adjusting for changes in flour

[fazzari]

For the past 30 years, I've been on a mission to make a consistent, dependable skin (using the cracker style methods of recipe and sheeting).  We now weigh every bag of flour, we take the temperature of the water we use as well as the after mix temperature, we undermix the dough and as the flour changes from lot to lot we adjust our hydration percentage to keep the dough undermixed (that is we mix each batch a specific amount of time).  In the winter time, it seems our flour changes to becoming very, very strong...that is ...it develops super fast during the mix...this flour causes us the most problems and produces the types of skins which require a ton of work (adjusting oven temps, the use of screens etc). 
Since working on the cracker style dough method at home..I've learned a ton, and am reminded about just how important undermixing is to the process....so to apply what I've learned to work, we cut the mixing time as well as lowered the hydration rate...this actually produces a great skin.....I have also learned that you can basically use whatever hydration rate you want (the last one I tried was the Round Table one at 48%?) and as long as you undermix it, you can come up with a super skin.
My question is: 90 percent of the time, I can manage a superior skin by simply adjusting hydration rate and keeping mix time constant, the other 10 percent I'm adusting hydration rate as well as mix time..........I'm wondering if I should simply keep the hydration rate constant for every flour and adjust the mix time according to dough development.. Could this be the answer I've been searching for...could you please share some thoughts?
John

[DNA Dan]

John,

As I scientist, I would suggest keeping the hydration always the same and figuring out a "baseline" time for when ALL the batches would be undermixed. Then have the operator watch the next 5 minutes of mixing since I am sure it's that time critical. You should be able to train someone's eye to find that sweet spot of when the dough is "just right". Changing the hydrations and keeping time constant seems like a more difficult way to standardize this, because if you are underhydrated and go through the whole mixing time that you established, then you will add more water and have to extend the mix time. You could not know this in advance without having mixed the dough.

You would certainly have to test that a 5 minute vs. 8 minute mix on the same hydration ratio (with your "strong" and "weak" flours) cook up the same.

On another note, is it possible you could "stock up" or buy futures in the weak version of the flour so you could skip the purchase of the stronger flour altogether? This would eliminate the issue almost entirely.

[Pete-zza]

John,

My first instinct was that you may not have been weighing out the flour and water. As you know, Big Dave Ostrander has noted on several occasions that a 50-lb. bag of flour weighs just about anything but 50 pounds. However, when I went searching for his comments on the extent of variations of the flour in 50-lb. sacks, I came across your post last year at the Pizza Today bulletin board at
http://www.pizzatoday.com/cgi-bin/ubb/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic&f=1&t=000771 where you noted that a 50-lb. bag of flour in your shop can weigh from 47 pounds to 52 pounds (not including the roughly 8 ounces that the empty sack weighs.)  Seeing that you weigh the flour and water takes that issue off of the table for purposes of this discussion.

My second thought was that the protein content of your flour may be varying from lot to lot or possibly on some seasonal basis. Tom Lehmann has commented on this little known phenomenon before (regrettably the PMQ Think Tank archives are no longer accessible for me to be able to cite his comments to you) but, as noted by member Trinity, a professional baker, the protein content of flour can vary to the point where more or less water is required in the mixer bowl to compensate (see Replies 12-17 starting at http://www.pizzamaking.com/forum/index.php/topic,3416.msg29094.html#msg29094). If protein content is an issue, I don’t know how you would know it in advance without technical instrumentation to be able to adapt your processes to the differences in protein content to achieve consistent results. If protein content were a seasonal phenomenon, you might be able to make some adjustments to compensate.

I am also aware that there are seasonal factors such as temperature and humidity that can affect a dough, as pointed out in this article by Tom Lehmann: http://www.pmq.com/mag/2006march/lehmann.php. Measuring and controlling temperatures as suggested by Tom Lehmann in the article is always a good idea, but that method is not precise and involves many variables in its own right that you may not be able to account for in your processes.

I think it may also be safe to rule out the moisture of the flour as a big problem in your case because, unlike those of us for whom a 50-lb. bag of flour lasts for several months or even longer, you are getting the flour fresh and quickly from the miller/supplier and are using it at a fast clip before exogenous factors can materially affect the performance of the flour.

It occurred to me that using rest period during mixing might improve the hydration of stronger flours but that will also make weaker flours “wetter”, and the rest periods will also affect the finished dough temperature as the dough temperature moves in the direction of the room temperature during the rest periods (assuming you are not varying dough batch sizes, mixer speeds, etc.). Even if rest periods were beneficial, I don’t know how you would know it since there are so few reliable and consistent visual clues with low-hydration doughs on the extent of hydration, as I myself discovered recently when working with low-hydration cracker-style doughs. Again, if there are seasonal factors involved, maybe rest periods could be selectively used.

All things considered, it seems to me that if you are weighing your flour and water and are adjusting water temperature to get a finished dough temperature in the desired range (e.g., 80-85 degrees F), those two steps alone should go a long way to getting consistent results. Whatever other changes might be required would be made in the mixer bowl on a case by case basis without your really knowing what factors are making those adjustments necessary. I agree with DNA Dan that I wouldn’t alter the hydration called for in the recipe you are using. I would try to fix as many variables as possible and deal with the other factors by exception, in the bowl and in the oven if necessary. It seems that that is what you are already doing.

Peter

EDIT (1/25/13): Since the link to the above Lehmann article is no longer operative, see the Wayback Machine link to the same article at http://web.archive.org/web/20110405042926/http://pmq.com/mag/2006march/lehmann.php

[fazzari]

Thank you Dan...I'm tending to agree wholeheartedly with your point after all the experiments I've done at home.  You know, you go through all the policies or procedures that are in place and you wonder why they are the way they are...and I keep coming up with the same conclusion....when a person tries to master a craft, he is aware of what he knows, he is aware of what he doesn't know, but he is unaware of what he doesn't know!! There is something very interesting in all of this...by keeping mix times the same, the amount of water added to make a very good skin to a 50 pound bag of flour has ranged from 8 quarts 17 ounces all the way up to 9 quarts 20 ounces..so it will be interesting to see (if and when I make the change) how the mix times will vary.  You all will never know how much I've learned this past month, and this small change in procedures may be the key to finally give me some peace.
Thank you Dan
JOhn
By the way...do you know why we decided to keep the mix times constant...because many years ago I read a book by a famous bread/pizza guy who constantly laments on mixing your dough fully.  So, we thought this might be part of the puzzle......WRONG!!

[DNA Dan]

Thank you Dan...I'm tending to agree wholeheartedly with your point after all the experiments I've done at home.  You know, you go through all the policies or procedures that are in place and you wonder why they are the way they are...and I keep coming up with the same conclusion....when a person tries to master a craft, he is aware of what he knows, he is aware of what he doesn't know, but he is unaware of what he doesn't know!! There is something very interesting in all of this...by keeping mix times the same, the amount of water added to make a very good skin to a 50 pound bag of flour has ranged from 8 quarts 17 ounces all the way up to 9 quarts 20 ounces..so it will be interesting to see (if and when I make the change) how the mix times will vary.  You all will never know how much I've learned this past month, and this small change in procedures may be the key to finally give me some peace.
Thank you Dan
JOhn
By the way...do you know why we decided to keep the mix times constant...because many years ago I read a book by a famous bread/pizza guy who constantly laments on mixing your dough fully.  So, we thought this might be part of the puzzle......WRONG!!

As Peter noted, the issue with varying the mix time is going to be identifying exactly when the dough is "just right". This is quite difficult with low hydration doughs, however you may find that you have a larger window to work with on this variable than you do the hydration/weight variable. I think as a master of the craft, this is something that you just have to "dial" yourself into. Clearly you know when the dough is right, and when it needs some adjusting. You have ventured from standardized practice to actually performing an art! Congratulations!

If you would be so kind John, could you reply to my questions regarding the sheeting process in the Round Table Clone thread? Many thanks.

BTW, I was thinking there must be some "test" for dough hydration or whether it's mixed properly. You should be able to devise a test for this based on your "ideal" dough characteristics. As an example, there are tests for smearing mustard when it's being produced to test for the size of the grains based on how it smears on a scale. They also do similar things with Ketchup to look at the viscosity, water content, etc. I mention these because these are naturally grown products that are subject to the quality of what the Earth grows. Same situation here with flour. So as a start to think about this ideal "test", try to take note of what makes your dough perfectly mixed. Is there remnant flour in the bowl? Does it stick to itself? If undermixed, what size are the dough balls? Like rice, peas or marbles? The more discriminating information you can come up with about what makes your dough separate from the rest, the easier it should be to make a standardized test that works for your process. I know that is mostly theory, but in my field it's the toxins, poisons and mutants that advance science. They are the exception to the rule, and give you a purpose to investigate why this is the case.

[fazzari]

Thanks for taking the time Peter
I appreciate all the information you've presented...I've read much of it in my quest to achieve total duplication given the different flours....you probably read in one of Lehmann's articles about adding additional gluten to flour to try and get what you want...I've even tried that route...I've tried calling the mill to get specific measurements from them...I really have exhaustively tried to get to the bottom of all this...I've even called the scientists at Washington State University to get some insight.   But guess what...it was the experiments on the cracker crust at home that really opened my eyes...it didn't matter if the dough fermented 24 hours at room temp, or 2 hours in a warm oven, it didn't matter what the hydration rate was....the key factor was the undermixing of the dough.  The only factor I believe that you can't count on at home...is what temperature to bake your skins at....there seems to be a perfect temperature for these skins (that is, the temperature it takes to have the bottom and top get done at the same time....especially if you are cooking right on the stone).  This is what can cause problems in a restaurant....the sixteen inchers might be cooking fast, while the  10 inchers are cooking slow...what to do?  Another dilemma is how long is a skin good for...we shoot for 2 days....but interestingly enough, this super strong stuff I've had problems with, seems to last a good time longer...and I've also noticed I've had to lower the temp from 625 to about 580.
I just decided to try and fix my hydration rate to a good average of all the flours we might encounter and I'll go from there....I'm betting on success!
You all will never know what this all means to me.....quite simply, it's my life

All my best
John

[Pete-zza]

John,

As I was composing my last reply, I wondered if there was some simple test that you could conduct on your flour and use the results on a larger scale. What I wondered was if you could make small, standardized test batches of your standard dough on a periodic basis using your KitchenAid mixer. At first, I concluded that that might be impractical but I recalled in another post that you said that over a 3-day period around Thanksgiving you made 1200 pounds of dough. Based on the dough formulation you posted shortly after becoming a member of the forum, I calculated that if you made only 16" pizzas using about 14 ounces of flour per pizza, that would come to almost seventeen 50-pound bags of flour.

On the assumption that your delivered lots or pallets of bags of flour are likely to have the same characteristics, would it make sense to make small standard test batches using your KitchenAid mixer, in your shop rather than at home (to reduce the number of variables involved) and, based on what you have to do to get the desired results, apply those results to the much larger commercial batches? With all the flour that you go through in short periods of time, you might not have to make all that many test batches, and over time you should get a pretty good feel for the changes needed.

Peter

[fazzari]

Peter
That one hit me right between the eyes......that surely is something I can do......  Today, I did the deed and raised my hydration to a rate very average throughout the year.  The mix time is now down to 7 minutes (on this very strong flour)...it has been 21 minutes most of the year.....I'm anxious to get into some new flour, so I can guage mix time and I'll bet I'll have the best skins I've ever had.  One thing I failed to mention Peter, in between the mix times of 0 (not mixed) and let's say 23 minutes (the dough is a ball ) is a time which has a dough which is both undermixed and yet very easy to use by the dough roller.  I was very alarmed to see the pictures of very undermixed dough when I first frequented this sight....I couldn't believe my eyes and couldn't understand what was going on....if anyone is interested, another interesting test would be to compare levels of development with final skin outcome...I maintain from my perspective, that the more developed the dough, the easier it is to sheet.
Thanks for your thoughts Peter, and I'll keep you posted as this process proceeds!
John

One quick question....how is the dough thickness tool adjusted for the dough forming method..that is wouldn't you think that a correctly sheeted cracker crust would be thinner than a similar size, similar weight hand stretched dough?

[Pete-zza]

One quick question....how is the dough thickness tool adjusted for the dough forming method..that is wouldn't you think that a correctly sheeted cracker crust would be thinner than a similar size, similar weight hand stretched dough?

John,

If I understood your question correctly, the dough calculating tool is agnostic as to the finished crust characteristics. For example, it is possible to have two pizzas with the same dough skin weights, the same diameter, and the same thickness factor, yet have markedly different finished crust characteristics. To show you what I mean, here is the dough formulation produced by the Lehmann dough calculating tool for the recipe you are using in your business to make a 16" pizza with a dough skin weight of 20 ounces:

Flour (100%): Water (37%): IDY (0.75%): Salt (1.25%): Oil (4%): Total (143%):

396.5 g  |  13.99 oz | 0.87 lbs 146.71 g  |  5.17 oz | 0.32 lbs 2.97 g | 0.1 oz | 0.01 lbs | 0.99 tsp | 0.33 tbsp 4.96 g | 0.17 oz | 0.01 lbs | 0.89 tsp | 0.3 tbsp 15.86 g | 0.56 oz | 0.03 lbs | 3.52 tsp | 1.17 tbsp 567 g | 20 oz | 1.25 lbs | TF = N/A

Now, here is the dough formulation for a typical 16” NY style dough formulation with the same dough weight (20 ounces):

Flour (100%): Water (63%): IDY (0.25%): Salt (1.75%): Oil (1%): Total (166%):

341.57 g  |  12.05 oz | 0.75 lbs 215.19 g  |  7.59 oz | 0.47 lbs 0.85 g | 0.03 oz | 0 lbs | 0.28 tsp | 0.09 tbsp 5.98 g | 0.21 oz | 0.01 lbs | 1.07 tsp | 0.36 tbsp 3.42 g | 0.12 oz | 0.01 lbs | 0.76 tsp | 0.25 tbsp 567 g | 20 oz | 1.25 lbs | TF = N/A

In both cases, the thickness factor (the dough weight divided by Pi x R x R, where R is the skin radius) is equal to 0.10 (0.0994719, to be exact), yet the finished crust characteristics of the two pizzas will be quite different. It is the set of baker’s percents values that will govern the finished crust characteristics, not the thickness factor. The tool isn't smart enough to distinguish between forming methods, even within the same style (e.g., hand shaping or using a rolling pin for the NY style), and it isn't smart enough to know whether a skin has a rim or not. With experience, one learns what thickness values to use to produce the desired results for any given pizza style.

BTW, in lieu of using the dough weight option in the tool, I could have used the thickness factor option (using 0.0994719) and gotten the same results.

Peter

[fazzari]

So, it's now been 1 week since I made the big change at work.  I increased my hydration rate to 36%, which is a very good average of what we use through out the year, and I decreased my mix time to 7 minutes (which is about one third the average time throughout the year, but one half the time we used on this particular flour).  I also had to increase my water temperature to about 110 to compensate for loss of friction factor and also to allow for how cold it is here.  My first observation is I was completely wrong regarding the ease of sheeting dough when the dough is more developed...I was simply wrong, this dough sheets very easily...my mixer is also very happy.  I've had to lower my oven temps sometimes to around 500 degrees...we've had them as high as 625 in the past few months.  This dough leaves shards of crust crumbs when you cut it, especially on the outer edges.  I've taken a few snaps to show it baking...if you look closely it looks just like a saltine cracker...as this pizza finishes it is completely brown all the way across.....this crust is crispy, and the bottom is rather thick...but, it is tender. I am not a real fan of this crust as I like the bottom to open up a bit more.   Although this particular pizza is good...it isn't exceptional..but I'm very pleased given the trouble this particular flour has always given us.  A couple questions if I may:  why would you think I had to drop the temperature so drastically?  I've been contemplating mixing in some lower protein flour until our flour changes...any thoughts on that?
Thanks all
John

Can't wait for a different flour to see what the new procedures create then

[Pete-zza]

John,

Did your last batch of pizzas baked at around 500 degrees F take longer to bake than those baked at your normal oven temperature?

Peter

[fazzari]

Peter
That is a fascinating question and one that I talked to my brother about...even though the oven temps are way down, the baking time isn't much longer...what made you think about this? 

John

[Pete-zza]

John,

I thought perhaps that the higher hydration (from 33% to 36%?) and reduced knead time may have necessitated a longer bake time at the lower oven temperature in order to dry out the dough enough to achieve a crackery characteristic and to get the same degree of coloration.

As for the possibility of adding a lower protein flour to your existing flour, I wonder whether that will require a longer bake time to achieve the same degree of crust coloration, all else being equal.

BTW, what type of flour and what brand of flour are you now using?

Peter

[fazzari]

We use an ADM High Gluten flour.
As for these skins:  these skins are crispy, even when they aren't brown, so drying them out doesn't seem to be an issue.  As for adding a lower protein flour to the current flour...I'm not as concerned about the bake temperature as I am to the overall texture of the finished crust...I'm just wondering if I could possibly make the compensation I need to get my desired ends.  As I've said somewhere else on this site, these skins are very heat sensitive...especially when you're cooking them on the stone or deck...the difference between an excellent skin and a good one can be as little as 25 degrees at times.  These are also excellent skins if you are using raw meat products as the heat transfer from deck/stone to top of skin can be fabulous if done right.  I'm home this week, babying a knee I had scoped this morning...this should give me some time to experiment with.....but let me give you my hypotheses
I'm guessing that if I can mix maybe an all purpose flour with my high gluten (and I have no idea what ratio to use)...I most likely will have to increase my mix time to compensate for the different protein leve. After that, keeping all other processes the same...I am guessing my skins will more have the texture I'm looking for...as far as baking temps, I've not a clue, but will just use observation to figure out.
Any thoughts?
John

[Pete-zza]

I'm guessing that if I can mix maybe an all purpose flour with my high gluten (and I have no idea what ratio to use)...

John,

One thought that occurs to me is to decide what final protein percent you would like to have. Then, you can use November's tool at http://tools.foodsim.com/ (the tool on the right hand side) to determine the quantities of the two flours to use to achieve the desired overall protein content. In using the tool, you would enter into the two blank boxes below the pulldown menus the protein percents for the two flours you will be using. Then enter the target flour quantity and the target protein content (percent) in the lower boxes. Obviously, the target protein percent will have to fall somewhere between the protein percents for the two flours themselves. 

Peter

[DNA Dan]

John,

I thought of a way to empirically test your dough development. This would only work if your dough is not incorporated into a single ball after mixing. If you stop mixing while it's the consistency of cornmeal or pea-sized dough balls this might work. What I am thinking of is taking a measured amount, say 1 cup of your undermixed dough, then pouring it down a plate of metal that basically has drilled holes in it the size of your desired texture and is shaken. What you would be measuring would be the amount of dough that falls through the plate, (as a cutoff based on size) vs. the amount of dough that just falls past the holes. This would give you a measurement on the amount of dough that was incorporated more relative to the rest based on dough ball size. (Which I think is a fair way to measure incorporation.) 

It isn't a ground breaking idea, but something to consider if the undermixed condition stated above applies to your dough.

[fazzari]

Thanks Dan
I have a pretty good idea of how much dough development I need 80 percent of the time...its these winter months that the flour makes it's big change on me....so far, the shortened mix time has done wonders for the skins.  To be effective at all Dan, the finished dough has to come out of the bucket in about 3 to 5 pieces...any more than that it would take forever to sheet because you would have pieces all over the place.
I have another question I've been thinking about:  Let's say I want to develop a dough all the way to the one giant ball stage.  In one mixer I add all my ingredients (with water temperature being for example 100 degrees)...after mixing this dough 12 minutes it forms a ball and its temperature is 80 degrees.  In another mixer I add all my ingredients (with water temperature being for example 80 degrees)....after mixing this dough 16 minutes it forms a ball and its temperature is 80 degrees.  Would you think both doughs would theoretically be exactly the same......   It seems as though they would be the same dough, but the second batch had many more turns with the hook, not to mention the incorporation of air...but how would this all show up in the doughs   I'm really mixing myself up, but we're having fun experimenting.
John

[fazzari]

On December 12, Peter directed me to a tool at unclesalmon.com regarding the mixing of different flours.  Little did I know, but that very day my little brother went to the store and purchased 10 pounds of Gold Medal all purpose flour.  He replaced 10 pounds of high gluten flour with the all purpose flour in a 50 pound bag of high gluten.  He mixed the batch just the same as we have been, to keep everything the same....36% hydration rate, 108 degree water temp, 7 minute mix time.  As he sheeted it, he said the dough felt dryer, but in all other aspects was pretty much the same.  I went in this morning to test out the skins from this particular batch.....guess what!!!!!  They were fabulous.  They still cooked looking like a saltine, they still browned nicely, in fact from appearances alone....I just wasn't expecting much.  But when I cut the pizza up, I knew it was different...although it still had the crispy bottom, the bottom was thinner...and the taste was great, but the texture was fabulous...similar to the pizzas we get most of the year.  So, if this test batch ends up being representative of future batches, I've got alot more answers today. ...such as  1) The flour you use does make a difference when looking for specific characteristics in this product 2) A much shorter mix time can be used to create a great textured cracker crust  3) the much shorter mix time seems to have alot to do with the reliability of these skins over time as we are baking skins up to 4 days old with great success (this was unheard of before).
I hope I'm not getting excited to quickly...but today was huge for me in the pizza world!!

John

[fazzari]

Peter and Dan
I wanted to give you guys a quick update on my dough since you helped me change procedures two months ago.  Just a quick review...to every 50 pounds of flour we now add exactly 9 quarts of water along with yeast, salt and oil...each batch is mixed 7 minutes.  At the time we made this change I predicted that when our flour became less strong, we would have to increase the mix time of our batches.  Well, two weeks ago the flour made a big change on us...but my prediction was wrong...we still mix the dough for 7 minutes (it is very undermixed with flour streaks still in the bottom of the bowl)...the difference is, these batches rise much more easily than the other flour, and dough has a very soft, almost fluffy feel...and the skins....well, the skins are second to none that I've ever had of this type.  It is hard to put into words the difference in skins made from the two different flours.....the stronger flour creates a skin with a thicker bottom crust...it is great....but the weaker flour creates a skin with a thin bottom crust, crispy, very tender and delicious.  What our new method has done is increase the percentage of absolutely perfect skins...in fact, the only way to get a sub par skin is to bake a pizza in an oven that hasn't recovered enough (when we're very busy)...so heat remains a very important ingredient in the perfection of this type of pizza.  I don't know if the above explanations tell you anything...but I thought i knew it all after 30 years in the business...but now I know the truth..there's alot more to learn....oh, and by the way, my ovens are back up to around 600 degrees and the heat just blows through these skins.

Thank you both
John