Whole grain dough, kneading in a combineA source:
🔗 by Elena Zheleznyak
What do you need to know in order to knead a good whole grain dough and then bake it into a good bread? On the one hand, what could be easier: here it is flour, here is water, mix and mash. But in reality, working with such a dough is very different from working with "ordinary" wheat, made from white flour.
First, a few words about the structure and composition of wheat grain. It can be conditionally divided into several parts: bran (fruit shells), endosperm (also called "flour kernel") and the embryo.
The figure shows what percentage of the grain is bran, which is the endosperm, and which is the germ, and you can also notice that the largest part of the grain is endosperm, which is mainly used to produce white wheat flour. Whole grain flour, as you understand, contains all grain particles without exception, therefore it also has a higher nutritional value. "Flour grain" is the richest in starches and protein, while the bulk of the nutrients are contained in the fruit membranes and embryos. The picture below shows what vitamins and how much flour is deprived of when it is "cleansed" of bran and embryo.
Among other things, these parts of the grain are also rich in fiber, which works in our body like a "brush", absorbing and removing harmful substances from the body. Nutritionists have not reached a consensus on the question of which is better: bran or pure fiber, because fiber is not digested at all, but is part of the bran, which in themselves have some nutritional value.
How does whole grain dough behave? At the very beginning of the kneading, it is very loose and, as it were, consisting of separate small particles, it does not stretch at all, and when you try to stretch it, it instantly breaks, as if it were shortbread dough, that is, there is almost no hint of gluten. White dough almost immediately becomes homogeneous, albeit sticky, and begins to stretch at least a little. Of course, not in the same way as the ready-made dough for chabattu, but in comparison with whole grain it is very even.
Why? The answer is in flour, so I will say the obvious now. White flour is a huge variety of soft particles of the same size, without impurities of coarse or large particles, in fact, this is the milled endosperm of wheat grain. Whole grain flour has a creamy color, it is heterogeneous in its consistency and contains both small white endosperm particles and relatively large bran and germ. There are a lot of large particles and they are randomly located in the flour. This affects not only the nutritional value of flour, but also determines its ability to form a dough.
What happens to white flour when it combines with water? It is instantly moistened, gradually protein particles form threads and films, due to which the gluten and dough framework are formed. I want to note that nothing interferes with this process, the protein swells freely, and then, nothing interferes with it. In whole-grain dough, everything is much more complicated: due to the fact that flour contains particles of different hardness and size, the protein of the flour cannot swell so freely and, when it stretches, it always meets obstacles in its path. Simply put, the bran and germ are constantly tearing up the gluten during the kneading process, so, in general, whole grain dough takes longer to achieve the desired consistency and properties.
I decided to experiment and knead the dough straight from freshly ground whole wheat flour and see how it would behave during kneading, fermentation and proofing. I kneaded in Ankarsrum Original with autolysis: two minutes at first speed, then plus 20 minutes (without salt), then kneaded for 15 minutes at second speed. Note that the white flour dough would have been kneaded 5 minutes earlier, whole grain would have taken longer.
This is how the dough looked in the process of further kneading, the dough remained quite loose and sticky for a long time, but over time it began to change and stretch out instead.
These photos show how it changed and became very smooth.
Then I put it to ferment at room temperature (22-24) for about 2.5 hours, during which time I folded the dough twice. Considering that this is a dough made from freshly ground flour, no unusual things were noticed in it until I noticed that it became more sticky and viscous during proofing. Someone recently wrote to me that they had similar problems with the whole grain dough, that it liquefied and blurred by the end of the proofing. No wonder, it's all about ... whole grain flour again! It has a high enzymatic activity, in other words, it begins to ferment faster, but also break down faster. It is not for nothing that bakers are advised to start the sourdough on whole grain flour. This is both the advantages and disadvantages of whole grain flour, its gluten and starches are subject to active enzymatic attacks, due to which the dough during fermentation can liquefy and lose its shape.
But we can still do something about it!- We use a dough of white flour. For wheat bread, I always put a dough from white flour, firstly, it turns out to avoid excess acid, and secondly, the gluten of white flour does not break down as quickly as whole grain gluten during fermentation. As a result, using white flour dough, we have a “semi-finished product” (and the dough is exactly that) of excellent quality to acidify the dough and strengthen the wheat gluten. Yes, bread with white dough will not turn out to be 100% whole grain, but I am ready to make such a compromise, because thanks to this the bread will turn out not only healthy, but will also look normal.
- We fold the dough during fermentation. One or two times will be sufficient for a medium dough. Folds will strengthen the gluten and allow it to develop a little more.
- We shape it tight so that there is tension on the surface of the dough.Poor molding is a mistake that many make with white bread, poorly molded, and then the bread spreads in the proofer and in the oven. After the workpiece has been molded, turn it over with the seam down and, as it were, pass this seam along the table a little, thereby crushing it and pulling the surface of the dough. Make sure that the dough "contacts" the table and that it does not just run on the surface. To do this, make sure that there is practically no flour on the table and that it does not get between the dough and the surface of the table. This is a very good method, which will allow you to mold a round or oval blank rather tightly, and achieve a very good shape of the bread.
- We make small pieces.Don't make items that are too large or too thin. Too large ones will spread, and thin ones will stretch too far in the proofer. If you still had to make thin ones (pretzels, bagels, land mines), put them to stand directly on pieces of parchment, so that you do not later drag them by hand.
- We monitor the fermentation temperature. Ferment and ferment the dough at low temperatures or even in the cold. A low temperature slows down the action of enzymes, which allows the dough to keep its gluten framework for longer. Remember that already at a temperature of 25 degrees, the enzymatic activity of flour increases greatly, which is why the properties of the dough begin to actively deteriorate.
- Neatly notched. Do not make deep and too large cuts, and if the workpiece has a full proofing, you can probably do without them. In order for the incision to open well without affecting the shape of the bread, just steam at the beginning of baking is not enough. It is also important how developed the gluten of the dough is, in what state it is at the time of planting bread in the oven. The dough, which has managed to liquefy in the proofer, will not give you beautifully opened cuts, most likely, they will be smeared in appearance and provoke the dough to spread even more.
- Preheat the oven well with a stone or baking sheet.Of course, if you have a stone, this is very good, because well heated under the oven will allow the bread to retain its shape as much as possible and rise up as much as possible, especially if you take care of the humidification of the oven in the first 15 minutes of baking. You can read about the role steam and stone play in baking bread in this article. I start heating my oven at least 40 minutes before baking, and more often in an hour.
In general, the recommendations are standard, as for the more familiar dough, only partially composed of whole grain flour, only here they are more critical, because they leave less room for maneuver. A step to the left, a step to the right - and instead of bread, you get a cake! Joke))) But if that - bake in shape!))))
Good luck and delicious bread!
