Sticky Dough

[fecpiemaker]

Hi Doc - I need some help.  My small shop purchases dough balls from Sams Club.  We keep frozen until ready to use, then we place in Fridge for 2 days.  Doughballs are pre-oiled in separate plastic bags.  We take out of fridge and are ready for use.  Sometimes when we take the dough out, it is extremely sticky and very hard to handle.  After we cook, the dough doesn't have a very good taste and the crust is extremely floppy.

This doesn't happen all of the time, but does happen.  We are trying to figure out where the problem is.  Maybe we are getting some boxes that have thawed and refrozen.  We just don't know.  What do you think might make the dough sticky?

[franko9752]

I used those dough balls for a little while too. Used them on my bakers pride p22bl deck oven right out of the fridge. Sams uses a press to form the shell and a convayor oven so the mix is made for their purpose. I have since switched to making my own dough again and glad i did.

[The Dough Doctor]

I can't say for sure without actually having the dough ball in my hands, but I'll put money on one of two things.
1) Essentially all commercially made frozen dough contains either L-cysteine (think PZ-44) or glutathione (think dead yeast) as a reducing agent to both reduce the dough mixing time and to improve processing of the cold dough. If they are getting inconsistent doses of this material into the dough (not hard to do), this might explain the unusually soft and overly sticky dough you are occasionally experiencing.
2) As you note, temperature abuse. Frozen dough does not tolerate temperature abuse well at all, and this could well be the culprit here. In either case, I would contact the manufacturer of the frozen dough and notify them of the problem. You may well need to change suppliers or go to making your own dough to get away from the problem if the dough manufacturer isn't getting flooded with dough performance complaints.
Tom Lehmann/The Dough Doctor