Understanding Yeast | Bake It Up a Notch with Erin McDowell

let’s talk about yeast baby[Music]hi I’m Aaron gene McDowell recipedeveloper and author of the fearlessBaker and the upcoming the book on pieand today we’re gonna be talking allthings yeast we’re gonna get to thebottom of yeast and figure out everyanswer every single question that youhave about it and I’m gonna show you howto make an easier bread recipe and amore complicated one and show you allkinds of troubleshooting tips along theway so first of all how do you decidewhich kind of yeast to use and what arethe differences between them there arethree main kinds of yeast there’s activedry yeast instant yeast and fresh yeastso active dry is my favorite yeast andit’s the one that most of my recipescall for the one we’re gonna be using inthe recipes that we make in this videoand they have small granules thatdissolve very easily however it’s a bitof a myth that these have to bedissolved in water that is not truethese can actually go right in with thedry ingredients so I love active dryyeast it’s the most common that I usenow you also have instant yeast whichlooks and acts a lot like active dryyeast but it just works a little bitfaster and you need a little bit less ofit that has some serious advantagesbecause it rises and works a little bitfaster that means you can make a recipelike a weeknight pizza dough a littlebit quicker than you might otherwise butit also has some negative things as wellmostly that you get you lose a littlebit of flavor that yeasty flavor andalso a little bit of the strength thathappens when the bread is rising becausewhen it rises faster it doesn’t have asmuch time to get some of that strengthand some of that flavorso that’s really the only con aboutusing instant yeast and also it’simportant to remember that you do needto use a little bit less of it sousually you only use about a teaspoon ofinstant yeast for every teaspoon and aquarter you would use of active drive itis actually a little bit finer so youcan see that when I hold them side byjust a smidge but it’s almostindiscernible finally we have freshyeast fresh yeast is really special andit just has a really delicious flavor ithas a little bit of a floral miss Ithink and it’s really really fun to workwith the downsides of fresh yeast arethat it doesn’t have as long of a shelflife these other two yeasts can live inyour refrigerator or freezer for a longtime several months and be a okay freshyeast on the other hand has a muchshorter shelf life and you know it’lldepend on how large the package isusually if it’s sealed really tightly itcan last still for several weeks but itcould be even shorter so it’s importantto keep an eye on the expiration datewith that and it has this like kind ofcrazy cakey texture it just crumbleslike this and you kind of crumble itinto the recipe often dissolving it in alittle bit of water or just however therecipe does say to use it and again youneed a lot less of this than you do ofthe active dry but it may seem like morebecause of the volume of what you’redealing with so for every singleteaspoon of active dry you need about ahalf an ounce of fresh yeast then you’llcrumble it into your recipe alright sothere’s one final kind of yeast that youdon’t see pictured here and it’s myfavorite east to talk about because it’severywhere it’s in the air it’s wildyeast it’s all around us and that is oneof the things that I think is so coolabout making bread is that it’s alivewe’re making something that’s living anda lot of the reason why people strugglewith making bread is that they don’tunderstand those things that areoperating to keep the yeast alive and tomake the dough living the wild East isparticularly important to understandbecause you can use it in pre fermentsand we’re gonna talk about that with theciabatta recipe but wild East is allaround us and you can use it to make preferments like sourdough Pat from Auntiebiga really any kind of pre ferment thatyou can put into a dough that will giveit tons of eesti flavor but just usingwildEast which is very cool to understandpre ferments and bread-baking in generalyou need to understand something calledbakers percentage and here’s what youneed to know bakers percentage is aseries of percentages based around theweight of flour in a recipe the baseamount of flour in any dough recipe isalways 100% then the percentage of otheringredients is calculated in relation tothe weight of the flour to get thepercentage of another ingredient all youhave to do is divide the weight of theother ingredient by the weight of theflour to determine the baker’s percentfor example if yeast is a half an ounceyou would divide it by the flour at 25ounces which would yield 2 percent I[Music]first learned about Baker’s percentagewhen I worked in a bread bakery which isstill one of my favorite jobs that Iever did it was when I was studying inpastry school and I baked the bread withtwo other girls early early on Saturdaymornings so when all my friends weregoing out on Friday nights I was turningin early so that I could wake up atmidnight and go bake bread and one of myfavorite breads to make was ciabatta andthat’s the first bread that we’re gonnastart with today so one of the things Ilike about ciabatta is that it can bemixed by hand it’s very easy to make itin results in a really impressive almostartisan looking loaf but that’s veryvery easy to replicate at homeespecially with just a few quick tricksand it’s the perfect example of ourfirst type of bread which is called alean bread or a lean dough and what alean dough is is any kind of bread thatdoesn’t have any kind of enrichingingredients like eggs milk butter sugarkind of anything like that so commonlyned’s that you know of our baguettes andciabatta is another great example andthat’s what we’re gonna start off withso to start we have to make our biga andthe vegan needs to set for about 12hours overnight so it’s a very quickthing that you can do and then wake upin the morning and be ready to mix yourbreadand we’re going to be using bread flourfor our biga and for our ciabatta recipenow bread flour is important to talkabout too because it has a higherprotein content than all-purpose flourso when you’re thinking about man shouldI you it says I have to use bread flourbut I have all-purpose I’m just gonna doit it really can change the recipe butthere are also bread recipes thatdefinitely use all-purpose so don’t feellike it’s the only one out there thatexists we’re going to measure 290 gramsof bread flour into our Bowl and youwant this to be a bowl that can go inyour refrigerator so make sure you’vegot room in that fridge for this bowlbecause it’s going to sit oh actually noit doesn’t go in the fridge it just sitsa good time never mindso we’re measuring 290 grams of breadflour and I’m using a scale here becausein baking it really is better to measureby weight there we go to under 90 sowhen you’re using volume measures if youdon’t have a scale what you’re gonnawant to do is just scoop it in with aspoon and level it off that’s the bestway to get the most accurate measurementand it would be two and a quarter cupsof bread flour now the pre fermentrelies a lot on the wild yeast that’s inthe air which we love but to give it alittle bit of a boost since we’re onlygiving it 12 hours of fermentation timewe’re gonna add just a quarter teaspoonof active dry yeast I’m just gonna putit right in the flour just like that andthen we just need to add 226 grams 8ounces 1 cup of room temperature waterI’m just gonna make a little hole in thecenter here and pour it in our water wedon’t want the water to be warm becausewe don’t want this to go crazy even thatlittle tiny bit of yeast is gonnaferment like mad if it was warm water sowe just want to mix this to combinewhen I worked in the bread bakery wewould have huge vats of pre ferments sowhen I make a little one like this itjust feels so easy and so doable to havefresh-baked bread at home and the preferment the amount of flavor that itadds but also the texture that itcontributes at the end you know some ofthe best crusty loaves have a preferment in them because that just helpsthat hydration helps the way that it’sabsorbed bread is really so simple justa few ingredients but understanding howthey work and getting them just right isthe key to everything okay so this lookspretty stiff and that’s normalit’s going to look stiff right now andthen it’s going to continue to absorbthe moisture as it sits I’m gonna switchto a spatula here just to make sure youdon’t want any big dry pockets but youdo want it to be fully fully combinedtotally homogeneous and if you’restruggling you can always add anadditional water a tablespoon or so at atime it’s going to then slowly fermentsat room temperature for 12 hours andit’s gonna add all that great flavor andstructure that it gained during thatrise time right back into our finalciabatta dough so there you go that’sall we have to do just mix those coupleingredients to combine and we have aviga so this is the biga that I justmade fresh right now and this is thebeaker that’s been resting for 12 hoursalready and you can see a hugedifference in the overall appearance andthe number one thing that you want tosee are the visible appearance ofbubbles so we can see on the surfacethere are some bubbles there are somebubbles that have burst that just meansyeast activity which is what we’relooking for so to get this one lookinglike this we just need to cover it andlet it sit overnight I’m just gonnacover it with a clean kitchen towel oryou could use plastic wrap and we justwant to set it in a place that’s not toowarm and not too cold and let it restovernightall right so once here viga has gottenall nice and risen we’re ready to mixthe final dough and you only need acouple of ingredients to get this doughall put together so to start I’m goingto measure out 360 grams of bread flourwhich is three cups and again we want touse bread flour here because of thathigher protein content it gives a littlemore structure a little more chew and ithelps it make it a little bit easier todevelop the gluten the gluten whichwe’re gonna talk about more and more aswe’re making bread gluten is a verymisunderstood word all right and then wealso need 1 tablespoon of active dryyeast which I’ve already measured hereand that would be 12 grams we’re justgonna put it right in the flour no needto put it into any water and we’re gonnado 2 teaspoons of salt and it’s reallyimportant in bread that you have enoughsalt where the bread really won’t have alot of flavor so I like to make surethat there’s plenty of salt we can’tleave the salt out especially in a leandough where it doesn’t have other thingslike sugar buttermilk etc to rely on forflavor I’m just gonna give it a quickstir just to make sure those ingredientsare combined done with my scale now andthen we’re just going to put the bigaand one and a half cups water into ourmixture and we’re gonna mix this by handjust using our spatula now one thingthat’s important to know before we starteven mixing this is that this is a verywet dough do not be alarmed you have notmade a mistake it is just the way it’ssupposed to be and that high hydrationis something that’s actually reallycommon in some bread recipes look atthis alright go in the bowl like you’resupposed to but that’s some of thatstrength that I was talking about thatthe process of rising allows the doughto have strength and it happens everysingle time so that’s actually alsogoing to be the saving grace of thevery hydrated ciabatta dough is eventhough it has lots of moisture the realthing that brings it together in the endis the strength that it gets during therise and from this viga just gonna pourour water right into itperfect now we get some arm arm workoutand it’s gonna take a little while forit to come together and at first I sortof like to stir in with the biga becausethat helps it to break up a little bitand start to combine with the otheringredients and when you’re mixing byhand you’re gonna be looking for glutenstructure in a different way than youmight be looking for it when you mix ina mixer sometimes you can tell that it’sfully mixed because it’s formed a ballaround the attachment of the mixer butwhen you’re mixing by hand it’s moreabout the consistency and one of thethings that I always tell people withbaking projects like this so many peoplebaked bread without a recipe withouttimers and proof boxes and tons ofspecial equipment so it is possibleespecially if you learn to use yoursenses if you’re looking at things andyou know what they’re supposed to looklike smell like taste like you’re gonnabe able to replicate it every singletime even trying a new recipe thatyou’ve never tried before you’ll be ableto do it without being scared I’m allabout the fearlessness just do it justbake and if it messes up well you makebread crumbs so I’m just gonna keepstirring this and we’re trying todevelop gluten so this is one way thatyou can see if it has any glutendeveloped which so far it does not whenI pick it up it just falls like thiseventually just like that vigo when Ipick it up it’s gonna stretch and that’swhat we’re looking for and glutenespecially nowadays is often considereda dirty word but it’s a very necessaryword in bread baking in particularbecause gluten is a protein that isfound naturally inside wheat flour sowhen you’re making something like a cakethat you want to be tender you don’twant very much gluten because if youhave a lot of gluten if you havea lot of those protein strands formingin the batter you’re gonna end up with areally tough cake but when you’re makingbread those protein strands are what spalike makes it possible to have that chewthat crunch that crispy crust all thosethings that we like in a good bread andeven in bread that isn’t chewy or has acrispy crust like the brioche we’regonna make later it still is providingthat structure it’s providing all ofthose things you need to get thattexture that makes it a sliceableperfect loaf so we love gluten heart theonly thing to be aware of when you’remixing by hand is making sure you don’thave any big pockets usually that meansit’s a chunk of the biga so you canalways just kind of press those againstthe side of your bowl you want to use anice big wide mixing bowl like this andthis one is particularly great becauseit has this pour spout which will makeit easy to transfer laterso already I still need to mix it alittle bit more but you see how it pullswhen I lift it now it doesn’t just falloff it’s making so we’ve we’ve formed alittle bit we just need to do a littlebit more and if you wanted to do this ina mixer you absolutely could it wouldjust take about three to four minutes ofmixing in a mixer but some so many breadrecipes do require a mixer I think it’sreally great to teach people that it isso possible to make a great loaf ofbread without even owning a stand mixerwithout needing one just need a littlearm strength and making this dough youknow probably ensures you an extra slicelater right I think that that evens outall right look at that so now it’sfalling off much more readily all rightI think we’re there so now what we’regonna do with this dough you could leaveit right in this bowl but I like totransfer it to a lightly greased Bowl todo the rising because this is such asticky dough it makes it easier tohandle later after it’s risen and we’lllet it rise for about one hour or untilit’s double in size[Music]one of the biggest tips I give peoplewhen you’re asking how do I tell us thedough is double in size is to actuallyput it into a bowl that’s about twicethe size that the dough was to beginwithbut if you don’t have that don’t fretyou just want to make sure that it hasthis noticeable rise one of the waysthat you can tell is that just the levelthat it was in the bowl has gone up andalso it’ll have kind of a bubbly topappearance that’s the main thing thatyou’re looking for to show thatfermentation activity that yeastactivity and fermentation is sometimes aword referred to in alcohol productionbeer making wine but it’s actually ofcourse what’s happening here as well andso we are trying to ferment it enough toget the flavor of the yeast and get allthat carbon dioxide in there to help getthe bubbles going and all of thatbusiness but we don’t want it to overferment because that’s when it actuallystarts to taste a little like alcohol soyou want it to be nice and puffy andrisen and it takes about an hour withciabatta it’ll take a little more if youuse cooler water and a little less ifyou use warmer water so I’m just gonnaget rid of our other guy let rise for alittle bit and let’s shape this newciabatta dough so this is an extremelysticky dough I’m gonna do something forthe overhead camera here to show see howjiggly that is that is a very wet breaddough so one of the things you have todo to compensate for that is use asignificant amount of flour in theshaping the final ciabatta loaf has thislike flowery outer crust and that’s thereason why is because we need that flourto actually even be able to handle itbecause it truly is a very wet dough sowe’re gonna give a big shower to ourworkspace here be generousyou’ll thank me later now not everybread dough is like this not every leanbread dough is like this when you makesomething like baguettes you actuallyuse a lot less flour when you’re shapingbecause if you use too much flour it canstick when you shape it we’ll be able tosee that with our brioche dough laterwell so what I’m gonna do is I’m gonnago ahead and just empty it onto here ohyeah now ciabatta and italian actuallymeans old slipper that’s the approximatetranslation and that gives you an ideaof how the bread is shaped which is veryminimal that’s another reason why thisis a really great recipe for beginnersbecause you don’t have to worry too muchabout the shaping the hardest part isjust being brave to get through all thestickiness so I’m gonna first give itanother little shower on top and thenI’m gonna fold the dough a few timesjust to bring it into a better shape andwhen you fold bread dough what thatmeans is you’re kind of moving it andredistributing some of that yeast actionthat’s going on and the way to do it isto firmly grasp itget your hands flowery as needed andpull it out and then over onto itself sowe’re gonna fold it a few times I liketo fold it kind of in every directionand get it into like a nice uniformshape like that just like that now wewouldn’t have been able to achieve thatif we did not have this much flour soit’s really important to remember thatand if you ever get dough stuck to yourfingers just get a little flour and rubthem together and it comes right outit’s another thing I learned back in thebread baking day washing a hand that issticky with dough just makes it gloppysticky dough even more so so the flourhelps get it off all right with my benchknife here or you could use a regularkitchen knife if that’s all you’ve hadwe’re just gonna cut it approximately inhalf if you’re a perfectionist you canbe more precise and weigh them but Idon’t like to mess with that and that’salready the base shape that we’re gonnahave for these loaves so got two bakingsheets here and you want to put yourbaking sheet as close as possible toyour work area let’s give them one moredust on the topjust like that now when I pick it up I’mjust going to gently stretch it andplace it right onto here in whatevershape it ends up it ends up let thedough fall where it may so I’m justgonna give it a gentle stretch whichalso kind of gives the texture to thefinal flour it’s a really cool look andall this extra flour that we have on ourcountertop you can sift it and reuse itjust sift it to make sure you don’t haveany bits of dough stuck in it somewhereso we don’t need to waste that flourstretch and just let it fall ciabatta isa really rustic loaf a really rusticshape and then we’re gonna do a moreprecise shaping with our brioche laterso you get to see this is the easy wayto do bread real simple very littleshaping and very few ingredients verylittle rise time all rightlet’s cover these so that they can riseand when you cover them just try to doit gently so you don’t disturb too muchof the flour that you’ve got on topbecause that makes some of that textureon the end of these loaves which Ireally love so just let them rise in awarm ish place for 30 to 45 minutesuntil they’ve got a little bit of puffgoing on all rightour ciabatta loaves have risen and let’stake a look at what they look like we’relooking for them to be noticeably puffyexpanded in size oh yes ooh now if thishappens don’t freak out you got a littlestuck to my towel just pull it away andjust work try to touch it as minimallyas possible whenever the dough becauseyou don’t want to deflate it now let’ssee if this one gives us a cleanermomentoh it’s a beautiful love alright and asyou can see they’re not exactly the samethey’re a little bit different in sizeand shape and that’s the beauty ofciabatta they’re very rustic very simpleand now we’re just ready to bake thesein the oven now this is a good time totalk about one of the important thingswith bread baking it’s really importantto pay attention to the oven temperaturea bread like this alein bread likes tobake at a really high temperature thehigher the temperature the faster theinitial oven spring the oven spring iswhat happens in those first moments whenthe yeast expands in the oven before thestructure of the loaf or roll sets soyou want to bake these at a really hightemperature I bake them at 475 and youcan also if you feel up for it bring inthe help of a tray of ice and that isreally great for crusty loaves like thisbecause it brings steam into the oven soyou can put these on a top shelf andjust put a tray of as much ice as youcan manage down below it will melt inthe oven creating steam and that helpsto create a really beautiful reallycrisp crust and it also helps to reallyevenly brown and just get everythingabsolutely perfect I love a little steamwhen I’m baking a leanin loaf so we’regonna bake these until the structure isset and the loaf is deeply golden-brownif you feel like it’s browning a littletoo quickly you can always tent it withfoil or knock the oven temperature downabout 25 degrees for the remainder ofthe bake let’s bakeso now that you’ve learned all about howto make a lean bread let’s talk aboutthe other category which is enrichedbreads now enriched breads are some ofmy favorite because the word rich isright inside we’ve got things likebutter sugar already my favorites milkreally anything eggs that’s another oneany kind of enrichment anything that’sgonna make the dough a little morebuttery tasting and it’s gonna make itreally golden brown and one of the bestexamples of an enriched dough is briocheand so that’s what we’re gonna maketoday we’re gonna make my salted butterbrioche which is a really deliciousrecipe and I think brioche especiallyanything that has a French name tendsscare people as being reallyintimidating but actually brioche is areally flexible recipe for people athome to bake so I’m excited to show youhow it’s doneto start out with this is a little bitof an interesting bread recipe becausebrioche ultimately rises in therefrigerator and part of the reason forthat is that there’s so many enrichmentsthat it’s a very sticky dough so youneed it to be in the fridge just so thatyou’ll actually eventually be able toshape it because of that we don’t reallyneed our ingredients to be warm the waywe might add warm water to a breadrecipe we’re going for a slower rise theother advantage of a slow rise is thatit adds more flavor the longer that thatyeast is fermenting its fermenting at aslower speed because it’s in a chilledenvironment and as a result you get alot more flavor rather than when you tryto speed it up really quickly and itstill gets nice and risen and lovely butit doesn’t have that same flavor sowe’re gonna start with bread flour againthat high protein content is gonna makethis a really nice smooth elastic doughwhich is really important and this is360 grams 3 cups of bread flourand this is one of those recipes we canreally just put absolutely everything inso we also have 50 grams of granulatedsugar sugar is an important ingredienteven if you won’t taste that sweetnessit helps keep the loaf tender so you geta little bit of an outer crust but thatinside is light and fluffy and that’ssomething that we really want we’re alsogonna add a tablespoon of yeast and ahalf teaspoon of sea salt and that’sactually a little low for breads I wastalking about how it’s really importantto have enough salt but the reason thatit’s low is because we also are usingsalted butter so it’s important not toover salt Justices it’s important not tounder salt I’m just gonna give that aquick mix just to get those ingredientscombined before I add the liquid don’tneed to go crazy here just give it alittle stir you could also do that byhand now brioche is a recipe that isdone by intense mixing because you mixfor a very long time so it’s you’ll seewhat I’m talking about but it’s calledintense for a reason now with the mixerrunning I’m gonna go ahead and add mymilk and then I’m also gonna add threeeggs and I’m just gonna crack them intohere first make sure I don’t have anyshell and again because we’re notworried about the temperature of theseingredients you can actually make thiswith cold eggs no reason for the eggs tobe at room temp and our third eggwe’re just gonna mix this on low speeduntil it starts to come together it’sgonna come around our dough hookattachment and that’s gonna be one waythat we know that it’s ready we’re gonnamix it just for about two minutes untilit comes together and is combined andthen we’re gonna raise the speed and mixit for four minutes more to build up thewhat the gluten the gluten that’s what’sgonna give this crazy structure it’sgonna allow us to really shape thisbread and get it nice and tight that’sone of the things that is really specialabout brioche dough is it’s a reallyeasy dough to work with if you’ve got itnice and cold and you can get a nicebeautiful shape to your loaf it isactually great to use in dessertapplications one of my favorite recipeson the site is a genius recipe thatserves brioche with ice cream and makeslike an ice cream sandwich it’s justdeliciousso it has that lightly sweet thing andthat insanely buttery thing when thisbread is baking you can smell it likehalfway down the block it smells so goodso buttery so rich okay so this islooking good the dough is starting tocome together around the dough hook andnow I’m gonna kick up the speed now onthe higher speed we’re gonna mix it forthree to four minutes until the doughlooks pretty smooth and then we’ll startadding the final ingredients our butterokay now the key here is to add itgradually if you add it too fast it kindof just gets greasy and doesn’t getcombined so you have to add it in andlet it mix in a little bit and then addin the next one and this is that partthat’s called intense mixing because theciabatta dough for example when we mixedit we just mixed it until we got thegluten structure but with this we’re notonly mixing it long enough to get thatstructure we’re also now gonna add allof this butter and make a deliciousdoughy emulsion so let’s give it a goand you can just do this on sort of alow to medium speed and about atablespoon at a timeand you want to use room-temperaturebutter so that can combine in there it’sa little bit cold it’s not gonna combineand you’re gonna get chunks of butter inthe brioche and you’re not gonna havethat beautiful smooth dough so everytime this gets mixed in and I can’t seeit anymore or it’s almost fully mixed inthat’s when I had the next one and ifyou notice that it’s not combiningevenly or you have a lot of dough aroundthe edge of the bowl you can stop andscrape the bowl a couple of times as youare brioche is an example of a doughwhere we’ve slowed down the rise time Ihave an article about this on the siteyou can slow down or speed up rise timesby making a few adjustments to therecipe for example if you had a recipefor pizza dough that required to berefrigerated overnight you couldincrease the yeast and the watertemperature and it would be ready in 30to 45 minutes ready to go it is going tobe a different end result but it ispossible to adjust those based on howmuch time you have so this is justanother example of how you really canbake bread so easily and fit it in toeven a busy schedule it’s one of myfavorite forms of baking to introducepeople to is bread because they’re oftenso scared of that yeast when you figureout what’s going on you’re gonna havegreat great great results all rightwe’re almost done before I add this lastlittle bit I’m gonna give the bowl ascrapeoh now look how soft that is I’m justgonna scrape but you can see how softand gooeyso unlike the ciabatta dough which issoft because it has a lot of hydrationthis is soft because it has a lot of fatand the fat particularly is why we liketo keep this dough cold because when fatis cold its Burtonso it’s easier to handle and work withall right once the last addition ofbutter goes in it’s just reallyimportant to mix it until it’s totallysmooth and come together the wholeprocess of adding the butter will takeanywhere between three to six minutesand it’s really important to get itfully incorporated so don’t worry aboutover mixing focus on getting it nice andsmooth it’s so hard to use the mixerfacing this way makes me feel like Idon’t know how to use a mixer alright sonow we’re just gonna give this bowl agood scrape make sure we’ve goteverything all the way at the bottomthat everything is incorporateduniformly especially in standing mixerssometimes the dough at the very bottomis a little bit of a different color soby giving it a little bit of a stir byhand you ensure that you get it all niceand even and everything’s combined andthat’s what we’re dealing withlook how sticky sticky we’re gonna putthis into a greased bowl and let it riseat room temperature for a little bitjust to let it start the process thenwe’re gonna put it into the refrigeratorwhere it’s gonna rise overnight it’simportant to know that it won’t be asbulky as a bread you leave to rise atroom temperature it may even look likeit hasn’t risen much at all but thetexture is going to change it’s going tobecome a little bit puffier and you’regonna see some signs of air pocketsthat’s what’s important to look forand we’ve got one ready that we can showyou so you know what you’re looking forand don’t worry too much about the shapebecause this is a sticky sticky dough sojust get it in the bowl cover it andyou’ll let it rise for about an hour atroom temperature and then in therefrigerator for about 12 hours orovernightthat makes brioche also a really greatbread for when you have a specialoccasion or something that you’re doinga lot of cooking because you can make itahead of time and then bake it whenyou’re ready this is our freshly mixedbrioche dough and you see how sticky andtacky it is and here we have this hunkahunka buttery dough that I can pickright up with my hands because it’s niceand chill the number one thing you’relooking for like I said is kind of thisappearance of tackiness where you cansee some pockets of air and really thebulk of the rise for this bread is goingto come in the second rise that we’regoing to do in the loaf pan so I’m gonnago ahead and cover this one let it startit’s room temp rise and we can go aheadand shape this lovely brioche loaf soshaping bread one of the most importantthings is that the bread shaping isrelatively tight if it’s not tight andyou don’t seal it well that’s when youget kind of an explosion of the dough inone direction or another that said ifyou do it too tight it also can restrictthe air from being able to allow thedough to rise to its maximum ability soyou gonna have to find that sweet spotsomewhere in the middle first I’m gonnaput a little flour down one of thebiggest mistakes people make with a lotof bread is using too much flour in theshaping when you use too much flour thedough can’t stick to itself so whenyou’re trying to seal it and make thisnice shape like we’re gonna try to doif it has too much flour it’s not gonnabe able to do it so I like to just do alittle bit and I flour my hands and putsome of that hand flour onto the doughand you can also put flour directly onany parts that are sticky now there’slots of different ways to shape breaddough but we’re gonna do a shape that’soften called a batard and that can gointo a loaf pan like this or be baked ona sheet tray with parchment so juststart I’m gonna form it a little bitinto a rectangular shape and then I’mgonna flatten it out using flour as Iknead and you want to work quickly withthis dough because it is really butteryand it’s gonna start to warm up with theheat of your hand so if at any point itstarts to feel sticky and you can’thandle it anymorejust toss it in the fridge for a secondand come back to it okay so what I’mgonna do is I’m gonna fold the doughover onto itself pinching firmly with myfingertips each time so again I’m kindof pulling it out and pressing it down Ilove doing this when you are shapingbread dough it’s always going to getlonger as you’re working so occasionallyyou can also kind of tuck the ends in sothat you don’t end up making it too longas you work like that pressingso when we get to the stage where youcan fold it over as much there’s noneleft kind of has just that tiny littletidbit that’s left that’s when we’regoing to use the heel of our hand toseal the bread loaf so now what I’mgonna do is that same motion just sortof folding it over but I’m pressing itfirmly with the heel of my hand and thenI’ll just squish it in a little tighterand roll it a little bit into a log nowagain if I’d been using a lot of flourduring this process when every time Ifolded that dough on to itself itwouldn’t stick it would just kind ofspring back so another common problemwhen people are making loaves when theylift the loaf to put it into the panthey lift from the edges and then whenthey put it into the pan the center issunk a tiny bit so what you actuallywant to do is you want to try to supportit all the way across the loaf just holdit like a little little precious and ifnecessary even push it in so that thecenter is a little thicker and then wedrop it into the loaf pan just like thatperfect and now as you can see thisdoesn’t even fill the loaf pan all theway on the sides that is all gonna comefrom this second longer proofing withbrioche or any enriched bread that’s atime that you actually want to use alittle bit of a warmer environment ifyou live somewhere really cold you keepyour house really cold it’s near an airconditioning vent anything like thatthis is gonna take a really long time torise so this is a time to let it be alittle bit warmer put it sort of nearyour stove anything like that so we’llcover it and we’re gonna let it riseuntil it comes about a half an inch overthe edge of this pan and that’s reallythe visual cue here to be able to tellthat it’s risen enough if it doesn’tcome above the pan it’s going to be areally sad piddly little loaf we don’twant that alright so here’s an exampleof the finished low you see that it’scome about a half an inch up the side orabove the rim of the panand just to see what it looks like withmy loaf I just made freshly look howpiddly those looks side-by-side likethat how does that become this but itdoes with enough time and patience sothat’s really the exercise here is beingpatient enough to let it rise and thenbeing patient enough to let it bakewhile it smells like butter and thenbeing patient enough to let it cool soyou can slice it but we’re gonna bereally patient because in the end we getbrioche so I get questions all the timein my email or in my Instagram inboxthey’re the same kinds of questions frompeople who are learning to bake and theykeep having the same problems so we’regonna troubleshoot one of the mostcommon problems with baking bread withyeast and that is proofing so proofingis when you let the bread dough risebread dough Rises at two stages first ithas the bulk fermentation when it risesthe whole amount of dough in the bowland then it has the final fermentationwhich is when you’ve shaped it and it’sexactly the way that you want it andyou’re getting ready to bake it so firstof all we’re gonna show you an exampleon these unbaked clover rolls of how youcan tell when something is properlyproofed so in the on the left here I’vegot an under proofed batch of cloverrolls and the way that you can tell thatthey’re under proofed is that when Ipress them they just hold the indent andit kind of just stays exactly where itis or sometimes it’ll pop really fastback at you it’s kind of depends on thetype of bread dough that it is anotherway that you can visually tell is justthe appearance these look very similarto when I shaped them they only expandit a little bit and people tend tofollow a recipe a recipe says let itrise for 30 minutes but if you keep yourhome really cold or it’s summer and it’sreally warm it’s going to take adifferent amount of time so learningthese visual cues is just so importantto getting it right even if the recipemight lead you astray on intenso this is a properly proofed and theway you can tell it properly proofed isthat when I press it it very slowlycomes back to its place so you justpress it gently and it holds theindentation for a brief moment but comesback to its exact same place so theother way that you can tell whensomething is proofed properly is that itlooks puffy a lot of recipes say thatthey say it looks noticeably puffy andwhat that means is especially comparedto this under puffy one which looks alot like it did when we just shaped thisone has started to expand but it’s notgone crazy it’s just noticeably puffynoticeably lighter than it was when wefirst put it into the pan so those areyour two visual cues you’re looking forwhen you press it back that it’s goingto slowly come back into place and youyou don’t need to Jam your finger inwhen you’re doing this or you will put ahole in your roll just gently touch itand get a sensenow with this overproofed one when youpress it it’s going to hold theindentation all the way so the same sortof thing that we’re dealing with withthis with the under proofed but it’sgoing to hold it in a much different waybecause as you can see this looksnoticeably puffy but I know because I’vemade this recipe many times that theseare risen too much they’re too big andwhen these go into the oven they’regonna continue to explode because theycontinue to rise in the oven not justoutside the oven so when you press thisone it just holds that indentation itnever springs back and that’s what youdon’t want once it’s over proofed themost likely thing that’s gonna happen inthe oven it’s not only gonna get superbig but it might also collapse on itselfbecause what you’re doing the whole timeit’s rising you’re letting the yeastfede fede fede fede until you hit theoven and the oven kills the yeast but ifyou let it rise too much it feed bppfeet and then it runs out of food to eatand it dies before it even hits the ovenand that’s what we’re trying to avoid sothose are some keys to how to tell whena bread is under or over proofed beforebaking but what about what it does thebread after baking I’ve got some loavesof challah and I’m gonna showyou post baking what it looks like sowhen it comes to proofing what does itlook like after baking this is aproperly proofed loaf of challah and asyou can see it’s relatively even thebraids have stayed in place and it’sjust got like a nice overall shape and anice volume it’s nice and lofty withoutbeing overly wide it stayed in the shapethat I braided it in this is an underproofed loaf of challah and when youunder proof a loaf of bread it actuallyis prone to tearing so this right hereyou can see the pieces of the braid areactually starting to separate from oneanother and there’s a physical sometimesyou can actually see the dough there’sbig jaggedy tears and it also makes theloaf significantly less even in shape sothis is a very common problem when youunder proof your breadnow when you overproof your bread acouple of things happen the first isit’s humongous it’s way wider than it’ssupposed to be it’s really fat low ithasn’t stayed even it’s thicker on oneside than it is on the other and it’sdeflated slightly so whereas this loafhas a little bit more height this one isverging on being a little bit flatbecause when it hit the oven it startedto collapse a little bit this can alsoaffect the interior crumb structure solet’s give it a go here and seethere’s a slice whoa that’s a beautifulpiece of bread so this is the properlyproof tile and as you can see we havesome nice bigger air bubbles but for themost part the air bubbles are uniform insize and we have this nice tight crumbstructure which is typical of this loafof bread when dough is under proofedit’s likely to be less light a littleless air bubbles a tighter crumbstructure and when it’s over proofed itmight have big gaps or air bubbles aswell so we’ve got our perfect loaf theseare the signs that you want to look forfirst press your finger into that doughbefore you put it into the oven becauseonce you bake it it’s too late there’sno going back and proofing it again nowhe’s an under proofed loaf of bread notgood to eat absolutely not it may justbe a little less beautiful and a littleless even an over proofed loaf of breadsometimes can have a slight yeast oreven alcohol flavor so if you’re unsurea little bit better to err on the sideof under proofing but that’s just from aflavor perspective once you get thosevisual cues and you press you can get aperfect proof every time so once yourloaf has risenlet’s give it a nice coating of egg washwhich helps it Brown but it also keepsthe surface nice and shiny which Ireally love with brioche and my egg washis just one egg mixed with about atablespoon of water and you can doublethat triple that if you’ve got a lot ofbaking projects coming upand I like to use that combinationbecause the egg yolk browns and the eggwhite makes it shiny and you want to begentle brushing this because it’s verypuffy and can very easily deflate justlike we showed with the proof test youknow when you press with your finger itcould just leave a mark so we want to begentle with the brushing get it brushedall over the surface and the key togetting a really good brioche is to bakeit until it’s very deeply golden-brown Ifind a lot of times with bread peopleare so afraid of burning things butreally you want that dark outer crustthat’s something that is really bakerylevel so we’re gonna do that this isready to bake it bakes at 375 until theinternal temperature is 190 to 200degreesso here we have our two finished loavesArleen bread the ciabatta and ourenriched bread the brioche and this iswhat they look like when they’re bakedand I want to slice into them to showyou what they look like inside but it isimportant to remember to cool your breadbefore you slice it if you don’t let itcool entirely it actually can compressthe interior crumb structure so eventhough it is delightful sometimes totear into a still warm baguette it’lljust change the texture on the insidecould be a little gummy err just alittle bit different so we’re thinkingabout but sometimes you’re impatient andyou can’t wait I get it so let’s givethis one a cut see what it looks like ohyes this is very typical of a briochesuper tight spongy crumb you know somevery even crumb structure and a niceeven crust all the way around that’swhat we like to see and I can smell thebutter just from having cut that slicewhich is also particularly amazing andexciting all right let’s cut this oneooh you hear thatthat’s crusty and this is exactly whatyou’re looking for inside a ciabattavery light airy crumb not as spongy lotsof big air pockets inside and a reallycrisp crust which I love like that yesso that’s what we’re talking aboutlooking for with ciabatta it’s gonnagive one more slice cuz why not yes seehonestly this is what you love to seeyou love to see big air pockets likethis because that’s the sign that therewas lots of hydration in that loaf andthat is the ciabatta[Music]so things we learned today we learn thedifference between the different kindsof yeast we learned how to make a preferment and how to utilize a pre from itwith bakers percentage we learned how tomake lean dough’s we learned how to makeenriched dough’s we learned how to slowdown and speed up east rise timesthere’s no reason not to beincorporating more yeasted recipes intoyour baking adventures because it reallyis much more easy and much more doablethan you thinkespecially if you know the reasons whybehind everything that’s happening sotime to eat some bread I think that workI hope this video gives you theconfidence to tackle any recipe that hasEast in it don’t be afraid it is totallypossible if you’ve got that confidenceyou can make any of these recipes and somany more so be sure to check out myother articles about yeast and breadbaking on food 52 all these recipes arethere as well and if you like this videobe sure to LIKE and subscribe so thatyou can see future episodes happy baking[Music]