Baker's Percentages

[_john]

I was never very interested in baking before because it seemed like an inexact "exact science" and also because I was never very successful. Measuring flour with volumetric measures? It just didn't make sense considering all the factors that go into the production of flour and environmental conditions. So a few years ago I bought a cheap digital scale (~US$20) and started experimenting with recipes that listed ingredients by weight. I finally started to be able to produce edible baked goods but the problem became where to find good recipes that listed ingredients by weight. Then I found out about baker's percentages and I felt like I had stumbled on the holy grail of baking.

So why aren't baker's percentages used by everyone? Why are we still dipping and sweeping when we should be multiplying and weighing?

(p.s. anyone have the percentages for muffin batter?)

[etalanian]

One reason bakers' ratios aren't used in recipes for the general public is that it scares many non-professional people. So publishers and food editors prefer to use volumetric measures instead. If that is where you are looking, you're looking in the wrong place.

You can find them in professional baking cookbooks.

eileen

[naes]

I know what you mean. Using weight measures just... makes sense!

If you're looking for a good bread baking book with baker's percentages, try Bread: A Baker's Book of Techniques and Recipes by Jeffrey Hamelman.

[alanamoana]

even with bakers' percentages, one still has to be able to diagnose differences in how the recipe is behaving. as you stated, the environment wreaks havoc on flour and there's no real way to compensate for that except experience in working with dough to know when/how to adjust.

[tino27]

The first thing I do with a new recipe is to convert it into baker's percentages (if it already isn't so). It is just SO much easier to scale the recipe up and down to fit what you need to make. Of course, then the problem becomes when you give out a recipe to friends or family who ask for it ...

"What the heck is a 'gram'?"

I think everyone would benefit from recipes that were listed by weight instead of by volume. Then again, I am a firm believer that recipes are blueprints ... not actual amounts to be used. As someone already posted, knowing how the dough or batter is supposed to feel is even more important.