Slow-rising bread

[mirrorshard]

The bread turned out well, though a 7.5 hour rising time is not ideal for during the day. Something to make before bed and leave to rise overnight, really.

500g multiseed flour (Allinson's, quite nice)
8g sunflower oil
A generous tablespoon of fine sea salt
1/4 teaspoon dried yeast
About 325ml water
Rather a lot of ground black pepper
1 pinch of sugar

I think next time I'll up the yeast a bit more, and see whether I can get it to rise within a couple of hours with this little sugar.

Comments

[watervole.livejournal.com]

I'm intrigued. I wonder what the yeast is feeding on?

Sounds like it might be a subtly different fermentation process. (I read somewhere that slow fermentation was better for the person eating the bread, but I've no idea if that's true or not)

[caramel-betty.livejournal.com]

http://busycooks.about.com/library/archive/blyeastingred.htm claims that most flour includes some sugars. It's just not as plentiful as dumping sugar in.

Google Books: The student's technology of breadmaking and flour confectionery - By Wilfred James Fance (http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=lFoVAAAAIAAJ&pg=PA40&lpg=PA40&dq=%22sugar+content+of+flour%22&source=bl&ots=uOce3bF7al&sig=lX-mfVX1Mj34-JKoTEeZ7-hK66k&hl=en&ei=DwkdStLpB4TLjAem8-SGDQ&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1)

(e) Sugar. Flour contains small but important amounts of various sugars, such as sucrose, maltose and dextrose, without which, in the presence of yeast, there could be no fermentation. Dextrose is directly fermentable by yeast to CO₂ and by-products; sucrose and maltose only after they have been converted to dextrose by enzymes in yeast and in flour.

The sugar content of flour actual and potential (known as the maltose figure) is of the utmost important to the baker because, during bulk fermentation, intermediate and final proof, the gas production in dough is influenced by the amount of sugar available at each stage.

The sugar content of flour increases as the extraction rate is lengthened. Here are some examples:

Flick to page 36:

The extraction rate is the amount of meal or flour that the miller produces from a given amount of clean wheat.

[arkady.livejournal.com]

Maybe you need to make a yeast "starter" with yeast and flour and a pinch of sugar which you brew up ahead of time, and then just add a bit to your bread ingredients as and when required - which is the medieval way of making bread.

[watervole.livejournal.com]

Ah! so I guess the slow fermentation is because of the time taken to convert the sucrose and maltose.

[mirrorshard.livejournal.com]

Aha, useful to know, thank you!

The "of which sugars" on the side of the packet works out to 1.4%, so that should give me a good way to tune the rising time with other flours.

[strangederby2.livejournal.com]

All really good advice. Also how cold was your kitchen at the time? Adding a handful ( per loaf) of pumpkin seeds that have been toasted in a dry frying pan untill they begin to crack and then crushed to power in a morter and pestle = really tasty bread.

[mirrorshard.livejournal.com]

This was yesterday afternoon, so not particularly cold - about 18-20 celsius.

The pumpkin seeds do sound good.