The dough was overfermened at this point but that only happened because it was this sticky all the way through proofing and i thought maybe it was underfermented. I never seem to get a nice smooth dough with a nice skin, and I’m really not sure why.
by qquackie
28 Comments
I can’t seem to edit but this happens regardless of recipe. This is the dough in the video, but Ive also done other beginner 70% hydration doughs. https://alexandracooks.com/2019/11/07/easy-whole-wheat-ish-sourdough-bread/
Try putting flour on your finger, helps with the stickiness
My dough is always like that until I shape it. I usually wet my finger before trying the poke test in order to keep it from sticking.
Use less water.
Go with a recipe that is 60% hydration.
If you have flour with low amount of proteins it is much harder to build proper dough strenght – 70% hydration can be too much for low quality flour. Sometimes you need more streches and folds or kneeding. Proper pre-shaping before final shape can help too. Next time try to use “stiff starter” 🙂
Stickiness is the least reliable characteristic of fermentation. I’d go with volume increase and bubbles. If your dough isn’t holding shape after stretches and folds it’s too hydrated, if it does but then doesn’t after shaping it’s overfermented
My dough gets sticky too. I usually use the poke test for my final proof, not bulk fermentation. I use volume, bubbles, wobble test, and window pane to determine when BF is finished
This happened to me 3 times when i tried to do baguette.
Sometime it is just about the flour… :/
Dust with flour first.or. Sometimes, I even dip my finger in oil first.
I stopped doing the poke test because it was never reliable for me. I look at the sheen of my dough, the bubbles, and how jiggly it gets instead.
It might still be underfermented, or your flour could have too many enzymes (indicated by a low falling number). These enzymes break down the protein networks faster than the bacteria and yeasts can achieve perfect fermentation, which will always end up in a sticky mess of a dough. Is your starter strong?
Hi. Wet the tip of your finger when doing the test. It should stop it from sticking. Having said that, a much better test, imo is the percentage rise.
Happy baking
Straight walled, cylinder, food storage containers are your friend 🙂 don’t need the poke test if you know when it doubles
Do more stretching and folds, it will fix the problem.
I am a newbie and my first three attempts were like this and went in the trash. It is so frustrating! I think I was under mixing the dough in the beginning.
I read somewhere that you should mix the dough for a full 5-6 minutes after combining ingredients, then proceed with stretch and folds per the recipe. This has helped me a lot with stickiness and shaping the dough.
Highly reccomend looking up The Sourdough Journey “The Bulk-O-Matic System” guide. Between that and using the aliquot method my loaves have been beautiful. (Aside from the very first one…we wont talk abkut how severly underproofed it was)
Learning to read the dough with multiple ways gives me mulyiple points to doubke check fermentation and makes it so much easier
My dough is also always sticky throughout the bulk fermentation. I just wet my finger before doing the poke test. Sprinkling a tiny bit of flour in the ‘poke area’ would also work.
Just lower hydration and get comfortable there then move up. You can go as low as 50%, depending on your flour
Did you wet your finger first?
Mine looked like this last night, and I’m so worried about it! Lol
The poke test is folklore. As other people have said, you have better results judging your bulk fermentation based on the rise. Buy yourself, a clear food container, and mark the height of when you put the dough in. Use
https://preview.redd.it/kphtfzofenoe1.jpeg?width=2436&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=4f176564ec21934d7cb4abd6d31553c7b4c8f087
attached fermentation chart as a guideline.
hi! This was happening to me when my starter was too acidic. Does it smell really strong?
It would look over fermented before it was ready, it gave me a REALLY hard crust, super gummy.
I ended up feeding it a larger ratio of flower (went from 1:1:1 twice a day to 1:5:5 once a day) and it 100% fixed my issue of sticky dough. I still havent gotten a perfect one but I think im getting closer lol
Put a little flour on your finger so it doesn’t stick
wet finger!
(tap water, pleuse dont lick it)
Put some flour on it
The only time I do a poke is when it’s coming out of the fridge after cold ferment, and that is just for satisfaction lol! Otherwise the poke test, the float test, all of it unreliable!!
Edit: thanks for all the advice everyone! I baked it off (though it was all sticky and stretched coming out of the basket after being in the fridge overnight. I reshaped it and baked it off.
https://preview.redd.it/0psr8pwionoe1.jpeg?width=3024&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=58d5f16e3c8ebff1841192db4e090dd5c229dc79
It’s ok, a bit weird shape and height wise but not bad! I went ahead and bought a much higher protein flour (previous one was only 11.7 for the white & 15.3? For the wholewheat). I got a 14.9% protein flour & my next dough already feels much better. We’ll see what happens though!
I think the poke test is kinda silly. I wish it wasn’t preached so commonly. There are much better and more objective indicators to watch for IMO