Feed your yeast

[shellyschachter]

I've been trying to eliminate sugar/sugar products from my diet and use artificial sweetener as a substitute. Not sure of the end results of using this but better alternative for me than sugar related disease. Also trying to cut back on carbs but very difficult for me to not bake bread now and then.

Anyway, I substituted the artificial sweetener for the honey I usually use in my whole wheat oatmeal bread. I mill wheat berries (stored in the freezer to counteract the heat produced from milling) and use 1 1/2 cups, with 1 1/2 cups white flour, heaping cup of old fashioned oats, heaping tablespoon of gluten, cinnamon, oil and salt.

My yeast was old so not sure if that was also partly responsible for the lack of rise. This loaf is on the left in the photo.

Made a second loaf using same ingredients, except fresh yeast and 1/4 cup honey instead of artificial sweetener.

Both loaves made in a bread machine on the whole wheat cycle.

Second loaf with honey and fresh yeast on the right.

I will always remember to feed my yeast.

Shelly

[rotuts]

I use a bread machine. One of its drawbacks is that it has both a fixed time and fixed temp. for the rise period.

the loaf on the L might have risen higher with more time to rise.

some even simple bread machines now have a manual bake button. again, the simple ones do not let you adjust the total baking time nor temp, but if your kitchen is warm, you can let the L loaf rest in the baking container to rise higher and try the manual bake if its a meaningful change for your using less sugar.

or you can try to add more yeast in the fixed cycle mode.

Edited September 23, 2013 by rotuts (log)

[HungryC]

You don't need sugar (or honey) to feed the yeast. You changed batches of yeast, so your comparison isn't valid. Also, the artificial sweetener (you don't say what kind) may be contributing something to the loaf that inhibits yeast performance. But seriously, you do not need to add ANY sort of sugar, artificial or real, to get a loaf to rise.

[rotuts]

correct. I never use any in my Machine Bread.

[shellyschachter]

Thank you for the feedback. Time and temperature were fixed as I used the same cycle for each loaf. I could not foresee that the forst loaf would need more rising time, thus a custom program.

But the concensus seems to be that the fresh yeast made more of a difference than using the honey in the recipe. Since I have always used a natural sweetener in my dough, it never occurred to me that it was an optional ingredient.

Shelly

[rotuts]

consider other yeasts for the Bread machine. one can learn a lot about them at King Arthur flout

http://search.kingarthurflour.com/search?p=Q&asug=&af=type%3Aproducts&w=instant+yeast

I use Red star, and SAF red instant. they keep well in a sealed jar in the refig. Ive never had a problem with them in my machine.

and they are much cheaper by the lbs or two.

[shellyschachter]

Thanks for the link and I am very familiar with KA. I do use Red Star which I buy in 1 lb pkg from Costco.

The yeast I had in the fridge was several years old, the very bottom of my container so I assumed it was just not very active any more.

I have learned that my use of honey is more for flavor than necessity.

I'm never too old to learn.

Shelly

[judiu]

I would attribute the better browning on loaf #2 to the added sweetener, though.