proper fermenting and proofing

[JEP]

Hi,

I'm trying to develop a home recipe for a dough that is pretty basic using ADY, water, 00 flour and salt.  My aim is a cold fermentation, to develop flavor and creat a crust that is light, airy, and puffs nicely like a Naples style pizza.  I'm cooking it in a home oven with a stone, but I'm not as concerned with my baking method at this point because I know I don't have the texture of my dough correct yet. 

Here is the recipe I used (and I know I need a digital scale), but nonetheless I think there is an obvious fundamental problem that lies in my recipe or method which I am trying to figure out.

4 cups 00 flour, caputo
1/4 teaspoon active dry yeast
1.5 cups warm water
2 teaspoons salt

Mix yeast with warm water.  Add mixture to flour in a kitchen aid.  Mix until it starts coming together.  Add salt and mix.  Let is rest for 5 min.  Mix another 7 -10 minutes on low speed until smooth.  Add to an olive oil greased bowl, cover with plastic wrap and store in 38 degree refrig for 48 hours.  Remove and shape into balls and place back in the refrig for 24 hours.  Remove from refrig and let come to room temp 2+ hours.  Shape, top, and bake. 

Here is the problem.  The dough expanded in the fermentation process, but not much.  I was able to shape it into a decent size and form, but it was not as soft and easy to work with as it should be.  I baked it at 500 degrees on a stone close to the broiler and it got crispy and had nice color but the dough was not as light, airy, and puffy as I would like it to be, nor did it develop as much flavor as I would expect from a 3 day ferment. 

Here are some of my ideas of what to expieriment with next, but I'm hoping to get some feedback so I have a better sense of where to go.

option 1:  use more yeast (since I don't think the dough rose enough)
option 2:  let the first bulk batch ferment at room temp for an hour or two before refrigeration, and then letting it come to room temp before I ball it up.  (I thought possibly more room temp exposure would speed up the fermentation process).

Thanks!

[buceriasdon]

I would double the amount of ADY as a starting point, also I doubt you have enough sugar for the yeast to convert to substain a three day cold ferment to obtain the flavor profile you seek. An aside and I quote from your post:"I'm cooking it in a home oven with a stone, but I'm not as concerned with my baking method at this point because I know I don't have the texture of my dough correct yet." The texture of your crust is interelated to your oven, it's baking temperature and your dough formula. Those characteristics you deem desireable cannot be regarded as separate issues but should regarded as a whole.
Don

[dmcavanagh]

I use very similar proportions, try a scant teaspoon of yeast and you will be fine. I never mix dough with warm water, it starts the fermentation process and that's NOT what you want in a cold fermented dough. Yeast consumes the starches in flour and converts them to sugar, thus there is no need for sugar in a cold fermented dough.

[buceriasdon]

JEP, You should get some replies now since I replied.
Don

[JEP]

Thanks for the replies. 

So the ADY should be fine and do its job even if I mix it with cold water?  I've always heard that ADY should be "woken up" with warm water. 

[dmcavanagh]

I've never needed to wake up my ADY, some will disagree. Try it for yourself and tell us what YOUR experience is.

[dellavecchia]

Hi JEP - I think this is a classic example of a workflow that does not match a recipe, and a flour that does not match a workflow. I am sure you can, with some manipulation, get this recipe to work for you as-is. But you should note that it is not optimal for the flour, the cold fermentation and the quantity of yeast. Your percentages are approximately:

100% Caputo 00 Flour
69% Water
.14% yeast
2.1% salt.

Caputo 00 Pizzeria is made to be fermented at room temperature due to it's low enzymatic activity. Low enzymatic activity means slower fermentation. In Neapolitan pizza making, room temp doughs need to be paced so they don't over ferment, and this flour is made specifically for that task (along with other key specifications).

If you are set on using this flour, here are my suggestions:

1. I agree with Don, increase your yeast - up to double.
2. I would absolutely use warm water to bloom your ADY.
3. Good instincts on your part: I would let your dough sit at room temperature for up to 2 hours to get the fermentation process started before you put the dough in a cold environment.
4. Your high hydration is another issue, and will prevent browning unless your oven temps are super high (especially with Caputo). Adding sugar to your dough, upwards of 2% might help you there.

John

[JEP]

John,

Thanks for the insight on 00 flour. 

I will definitely experiment with some of your ideas on my next batch.  You mentioned the hydration level.  Eventually I am going to test this recipe in a wood burning oven.  Do you think my hydration level is appropriate or still high for even that? 

[buceriasdon]

JEP, I guesstimate your hydration to be close to 64%, I can't be more accurate, but that's great for 00 flour and high temps, in fact, that's what you want. Between 62 and 65. Buy that scale you've been looking at.
Don

[Pete-zza]

JEP,

Yeast producers recommend two ways to rehydrate active dry yeast (ADY). The first is to suspend the ADY in a small amount of the total formula water at a temperature of around 105 degrees F for about 10 minutes. At that point, the rehydrated ADY can be added to the rest of the formula water, or to the rest of the ingredients in the mixer bowl. Ideally, you want the temperature of the rest of the formula water to be such as to produce a finished dough temperature of around 75-80 degrees F. The second way to rehydrate the ADY is to add it dry to the flour and other dry ingredients and use water at a temperature of around 120-130 degrees F. You don't want to add ADY to cool or cold water. If you do that, and especially where the amount of yeast is small, what you can expect to see is a very long fermentation window before you are able to use the dough. To give you an example of what can happen when you take the rehydration rules too casually, read Reply 48 at http://www.pizzamaking.com/forum/index.php/topic,6758.msg64308/topicseen.html#msg64308. In that case, I used roughly the same amount of ADY as you did but its percent of use was higher (about double what I estimate you used) because I was using less flour. You will note that I added the ADY dry to the flour but used a water temperature of only 65 degrees F. I did everything intentionally in order to extend the fermentation window but you can see from the above post that using ADY out of the norm has consequences.

In your case, your use of all of the water warm was actually a good idea even though you did not follow the recommended rehydration procedures. But, your use of yeast was small and using all warm water no doubt accelerated the fermentation process, but perhaps still not enough. I agree with the others that you should use more yeast. I might use about triple what you used but follow the recommended procedures to rehydrate the ADY.

I also agree with Don and disagree with Dave on the matter of adding some sugar to your dough. The main reason is that you are using Caputo 00 flour. That flour is an unmalted flour, so you will not have the benefit of amylase performance conferred by the barley malt to convert the damaged starch to sugars to feed the yeast and to contribute to crust coloration. Moreover, the Caputo 00 flour has less damaged starch than our domestic flours, so you will get less natural sugar production for that reason also. Normally, a dough made with a malted flour can last a couple of days or so under cold fermentation. Sometimes, you might even make it out to three days. In your case, I would add about 2% sugar to your dough.

I see as I was composing this post that you got some good advice from John, one of the forum's best on the use of 00 flours and making Neapolitan style doughs. For that reason, I did not change my post.

Peter

[JEP]

Thanks Peter.  Gotta say this is my first day on the forum and I'm lovin' it already! 

With some of the insights you and John have provided on the 00 flour I am using, it brings me to the question:  is there even any point in cold fermenting this type of flour? 

BTW Don, bought the scale today! 

[Pete-zza]

With some of the insights you and John have provided on the 00 flour I am using, it brings me to the question:  is there even any point in cold fermenting this type of flour? 

JEP,

I'm glad you are enjoying yourself. But, if you are not careful, you might become hopelessly addicted.

I discussed some of the implications of using the Caputo 00 flour for cold fermentation applications, as well as some of the points I covered in my last post, at Reply 46 at http://www.pizzamaking.com/forum/index.php/topic,17555.msg179560.html#msg179560. There are some professionals who cold ferment 00 doughs but I believe that the 00 flours do better in ambient temperature fermentation applications. However, if you are interested, there is an entire thread devoted to the use of 00 flour in cold fermentation applications at http://www.pizzamaking.com/forum/index.php/topic,1298.0.html. Several of us struggled in a largely losing cause to find ways of making and using 00 cold fermented doughs as discussed in that thread, specifically, in the context of using standard home ovens. I think it is almost universally agreed that you really need a very high temperature oven, such as a wood-fired oven, to achieve optimum results when using 00 flours. However, one approach that seems to work reasonably well in a standard home oven setting is to blend the 00 flours with some of our domestic flours, such as bread or high-gluten flours. That is what Dom DeMarco does at DiFara's, with a gas deck oven but one that was modified to produce higher temperatures than specified for current models of the same type of oven.

Peter

[Pete-zza]

JEP,

There is a point that I forgot to mention in my earlier posts. And that point has to do with the kinds of things that harm yeast and how that problem might be resolved by simply using more yeast. For example, yeast can be harmed by water temperatures that are too low (like ice cold water but also including cool or room temperature water in the case of ADY) or too high (above about 130-135 degrees F), excessive amounts of salt, excessive amounts of sugar, and freezing a dough. However, if you materially increase the amount of yeast, you can end up with enough viable yeast cells such that the dough can perform reasonably well despite the loss of fermentation capacity.

I remember one case where a member posted a recipe that, in my opinion, had far too much salt and far too much sweetener (a combination of sugar and honey). However, the amount of yeast was also excessive in my opinion. Surprisingly, the recipe performed beautifully, and I did a lot of head scratching to determine why the recipe performed so well. I concluded that the excessive amount of yeast overcame all of the attacks on it. By analogy, it was like sending more troops than necessary into battle knowing that there would be substantial casualties but that there would be enough survivors to achieve the tactical objective. In the above example, I scaled down the amounts of salt, sweetener and yeast and got comparable results.

So, the lesson I took away from the above exercise was that if you plan to break the rules regarding the proper use of yeast that are likely to harm the yeast, use more of it. My preference, of course, is to follow the rules.

Peter

[JEP]

Thanks Peter.  In my next batch I'm going to:

- use more yeast and attempt to properly bloom it
- let the dough rest for a couple of hours at room temp before I send it to the fridge.
- add sugar to my recipe, initially I wanted to keep it minimalist, but your discussion of using sugar convinced me that I must experiment with it. 

Looking forward to testing this out and will get back to on results in a few days.

Jimmy

[Pete-zza]

Jimmy,

If you are going to let the dough rest for a couple of hours before refrigerating, and especially if it is warm where you live (with an elevated room temperature), you may want to use less yeast than I suggested. Maybe something between two and three times the amount of yeast you used.

Peter

[dmcavanagh]

Wow, either my doughs are a mirage, or I get lucky...every single time!

[Pete-zza]

Dave,

There are many ways to skin the cat, and you aren't the only one who is "breaking" the rules when it comes to the use of ADY. There are several other members who do the same, me included, but with a purpose. I also believe that Papa John's does the same thing. it's the only way that I can think of to make dough at a commissary using a small amount of yeast (I am guessing ADY) and transport the dough balls (in refrigerated trucks) to stores and be usable up to eight days, and to do do consistently.

But when it comes to newbies, given a choice, I'd rather that they learn how to use ADY in accordance with the rules. After that, it is their prerogative to do as they please.

Peter

[JEP]

Peter,

I missed your last post before I made my next batch of dough - I ended up going with 3/4 teaspoon of yeast as opposed to the 1/4 t in my original batch.  I also added sugar as you suggested.  I let the dough bulk rise for 2 hours at room temp then into the fridge for 48 hours.  Brought it out for a couple of hours, balled it, then back to the fridge for 24 hours.  Before I shaped it I let it rest at room tempo for 2 or 3 hours. 

It definitely turned out better than my last batch.  The dough was easier to work with, flavor was really good, crust was puffer and lighter. 

It is still not quite where I want it though.  The dough balls are still not stretching (or are as easy to shape) as I would like them to be. 

I was thinking for my next batch I would add a touch more yeast and that I will ball the dough after 24 hours instead of after 48 hours.  Is there anything else I should be thinking about? 

Thanks.

Jimmy

[dellavecchia]

The dough balls are still not stretching (or are as easy to shape) as I would like them to be. 

Jimmy - Could you take pics the next time? Caputo at 65% and higher nearly stretches by itself - it is so elastic. It's flour composition is made to be very elastic to begin with. So your comments about it not being able to stretch well has me thinking a) it is over fermented or b) there is a measurement mistake. If the dough is over fermented it will build up enough acid and become tough to stretch. It will also tear easily.

John

[JEP]

John,

I think over fermenting might have been an issue.  The dough was not stretching itself easily and wanted to thin out a little too easily in the middle while I was shaping.  I will definitely photograph next time.

Its possible that I may have overcompensated a bit in the fermenting process this time since my dough did not rise much in my previous batch.

What do you think?  Possibly a little more yeast and a little less room temp proofing?  I have a scale now so I will be able to provide exact measurements of my next batch.