Bread – an introduction

It is difficult for me to come up with an all-encompassing definition of bread.  It is an incredibly complex subject.

Bread is a staple food eaten all around the world.

I find that a lot of people have an emotional connection to bread. It was part of the reason I started baking breads. I have enjoyed great breads from around the world. But because I was living in a culture where the traditional bread was the flat bread – pita, which I enjoy in shawarma and as a side but not for breakfast, finding good quality breads at a reasonable price became a chore, to say the least. I therefore started reading up on breads, then I became passionate about bread.  I was already making memorable breads before I went culinary.

Typical bread for me, is made from a dough that contains, water, flour, salt and yeast. This is bread in its simplicity. When you become serious with bread making, you will hear about the baker’s ratios/percentage. ‘Baker’s percentage’ is basically the ratio of all ingredients with respect to flour which is always expressed as 100%.

So, here is a simple example:

The bread above is 63% hydrated.  Most bread contain about 2% salt and 1 – 1.5% yeast. To get more flavour out of the bread, we can preferment a percentage of the overall flour and we will explain this while making breads with preferments and sourdough.

Let’s look at bread classifications based on the many qualities we have come to expect from our breads

1. Hydration (moisture content of the dough): the less water in the bread dough, the chewier the texture. Hydration affects the texture and crumb.

We will explore 3 levels of hydration;

• Low hydration doughs: about 50-57% moisture e.g. bagels
• Standard hydration doughs: about 58-65% moisture e.g. French bread
• High hydration doughs: above 65% moisture e.g. ciabatta which is typically in the 70s-80s.

 

2. Richness (fat content): Fat in a bread dough offers a tenderness and flavour in the crumb. There are different ingredients used to enrich a bread dough. These include; milk, eggs, butter, sugar, syrup, cream etc.

We will also explore dough richness in 3 levels too:

• Lean dough: contains little or no fat at all e.g. baguettes.
• Enriched dough: contains 5-20% fat e.g. dinner rolls.
• Rich dough: contains 20% fat or more e.g. Brioche and laminated dough such as Puff pastry.

 

3. Fermentation Method: Fermentation is a step in which yeast feeds on the sugars in the flour and produces carbon dioxide (CO2) which leavens (rises) the bread. There are different techniques to achieving fermentation in yeasted bread and the longer the fermentation period, the better the flavour of the bread.

Let’s look some techniques:

• Direct or Straight dough: all the ingredients are mixed at the same time and left to ferment.
• Doughs with yeasted starters: a percentage of the flour is mixed with water and commercial yeast and left to ferment typically around 12-18 hours. You typically see around 15 -50% of the flour fermented and then mixed into the rest of the bread next. Commonly used preferments are biga, poolish and pate fermentee.
• Sourdough culture: this made by the fermentation of dough without the use of commercial yeast. Sourdough culture contains naturally occurring lactobacilli and yeast. When a sourdough culture is added to a bread dough, it typically substitutes a portion of the overall flour and water needed.

 

4. Yeast type: Yeast is the organism responsible for producing the CO2 that leavens the bread. Yeast in baking is either commercially produced or naturally occurring.

Let’s look at yeasts in bread briefly:

• Commercial yeast: The form of yeast which is commercially available is Saccharomyces cerevisiae and it is sold in 3 forms:
  • Instant dry yeast
  • Active dry yeast
  • Fresh compressed yeast
• Natural yeast: this is the type of yeast found naturally occurring in sourdough cultures, there are several identified types of yeast and the most common is Saccharomyces exiguous.
• Mixed yeast doughs: Some breads use a combination of sourdough culture and commercially available yeast.
• No yeast: this is a category of unleavened breads which do not contain any yeast at all, as a result, they are flat breads. Common examples are: matzo, roti and tortilla.

 

5. Height: This category looks at bread in terms of height, i.e. whether they are flat or not. Most flat breads are unleavened but they are also traditionally leavened and flat breads such as our beloved pizzas.

With all this information, we will be making breads in the different categories soon.

Looking forward to sharing recipes and reading your feedback!

Warm Regards,

–AJ