?_Lehmann:

[system]

tom, 2 months ago, i submitted a question via telephone and you responded to it by telephone. it was a question about making my own hogies for phillies, parmesan sandwiches etc.
you referred me to the website where you had a recipe that you called grinders. first off, i was disappointed in the instructions. you suggested throwing everything in the pot and then adding the flour. i was surprised that this recipe came from a man of your standings
after acquring the correct type of yeast for your recipe, everything was properly measured out. the mixture was blended by your time frames being careful to moniter the temp. after removing it from the mixture, it was a gooey mess. i measured again the second time and to me, it appears that either the amount of water or the amount of flour is not correct.
hopefully, not too many people tried to follow this recipe. [email protected]

 

[Tom_Lehmann]

Carl;
I’m sorry to hear that you were disappointed with the dough formula. We have had a good number of very positive responses with this formula. There are several things at question here. 1) The type of flour that you are using. You want to make sure that you are using a strong bread type of flour rather than a lower protein content all purpose flour. 2) You didn’t provide me with anny details as to how you actually mixed the dough, but using a planetary mixer (Hobart) you should be able to achieve pretty good gluten development with about 16 to 18-minutes mixing time. Remember, this is a bread type dough and not a pizza dough, as such, it must be mixed to a point of pretty complete gluten development. Sorry about the procedure, but it is common industry practice to use a straight dough procedure for making this type of bun. First add the water (cold water) to the mixing bowl. then the yeast (if not identified as another type, it will always be compressed yeast) Then just mix the dough to full gluten development. The finished dough will be smooth, soft and extensible. Cut the dough into pieces of desired weight (6 or 7 ounces) form into balls, allow to rest on the bench top or on sheet pans for about 15 to 20 minutes, then you can pass the dough balls through your sheeter or hand form into mini loaves (each loaf making a single hoagie bun). Allow the formed dough to proof for about 45 to 60 minutes, give a cut from end to end along the top, spray with water and bake.
I’m guessing that you left out a step in the procedure.
Tom Lehmann/The Dough Doctor