I've been baking breads & rolls with great success for many years.. but occasionally I run into problems when it comes to rising sweet doughs (panettone, Polish or Russian egg breads & such)...sometimes it takes hours & hours before the sweet dough starts to rise.. even if it rises, it rises a little bit. I always check the expiration date for yeast. So what do I need to do correctly to get the sweet doughs rise promptly & effectively?
Thanks, Michael
snipped-for-privacy@aol.com (Finocchio568) wrote in rec.food.baking :
Generally speaking sweet (rich) doughs require more yeast than lean doughs. Try using an extra 7gm packet.
Ok here's the list of ingredients for the Polish breakfast bread I"ve been trying to make but it takes forever to rise...
- 8 Tbsp. sugar
- 1/2 tsp. salt
- 6 Tbsp. unsalted butter, softened
- 1 tsp. cardamom
- 1 whole egg plus 1 yolk
- 3/4 cup warm half andhalf
- 3/4 cup cake flour
- 3 tsp. active dry yeast
So does it look like it needs more yeast?
It looks almost hopeless to me. There is only 3/4 cup of flour, and that is low protein cake flour. There isn't much gluten there to hold the CO2. Then you have 8 tablespoons of sugar. When you exceed three tablespoon of sugar per cup of flour, you start having problems. In this case you have a ratio of 10.7 tablespoons of sugar to each cup of flour! Sugar links to gluten forming proteins and keeps them from combining into gluten strands. Then you have 6 tablespoons of butter which also interferes with gluten formation. You could probably add a cup of yeast to this and still have bad results. Sweetness in yeast raised products generally comes from filling and/or toppings, not from adding all the sugar to the dough. With the amount of liquid (egg + dairy) coupled with the butter and the scant amount of flour, this looks more like a batter than a dough. Where did the recipe come from?
oops sorry.. I forgot to add 3 cups all purpose flour
I lost my glasses last night and I'm waiting for a new one tonight... please forgive my error.
Due to the factors (high sugar and high fat) mentioned in my last post, you will find that sweet dough takes significantly longer to rise than lean dough. Furthermore, it is more fragile, so you are better off not letting it rise too much - I would stop a little short of double.
Here are two recipes that work for me. While I like to let most bread rise at room temperature or in the refrigerator, I proof sweet dough in a warm place. That is usually in my oven set at 100F or in the oven with a large pan of boiling water.
I use SAF Instant yeast the I buy in 1 pound bricks. I also tend to use a generous portion for sweet dough - a slightly rounded tablespoon for each package specified in the recipe rather than the usual 2 1/4 teaspoons for each package. SAF makes a yeast specifically for high sugar dough called SAF Nevada Gold. I haven't tried it, but you can get it at this link:
---------------------------------------------------------- Coffee cake sweet bread dough
1/4 cup warm water (for the yeast) 1 tablespoon (1 pkg.) yeast 1/3 cup sugar 5 3/4 to 6 1/4 cups AP flour 1 1/2 teaspoons salt 1/3 cup warm milk 1 cup sour cream 3 large eggs grated zest of 1 lemon 8 tablespoon unsalted butter, room temp. cut into piecessnipped-for-privacy@aol.com (Finocchio568) wrote in rec.food.baking :
Yes. Try 5 tsp of yeast. If that fails, switch to quick rise yeast.
There are many factors..... Maybe you use the same amount of yeast you apply to normal doughs. Some bakers falls to that habit regardless of the richness of the dough they are producing. Think about it, dough richness has a slowing effect on yeast activity due to high osmotic pressure that the high sugar contents exerts on the yeast cell. A common remedy is.... Increasing the yeast to a certain level helps..... Normally for sweet dough I use 6-9% ( flour basis)compressed yeast or half of that with dry yeast and nearly a third of that with instant yeast. Another option is: Use a special yeast for high sugar dough. In my trials its more efficient as it has tolerance to high sugar levels and the dough tends to rise faster and gives good oven spring. In addition I tend to use lesser amount of that yeast than using the common compressed or dry yeast. Most of these high sugar yeast is of instant type and the usage level will be around 1.5-3.0% flour basis. In comparison the normal instant yeast can be used at 2-3.5% flour basis for sweet doughs but still you can notice that the rising rate is still better with the special high sugar yeast. If you are using dry yeast properly hydrating it with lukewarm water should be observed and use it when its really bubbly. Even with normal instant yeast rehydrating it with lukewarm water seems to make it more adaptable to sweet dough. In addition.... A slightly higher dough temperature helps also in the range of 27-29 deg C. Another is if you use lots of eggs, its better to cream that with added the sugar to form an emulsion that tends to result in better fermentation performance. Making a sweet dough by multi stage fermentation also results in better fermentation and proofing performance and that is the option that I use if I have the normal yeast. Divide the flour into three parts: First sponge 25% of the flour with just 1.5% yeast and 25% water, let rise, add 25% more flour and enough water, and little bit of eggs or egg yolk to form a very soft dough. Let it rise again fully then finally cream the sugar and remaining eggs including the remaining yeast and combine the other ingredients and form a soft dough. Do not overmix, just until the dough has cleaned the bowl and appears smooth. The nature of sweet dough is that it tends to slacken as the mixing goes you should watch out that when the forms a ball that does not stick to the bowl that is considered optimum time to be removed and sent for fermentation. Mix the dough to the point that the dough remains on the agitator and does not stick to the mixing bowl. it also appears smoother .The sweet dough is already optimally mixed if it does not stick to the bowl anymore and you can lift in in one piece from the mixer. In comparison a normal lean dough still needs more mixing time even if it reaches at that stage. If I use a larger institutional mixer I use the sweet dough blade which makes it more easier to see the developmemt of such dough than with using a dough hook. Roy
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