Over Proving the Dough with Time
When things go wrong it’s a great opportunity to show why. I have plenty of failures but don’t always have the time to photograph and post them but here I wanted to make the effort since it’s something I don’t often see discussed. I’ve read plenty of discussions on over-working the dough causing the collapse of the gluten structure but here that wasn’t the case, it was purely leaving it in bulk fermentation for too long in a warm environment. If you don’t know bulk fermentation is it means letting the dough prove in a big mass after mixing.
One dough was 100% spelt and the other a Swiss dark flour, both of which by the way I made again yesterday and produced a loaf without a problem. What went wrong here was me mixing one evening and going to bed forgetting about them. I should have put them in the fridge overnight taken them out in the morning and do my fold & bake method.
In the winter I can get away with this neglect since my kitchen is unheated and it would remain cold enough not to cause problems. Unfortunately when I left these doughs out it was during the heatwave we’ve just experience and night temperature was 19C / 66F. As soon as I saw and touched the dough in the morning I knew it was a no good but I wanted to bake to photograph it for this post.
You can see from the crumb it still has evidence of gas bubbles existing in the dough but the gluten structure could no longer support the dough and make it rise.
The bread below was also another failed attempt, a collapse dough I made months back but that time it was over-proving on the last prove using rye flour. Rye flour also doesn’t like long proving especially like this where it’s not baked in a tin.
When you have an over proved dough it feels and appears like a thick pancake batter and spreads into a flat disk, there’s nothing you can do about it, a bit like over-heating chocolate.
Wanted to show you how pulling some of the dough you’ll see the lack of stretch and pull from a lively dough as it should have been.
Instead the dough just breaks easily.
This is the other dough, again no gluten structure of pull and stretch or elasticity, the dough should fight with you a little like it has some energy.
Here it simply gives up without a fight.
Below are photos of another dough with its gluten in working order, you can see when I fold it how it stays in place, there’s evidence of strength.
And importantly when you folded it and leave it it can form a shape.
That will teach me for being absent minded.