd recommend to just toss your dough into a loaf pan, proof it 24 hours in your fridge and then bake it with steam for half the time at 230°C. It's ready when the core of the bread is 95°C. If you want to see a full tutorial on sourdough from start to finish I recommend this video: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-NMglhwp2lNs.html. It features the full process very much in depth.
@@the_bread_code No, I just finish bulk at about 29°C and then cool it down to make it easier to work with. Then I shape it and let it in the fridge for about 10 hours before baking.
I have watched so many videos on sourdough that it is crazy and none of the others even comes close to how well you have done explaining how to work with the dough. Thank you for all the help making sourdough bread. You have been a blessing for those of us that dream of making sourdough that looks and tastes amazing. The real hard to imagine is you do it without all the gadgets that everyone else thinks you have to have! Thank you for all the help and God bless you.
This video cleared up to me the notion that there are countless ways to treat our moist doughs and get excellent results! Ich liebe Roggen auch! Vielen Dank!
Beautiful Crumb 👏👏😍😍 and thank you for the freezer tips. Normally i did that only when i bake baguette, 15 mins in the freezer before baking. Definitely will try for loaf bread.
Moin Rika. Awesome - you must have a large freezer. How do you place the baguettes in the freezer? I keep failing at scoring baguettes. Very curious to know how you do that. Thank you!
I’m experimenting with a 50/50 bench/fridge proofing so far, I’ve got tipsy n forgot to put it in the fridge till I woke at 6 with a headache n went downstairs to get painkillers- saw the dough on the bench, said ‘oh deary me’ and put the dough in the fridge for a couple or 4 hours- needless to say it was somewhat ripe, vaguely kept it’s shape when it went in the oven- but came out actually flatter than it went in and had a strong but not unpleasant acidic/sour taste. The second time went better, still slightly over proofed I think but much less bench proofing, but overall bulk proof was too long, the bread rise a little in the oven, had a nice soft lattice inside, a small ear, but very tasty, I’ll try again with less bulky fermentation- I think my starter may be a bit slow, took it out of the fridge the day before, fed it, discarded most the next day and the-fed, still took overnight to double in size. What I have stated doing is putting the starter in a screw top drink bottle - like a protein shaker type thing- adding the water first and giving it a really good shake before adding the flour to the starter- oxygenating the starter, as you would a mash before fermentation to make beer- yeast like oxygen.
Moin Sean. Haha, yes, this happens to me all the time. I forget about the dough frequently 🤣. You always have to adapt and overcome. Interesting idea with the oxygenating. Thanks for sharing. Cheers!
Very timely video. I'm on loaf 3. I feel good about my starter. My bread protein is around 11, I think. 20% starter and 65% hydration with the starter flour and water included in the hydration calculation. I even used my oven and its light for proofing. I stirred my starter into my 110 degree F water. It all came down to wet dough, even at 65%. I spend a few days getting my courage up to try one more time. I am determined. BTW, rye starter 1:20:20 started at 10 pm and used in the morning. the starter had doubled in 6-8 hours and had a nice dome on top. It looked ideal. I mixed the dry flours with salt and the wet starter with the water. Autolyse for 1 one hour. etc. I'll try the overnight autolyse next time.
Moin Micky. Wow. That's a fast size increase of your starter. You can also use colder water to slow down the process. In general colder temperatures favor yeast activity. With warmer temperatures you run into overfermentation a little faster.
@@the_bread_code Some other video said a well developed (new) starter will double in 6-8 hours. That's what I was looking for. It did that. There was a nice dome on top of the starter when I used it.
Micky, try to find a higher protein bread flour. Bob's Red Mill Artisan Flour is a good choice. You might want to research using a Vital Gluten to bump up your gluten. In the USA, it will be difficult to find any flours higher than 14%. Use Vital Wheat Gluten sparingly as a little goes a long way.
@@keithepstein2812 I bought a bag of Giustos Organic Ultimate Performer bread flour. They claim protein is 13.0 - 14.5 %. I do have some gluten flour. Thanks for the tip.
@@MickyELee Foodgeek has a video on spiking low protein flour with Vital Wheat Gluten. However, the Giustos's Performer might not need it. ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-BL6lIANkWCc.html
Thank you very much for this - I have just had a disaster so found this - I think I have to be very patient with sourdough!!! Not sure I have the patience but thank you for your channel!
Thank you for your videos! They are a great inspiration for me. I like to watch them while I make bread. I have learned to treat my dough more gently thanks to them! I love making 90 % hydration of bio Dinkel 1050 and bio Roggenmehl 1150 because it tastes wonderful! But that means only 9 and 13 percent gluten respectively. Your tips on how to create dough strengh work very well until I get to the coil folding... The dough is too sticky on my hands and won´t let itself "fold". I try though but perhaps I am damaging it more than creating strengh... Have you ever baked a 90 percent hydration bread? The taste is wonderful but I need to use a cake mould to bake it because it won´t stand on its own... Not a big problem though... Thanks again. Liebe Grüße aus Mannheim! Carina
Moin Carina. Hope all is good! Yes - tried to even go to 106% hydration. You can just use a loaf pan if you like. That will make things a lot easier. What you described sounds like you might have used a little bit too much water for your flour. It's okay, but then the loaf pan option will make you an amazing sandwich bread!
Thanks for another great video! I learn with each viewing. I think on the next loaf I will be more gentle on the coil folds. Bit by bit and loaf by loaf they are getting better. The latest change for me was moving from King Arthur Bread Flour to Bobs Red Mill Artisan Bread Flour. I have to send to the midwest for it. But, my first loaf has MUCH bigger bubbles than I have ever got before! It is all the technique I am getting from you and better ingredients that make the difference! Yeay!
I totally agree with you about Bob's Artisan Bread Flour. High protein content helps a lot. If you can find a locally milled high protein bread flour, give that a try. I'm in the Seattle Area, and Cairnspring Mills produces amazing bread flours.
@@keithepstein2812 I live in California and and thought sure I could get locally milled artisan flour. NOPE! I mean I bet you can but 3 stores in Berkeley but they had no idea what I was talking about.
Awesome, that sounds very good. Why did you get bigger bubbles? Was the protein content higher of your new flour? What did you change? I am very curious. Thanks!
@@the_bread_code I write out what I do and so keep it pretty much the same. The difference really was the bread flour. I am hearing from people that how old the flour is makes a difference. King Arthur around here has a good reputation and the bread was good. But all I would ever get was a few big bubbles. All the rest would be like normal bread. It was like you punched it down. Lots and lots of really small bubbles. The flour I am using now is Bobs Red Mill from the midwest. I sent directly to them and they sent it direct. So not very processed and very fresh. He does not put protein content on the package (or have not found it). But now it looks like actual sourdough when I bake it. It is so cool! I am using around 80% hydration. It also seems to take the the higher hydration better. It does not get AS sticky and messy as the KA did. Thanks for the notes and I am following your bakes!!!!
@@qwarlockz8017 Bob's Red Mill Artisan Bread Flour nutritional information can be found here: www.bobsredmill.com/artisan-bread-flour.html . 5g protein in 36g of flour, so protein is 13.9%.
Thanks for adding to my "continuing improvement". All good tips, but what works especially well for me is: let the dough rest for a quarter hour, have a cup of tea, and wash your hands! Sticky hands beget sticky dough.
Moin Jon. How did it work out? For my day to day bread I go much lower, more around 65%. Make sure to add enough strength, that is very important for a sticky dough :-). If it doesn't work, just use your loaf pan in the end.
Shaping dough fermented in the fridge makes things a bit easier. I find quick stitching works for me. If it's too sticky for that then a tin is probably best
Moin my Dear! So if I understood you correctly, you feed your dough the night before, right? I'd love to see a timing video of the whole process pretty please :) and what's the deal with you and fünfzehn? 😁 You are saying it purrfectly in English :) same as German, short first part, longer second :) and when you say fünfzig, that's the same sound as fifty. There you go mein freund :)
Moin Kati. Haha. Thanks. I will try this. Maybe I am too excited when recording the video 🤣🤣🤣🤣. Yes, sure. Full process sounds good 😎. Yes. I feed starter before going to bed and also autolyse over night. Then it's ready the next evening 👍
I tried for the first time making sourdough with a few RU-vid clips. I spend an hour cleaning the kitchen.. The sticky dough was everywhere.. 😂😂😂 I got so frustrated it was my stress ball. The more it sticks the more i squashed it.. So i had to restart and found your channel.. Lets hope for the best
Hi Hendrik, I love your channel I learn so much from you. As you might know your great sourdough friend Sune has a breadcalculator. In the calculator is the option 'tangzhong' can you make a video about baking a sourdough bread with a tangzhong, please? See it as a challenge.....!
could you please put the timeline from start to finish? and also, if I can put the dough in the fridge after mixed the starter, water and flour and work on the steps after? with the timetable, it will help a lot to know how much time I need to put into each of the process. thank you so much for your time and help!
Moin Mary. Hope all is good! Yes, you could do that, that would slow down the process. In general you want to wait until your dough doubled in size during bulk fermentation. I recently made a video covering all the aspects from start to finish, including the time-table. Hope this helps: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-NMglhwp2lNs.html
@@the_bread_code I let the dough in the room temperature for 4 hours and it didn't double the size, during which time, I did the folds every 15 minutes to increase the strength to no avail. the dough became loose and flat and very sticky and I can't manage it anymore. that's why I put it in fridge, otherwise, I will go crazy. so, should I take it out and let it sit in room temp again and go from there to the bulk fermentation and put it back in the fridge for how long? and if I can bake it after bulk fermentation - not put it back to fridge? I will check the time table you have and hope I can understand it. thank you so much again!
Mon Mary. I think the problem is that your starter is too sour. Try feeding a 1:5:5 ratio over a few days and then use it at peak performance. If you want to bake an overnight bread consider using 5% starter or 10% starter so that you can sleep and continue in the morning. No need to use the fridge then :-). For proofing you can use the fridge yep!
Fantastic, amazing. Congratulations! Please: After coil fold, how many time the dough needs to rest before shaping with dry flour, in this process? And how many time in banneton basket? Danke for this!
Moin Sergio. Excellent question. It needs as long as it takes to roughly double in size. I have a small probe which I extract from the main dough. It does wonders 👍. For proofing in the banneton try 24 hours in the fridge. That's the easiest 😎
@@the_bread_code Aww, you are such a nice guy. It's always a pleasure spending time with you. A long time ago I spent a year as an exchange student in Austria and Germany, mostly in Austria. I don't recall the Moin greeting and probably would have thought someone was saying Good Morning. But now I know better, haha. In Austria, they said Servus. I have a soft spot in my heart especially for Germany. Greetings from Akron, Ohio ~Janet
I will have to try rye starter. I put some whole wheat in yesterday’s bread to add flavor and it turned great. I have been using 1:3:3 but I have been also using ice packs on the overnight bulk fermentation 🤣🤣🤣
Hi! Where do you live? And what's the temperature at your place at this time of the year? Just curious, because I live in the Philippines a tropical country where our current temperatures range from 26 to 34 degrees C and high humidity at 90%.😅
Maria Carla Kramer I live in Florida. At this time of the year it is in the 80s and very humid. With the AC it is around 78 in my kitchen and the humidity about 50% But I have noticed it is too warm. So the ice packs help
Awesome :-D. You could also try reducing the starter %. I typically do 10% starter on my overnight bread, but recently with temperatures in the 80s/90s I have switched to using only 5% starter over night. Could help you avoiding using ice packs. You can try experimenting with this value a little bit :-). It shouldn't have fully doubled when you wake up.
Thanks for the method/process. But mine is still super sticky, like titebond II. I even applied the technique of Richard Bertinet but still doesnt work, unless I spread a bit of flour. But, I will try your method and advice :) Other than that, I have no problem making it round when I use poolish, not the starter.
I think the one thing that saved my dough is remembering that almost all dough is sticky if it's too hot! Keeping my temperature control lets me comfortably shape a 74-75% hydration dough easily after basically wasting dozens with very little oven spring and impossible to score nicely. I try to keep my dough around 25-26c, what temperature do you go for?
Moin Randomness. Great comment, thanks! I feel this is mostly though due to the fact that the bacterial part of your sourdough produces more acidity. In general I did not notice that warmer dough is stickier. I agree though that it is way easier to score a cold dough than a warm dough.
I was so discouraged because, after 2 years of wonderful sourdough bread, I started getting super sticky dough! The bread was edible, well actually tasted good, but not great texture. And really dissatisfying to work with this video gives me hope! I think my starter has become too acidic. I’ll be watching this one and the one about refreshing my starter again a few times! Thanks so much!
Beautiful result, Bro! I see you purchased the Danish (or is it German?) oven baking glass dome and plate...is the base plate made from metal? I saw it was about 200 Euros? By the way, did u ever See Joy Ride lamination technique ? it is AMAZING! I wonder why Sune never does lamination? Did u ask him?
Moin Harley. Thank you. Yep, it's called Brovn. It's great for doing a timelapse during baking :-). I would normally use my dutch oven, or 2 tray steam technique. Yep - Joy Ride likes doing this too for sticky doughs. I will reach out to Sune and ask, great question.
I have a question. If I feed my starter in the evening and it doubles in size after 5 hours can I still use it in the morning after 8 hours , or will it have fermented too long.
You can still use it, but you have to be more careful! You will run into overfermentation issues much faster. Try using a feeding ratio like 1:5:5 next time or use cold water.
@the bread code. Hi. You mention at the start of the video about an overnight autolyse . can you please tell us more about this because I like your thinking that you can start early the next morning
Moin Dharmesh. Excellent question. Of course. So I feed the starter 1:5:5, sometimes 1:10:10. I want it to be ready when I wake up. Then I also mix the flour and water of the dough. Your dough shouldn't be longer than 24 hours at room temperature, else your flour breaks down too much. But this way I can mix everything together first thing in the morning and typically have a bread by around 5-6pm the same day :-).
Water makes a huge difference. I usually use 66% (297ml on 450g flour). Yesterday I uses 69% (310ml on 450g flour) and it became a lot(!) more liquidy than normal. This was with spelt flour and I think spelt flour can hold a lot less water. If I were to try 75% doughs they would be an extremely sticky mess. Did you ever test spelt dough? If not maybe you could try it, I use the Lidl (Germany) 650 (300g) and 1050 (150g).
Whazzzaaaaaaaaaaaaa wuzzzup. See what I did there? 🤣. I'd recommend to stick at 65% hydration for that flour. 1050 might be able to absorb more water. Have a look at the protein content of the flour, it is the major factor. You can use whole wheat, or whole spelt. Regardless, the closer to whole grain, the more water you can absorb. Imagine a seed, the seed likes to soak in as much water as possible. I actually never baked with spelt before. Shame on me!
The Bread Code My every day bread is Dinkelbrot with yeast (I have no luck with sour dough but I am still trying). I use the recipe from Lutz Geißler’s „Brot backen in Perfektion mit Hefe“. And he recommends to use a Mehlkochstück for Dinkelbrot. For higher hydration. That ist 5 parts water 1 part flour. And for my recipe the salt. I mix 12 g salt with 150 g water add 30 g spelt flower and cook it like a pudding. That is the amount I need for one bread with another 570 g of spelt flower. 215 g water, 25 g lemon juice (spelt benefits from vitamin C) and 0,3 g of yeast. Yes, less than 1 gram of yeast. That is possible with 24 hours rest at room temperature. So all in all 65% hydration. But I guess higher hydration is possible. Lutz Geißler also recommends a Mehlkochstück for spelt sour dough bread. But no lemon juice for sour dough spelt bread. If you put the salt from the recipe in the Mehlkochstück you can make the Mehlkochstück several days in advance. You can keep it in the fridge for about a week (with the salt). Since you mastered wheat sour dough so well - what about spelt? New challenge!
My dough is way stickier even with not too high hydration levels. It's literally like glued to the surface. I could never just with my fingers lift the dough even a little bit. Everywhere the dough touched the surface it leaves (a lot of) residue. My surface is untreated wood (though it saw a lot of olive oil through the years) and not a nice and smooth granite top though. You often tell us that something has gone wrong if our dough doesn't look like yours but is there actually a remedy at those stages or is prevention by doing everything right in the first place the only way? I fought my dough today for literally 2 hours. It never got to the point where I could lift it off the bench.
I am, at this moment making a truly stick dough. Started with a sponge of rye starter, coffee, and approximately 2 c rye flour. Eventually adding molasses, cocoa, salt, pecans, and sour cherries, plus bread flour and a strong wheat flour; so it is truly sticky!! It rose nicely! Doubled in about 3 hrs bulk fermentation. I am at the shaping process and it is really STICKY! I heard with rye it may be difficult to obtain the window pane effect? Because it never really developed a good stretch. Any thoughts?
Moin Lynn. Rye is a completely different world. This won't work with rye unfortunately. With rye you should go for 65% hydration roughly, or go to 100% and then bake it in a loaf pan. Try the loaf pan version, definitely my top 3 favorite breads :-).
Thanks for the suggestion! Jules, it tasted good but it ended up flatter than when I put it in the oven! Steam and everything I usually do. This is such a learning experience and happy for that. I am a pretty inexperienced baker but for some reason this has caught my attention. When I get it right I will report back.
Gute Frage. Dann würde ich glaube ich erstmal ein Bier trinken, mich 10 Minuten auf ein Bein stellen und dann anfangen zu weinen 🤣. Spaß beiseite, das habe ich noch nie gehört, dass sowas passieren kann. Könnte dein Sauerteig eventuell viel zu sauer sein? Zu viel Roggen eventuell?
I assume your starter is at 100% hydratation ? In which case it's 400water/550flour = 73% hydratation for the dough and not 77% or am I missing something ?
Thanks so much for spotting the error. It's been 375 grams of water, also double checked my original video one more time :-). So 425 grams of water with 550 grams of flour (including the starter). Cheers and thanks again!
I think I’ll not only give up in making bread but also on eating bread . Spent 2 months learning the skill and wasting time and energy and supplies I am at the end of my wits.Have to admit this is not my thing.
At what point are you doing this with your sticky dough? I do my S&F and go to let it rise (bulk ferment) and it doesn't matter the % hydration or recipe, my dough gets very wet and is very heavy at this point. It never rises. Obviously I am doing something to cause this but I don't know what. My starter is a couple months old and ALWAYS at least doubles. So I don't think it is my starter.
How does the dough know if it is in the fermenting phase or the proofing phase? How does your process of shaping ”tell” the dough to now proof instead of ferment? Or is it the same thing? Can’t I just put the dough into the basket right from the start and let it sit there for 5-6 hours?
Moin Jochen. The whole process is called fermentation. Bulk fermentation is the first stage. In this video we don't divide the dough, we don't ferment in bulk. Normally if you make multiple doughs at the same time, this term would apply more. If you want, I would recommend you to consider using a loaf pan. You can make a sticky dough (1 part water to flour 1 part water). Then let that ferment for the same time and in the end toss it in the loaf pan. Place another 24 hours in the fridge and then bake :-)
Thanks! I am sure I am going to have more questions in the future. Your channel has helped me bake my first successful bread. Before that I was just stumbling around and nothing really worked well. Now I am in the process of understanding all the ”why?”. I am a fellow German who has lived in Sweden for 14 years and I recently moved to the country side where you cannot get any decent bread anywhere, so there is only one way forward!
English is my first and only language, I clearly heard fifteen. That being said; many native English speakers, especially Americans, cannot differentiate between 13 and 30, 14 and 40, 15 and 50 etcetera. It is quite frustrating. We Americans are truly frustrating.
My dough is much more sticky than your. I used “bread” flour and 80% hydration and starter as you recommend. Wet hand still stick, badly. I started sprinkling flour and a scrapper many times till I could handle the dough. Little oven spring. I suck at this 😞
Moin Ali. Could be an option, but then you would also damage the structure of the main dough. I placed it in the fridge and then baked it in the morning in a pan with a little bit of oil. Perfect breakfast bun :-).
My starter rises perfectly with whole wheat flour. When I try to change it to a white starter or use it in white bread, it barely rises. I've tried unbleached organic white flours of both bread and AP flour and different brands. Is it necessary to have a high ash content flour with plenty of nutrients like whole meal even in white breads? My white breads just don't rise or aerate and just start to smell sour instead.
Hi, you do take your job very seriously, thank you for all the detailed explanations. Though I don’t understand why you - as a German - use this very simple English with american accent. If you grew up in Europe I would expect you to have a British English accent and use a more refined grammar. Did you grow up in the U.S.?
Moin VR. Valid comment. That sticking to the fingers, that only happens after I overfermented the dough completely. Also - wetted hands make a big difference.
The Bread Code Danke! But its not overfermented, I think I need to autolyse it longer. I tried one today and it came out better with same hydration but with longer autolyse and even more kneading by hand ...
@@the_bread_code what should one do if it is indeed over fermented. Do you recommend tossing it? I would be interested in learning how to save a **really** sticky dough (over fermented and all).
Maybe I am overdoing it... I think I get excited when my balls start to firm up. Then they bust up and make a mess and it gets all over my hands and in between my fingers... When I try to make a wet dough. The results are not good and the crust is too hard. I am just learning but I guess I would rather end up with a loaf that crumbles apart instead of one that is a rock, Though I learned to avoid when its too crumbly. Wet dough never works for me then I want to swear or cry. The worst thing its like every time as soon as my hands are covered in slime then I have to go pee really urgently.
Moin Void. Haha, oh noes. I think what happened is that you overfermented your bread. That's the reason why it turned out like a sticky mess in the end. Try fermenting a little less the next time. That will definitely help.
Vor dem Hintergrund, dass die Deutschen das Backhandwerk ernster nehmen als der Großteil der Rest der Welt: Willst Du nicht auf deutsch sprechen, und englische Untertitel machen?
Moin dffvb. Wäre mal eine sehr gute Idee. Hatte ich auch schon überlegt. Allerdings, würde ich dann denke ich nicht so eine große Zielgruppe erreichen. Eventuell mal einen BreadCodeDE Channel?
@@the_bread_code Gute Frage mit der Zielgruppe. Du kannst ja auch mal das gleiche Video doppelt hochladen, und schauen wie die Resonanz ist. Ich bin im Ausland geboren, und daher mit beidem fein :-) So oder so: Sehr guter Kanal, der mir mühsame Recherchen / Versuche in der Vergangenheit erspart hätte :-)
Würde ich nicht machen an deiner Stelle: fast jeder der deutsch kann und sich auf RU-vid bewegt kann auch englisch. Die Wahrscheinlichkeit dass jemand der englisch spricht auch deutsch kann oder auch nur anhören will ist dagegen verschwindend.
@@peterp-a-n4743 Falsche Annahme, selbst in der IT gibt es unheimlich viele die wo möglich einen Bogen um Englisch machen, bei Leuten die Brot backen wollen ist die Chance ungleich höher....
@@nixxblikka mag schon sein dass es "unheimlich viele" sind. Am Ende des Tages sind IT-ler die nicht englisch können (insbesondere unter denen die Deutsch können) eine Minderheit und das gilt auch für YT Konsumenten im Allgemeinen.
