Dough is ALWAYS too wet
Hello,
I am new here and trying to figure out how to make a high hydration sourdough that will hold its shape.
I tried a new recipe today that I found online:
325g flour
253g water
65g starter
7.5g salt
I mixed the flour and water and let it rest (autolyse?) for several hours. I then added the starter and let it rest for 30 minutes. The recipe then said to do several cycles of folding and resting which I did, to the best of my ability. It was really almost impossible because the dough was just so wet. It didn't feel like dough at all. It's just...a sticky glob.
I have tried an 80% hydration as well, with almost the same results. How do I get it to be a dough, even a sticky one?
When I put it in the bowl to proof it just looks like...thick oatmeal.
Any help is greatly appreciated.
How healthy is the starter? An underfed starter can get very acidic and that can interfere with gluten formation - which is what will combine with the water and make a dough tacky instead of sticky.
PS - you don't really need high hydration to make bread. Tis better to stay around 65% till you get well accustomed to the handling the dough. Enjoy!
It might be the starter. I'll keep feeding and growing it and see what happens.
Thank you!
What kind of flour? What country are you in?
Aaaaalso, if your starter isn’t very active, prefermenting <10% of your flour may cause the process to take a loooooong time. You sure your starter is active?
(Also, truly the real answer is just lower the hydration cause the high hydration numbers are so much less important than how the dough is to mix/ferment/handle/shape/proof/EAT!)