Dough question: anyone else using a bread machine to make dough?

[mmmhumous]

We tend to make our dough in 500g (flour) batches. Uising both our breadmaker and kitchen-aid style mixer. The dough hooks on the mixer seem to make a better job of kneading the dough than the bread maker (though the bread maker has a timer function).

[Frances]

Hey Adam, is that your new signiature line? I love it!

[mmmhumous]

Originally Posted by Frances

Hey Adam, is that your new signiature line? I love it!

Yep, a quote from a very outspoken Glaswegian friend. Also asked me if I'd considered using it as a crematorium for pets

[carioca]

Originally Posted by james

<SNIP>
Also, you can't control the process, such as using autolyse.
<SNIP>
James

Hi,
the word autolyse caught my eye - yesterday I made pizzas after Pizza Dough II in Peter Reinhart's 'Crust & Crumb' but the dough was exceedingly firm even after "resting" it for an hour in the refrigerator as per recipe.

So after we polished off the pizzas (brought back in the rain which did aught to soften the cracker crust!), I investigated 'proper' pizza doughs in the FB manual.

There was that word again: autolyse! (Incidentally, it does NOT come from the French word for rest, its from the Greek words for 'self' + 'dissolve'; so you might consider the following excerpt when next editing the e-book):

"Autolyse
Le terme autolyse désigne l'autodestruction (le suffixe -lyse fait référence à la dissolution). Le terme est utilisé en médecine pour désigner le suicide, et en biologie pour désigner l'autodestruction de cellules.
Pour la suite, voir Wikipédia.org..."

Interestingly, my wife 'discovered' autolyse on her own back in the 1970s when making sourdough bread in Sydney after a recipe from a German friend - but Bianca made the dough very wet, let it ferment overnight, put it into bread pans the next day and allowed to rise again, then baked it in a very hot oven (220C) for 60-65 minutes. Totally delish! Same procedure yields excellent breads for her today, whereas I still struggle with the experts' master formulas :-)

Cheers,

LMH

[gjbingham]

I thought autolysis was latin. My bad I guess. Anyway, you're correct on the meaning. It happens to dead cells all the time in your body. The enzymes inside basically break down the cells and surrounding tissues.