Book of American Baking / A Practical Guide Covering Various Branches of the Baking Industry, Including Cakes, Buns, and Pastry, Bread Making, Pie Baking, Etc.

by Various

Mix thoroughly. Temperature when mixed 80 degrees in summer; 84 degrees in winter.

You will notice I allow seven pounds of flour to the gallon of water in the sponge, which makes it medium soft, causing it to show the drop good. A stiff rye sponge will sometimes hold up on top until it is completely rotten. On this account I have water and flour weighed accurate for rye sponge.

The sponge is usually ready in three and a half to four hours. I give it a full drop and regulate how far it comes up the second time by the strength of the flour. In this instance the sponge took one full drop and had risen half way up the second time when I took it. I have already had to give the sponge the second full drop when using very strong flour.

Now we come to the doughing stage: Two gallons water (about 10 degrees lower temperature than required for sponge); two pounds of sour from crock; one pound eleven ounces of salt; 50 pounds of the same blend of flour as used in the sponge. Mix good and thorough. The temperature should be about 80 degrees in summer when finished, and 84 in winter.

I cover it up and allow to stand until when I push my fist well into it and withdraw quickly, it recedes slightly instead of resisting. It is generally one and a half to two hours in getting ready. I then throw it out on the table and have it scaled, rounded up, made into loaves, set in boxes, dusted with corn meal, with the crease down and set away to prove. When the loaves had risen or increased in bulk about 50 per cent. we washed them over with boiled corn starch and water, and set them in the oven to bake; the oven being as near 400 degrees as we can get it, with steam running in. The steam is left running in until the loaf is done rising, then we shut it off and open the steam damper a few minutes. A few minutes before we commence to draw we turn the steam on again to glaze the crust, which does away with washing after it comes out of the oven. We let it bake until it a good rich brown and gives a firm sound when rapped with the knuckles. The result of this description you see in these two loaves.

Now, gentlemen, I will endeavor to tell you in as short and plain a way as I know how why I did or did not do certain things.

I will take the sour first: That is the cause of endless trouble to most bakers, and many have stopped using it altogether. The idea is to produce just a little acid taste to the bread and still retain the full, sweet rye flavor, a kind of “bitter sweet” as one may say. People who like a little of it in their rye bread would be the first ones to disdain sour and flavorless rye bread from over-fermentation. And I would not blame them either. So the old fashioned idea of adding sour is an excellent one, if conducted rightly. And I find when it is done right it contains a high per cent. of lactic acid—the same bacillus the farmers and dairymen develop by letting their milk sour before churning to give a flavor to their butter and cheese. The same bacillus gives the acid taste to buttermilk and cottage cheese, and what German does not like them? Now milk may be said to be the home of lactic bacillus; that is why you heard me say add water and skim milk. The ideal temperature for its development is 95 degrees. You notice milk turns sour very quickly during hot weather; that is the reason.

Do not make the sour over night, as at the conclusion of the lactic ferment others, undesirable, may commence and cause you endless trouble.

Do not put the sour in the sponge and think to save a little yeast that way. It may turn your whole sponge sour, and spoil your bread. If you want a little more acid taste to the bread, use a little more sour, and vice versa.

You will notice I use a little hops (or rather hop liquor) in the sponge. The reason is to keep the sponge as pure and sweet as possible. Rye flour differs from wheat flour in that there is in rye flour scarcely any of what we call gluten. It analyzes a higher content of albuminoids than the average wheat flour, but they are nearly all soluble in water, and therefore, ready for easy assimilation by bacteria, and as it is this the proteids bacteria thrive on they have an easy chance to start a very undesirable fermentation, unless something is used to hold them in check. Therefore, I advise using a little hops which will do it effectually.