Is it okay to add extra sugar to a specific brioche recipe?
A recipe calls for the following ingredients: (a version of potato brioche):
- 250g potato
- 1/3 cup milk
- 1 tablespoon olive oil
- 3 and half cups flour
- 2 teaspoons instant yeast
- 1 teaspoon bread improver
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1 teaspoon sugar
- 1 large egg
But I like a taste of sweetness for my baguettes. Is it okay to add extra sugar, and how many tablespoons would be okay?
Best Answer
First of all, this recipe is not supposed to taste sweet. There is so little sugar, it must be there for tenderness - and even this is strange in a bread with so much glutenless filler (the potato). If it is in the sponge only, maybe it is only there to speed up the sponge rising time.
Adding sugar to a bread recipe is not trivial. Sugar interferes with gluten creation. The maximum sugar you can have in a bread recipe is two tablespoons sugar per cup of flour, which is not very sweet. And then you have to change the recipe: it needs much longer kneading, and more yeast. At very low concentrations, sugar does indeed feed the yeast, but if you use more of it, its osmotic activity interferes with its growth.
The probelm here is that you have all the potato in the recipe. This means you already have very little gluten compared to the mass of dough. And also that it is diluting any sugar, reducing the sweet taste.
You can certainly try adding up to 7 tablespoons of sugar, but you should knead longer (double the knead time for the full 7 tablespoons - I knead standard brioche for about 30 minutes per hand before adding the butter) and will have to live with a bit worse texture. You can also try to use gluten strengthening tricks to compensate - add ascorbic acid (vit. C powder or a crushed pill), start with cold water, or add vital gluten.
Pictures about "Is it okay to add extra sugar to a specific brioche recipe?"
Can you add extra sugar to bread dough?
Adding sugar to bread provides easy food for the yeast, allowing it to produce carbon dioxide faster and therefore leading to faster rising times. As well as this, sugar provides more flavor, tenderizes the crumb, increases browning, and holds onto moisture, which keeps the bread fresh for longer.What does extra sugar do to bread?
Adding the sugar gives an added boost to the yeast as the yeast grows and multiplies. The yeast uses the sugar, forming by-products of carbon dioxide and alcohol, which give the bread its characteristic flavor. The sugar that is not utilized by the yeast tenderizes the bread by preventing the gluten from forming.Why is my brioche not fluffy?
Brioche dough that's too wet will be slack and hard to handle, and it won't spring up as pertly during baking. Dough that's too dry will give you brioche that's heavy and dry, rather than light and fluffy.Why are my brioche buns so dense?
Dense or heavy bread can be the result of not kneading the dough long enough. Mixing the salt and yeast together or Losing patience in the middle of molding your bread and there is not enough tension in your finished loaf before baking.How Does Sugar Affect Bread Dough? The Effects of Sugar Explained
Sources: Stack Exchange - This article follows the attribution requirements of Stack Exchange and is licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0.
Images: Mikhail Nilov, Monstera, Tim Douglas, Tim Douglas