Additives to keep bread soft longer?

[Integraoligist]

Was wanting to know if anyone knows of any additives to add to bread to make it stay soft longer?
We have limited space to make sub bread and we have to make multiple batches a day to keep up with demand… I want to try and stay ahead of the game and make extra sub bread the day/night before and still have that fresh baked softness.

We do not have freezer space for bread, so thats out of the question…

I thought that RediSponge was suppose to help with this, but after multiple tests even with a 6% addition it didnt help.

Thoughts on what we can use?

Thanks all!

 

[Tom_Lehmann]

You bet!
Reddi-Sponge is a reducing agent made with dairy whey and L-cysteine and I bet that 6% level really gave you a soft and extensible dough. The best suited product for your application is an additive cocktail made with SSL (sodium stearoyl lactalate) and distilled mono-diglyceride. Caravan Ingredients out of Kansas City has a product containing these two functional ingredients that should work well for you…that’s the good news, the bad news is that these ingredients are typically sold in boxes containing 50-pounds of material. Another option for you is to use the old standby, add about 2%, maybe a little more, of mashed potato flakes to your dough. You will need to increase the water added to the dough by 2.5 times the weight of mashed potato flakes you add. No other changes to the formula or dough are needed. Remember, do not refrigerate or freeze the bread if softness/freshness is of prime concern as bread will stale at an accelerated rate at refrigerated temperatures.
Tom Lehmann/The Dough Doctor

 

[GotRocks]

Remember, do not refrigerate or freeze the bread if softness/freshness is of prime concern as bread will stale at an accelerated rate at refrigerated temperatures.
Tom Lehmann/The Dough Doctor

I was not aware of that,
could you please explain the process/mechanics of how that happens? I was thinking that the reduced temperatures under refrigeration would retard water evaporation. Or is the chemical process of something becoming stale a different set of circumstances that is not actually water evaporation?

 

[Tom_Lehmann]

GR;
Your last sentence sums it up correctly. The staling process is a very complex process which is not yet fully understood, but it is recognized to be related to firming of the wheat starch after baking. Moisture loss is not a part of the staling process (even bagged bread goes stale in a few days if it isn’t formulated with shelf-life extenders). When we make croutons from sliced bread, the bread is baked, cooled, refrigerated overnight, then sliced and cubed for the croutons. The refrigeration period is an important part of the process in that it firms the bread through staling, making the slices durable enough to be cubed or shredded for use in making bread crumbs. The most effective bread softeners presently available are enzymatic softeners. These are specially selected enzymes that survive baking and continue to work on (break down/hydrolize) the gelatinized starch during the shelf-life period. Have you noticed that the bread you buy today never seems to get very firm like it used to? That’s the reason. Freezing doesn’t improve the staling picture since the bread must pass through the critical temperature range for accelerated staling (60F to 20F) twice, once during the freezing process and again during the thawing of the product. This is why stores that use frozen bakery products often have a temperature/humidity controlled cabinet that they use to slack out (thaw) the frozen product as quickly as possible to minimize product exposure to this temperature range as much as possible.
Tom Lehmann/The Dough Doctor