Proportionate recipe quantity

[Purdyhorse]

Please can someone advise me that if I want to reduce the quantity a recipe makes by proportionally reducing the ingredients should I similarly reduce the quantity of yeast? Thank you

 

[Norcalbaker59]

Please can someone advise me that if I want to reduce the quantity a recipe makes by proportionally reducing the ingredients should I similarly reduce the quantity of yeast? Thank you

Yes.

Look up “Baker’s percentsges”. All baked goods are based on ratios by weight. It's the system used by commercial bakers to scale all recipes.

I’ve written a lot here about baker’s percentages, how to calculate it and how to scale using baker’s percentages.

Your recipe needs to be in metric weight to scale properly.

 

[Purdyhorse]

Yes.

Look up “Baker’s percentsges”. All baked goods are based on ratios by weight. It's the system used by commercial bakers to scale all recipes.

I’ve written a lot here about baker’s percentages, how to calculate it and how to scale using baker’s percentages.

Your recipe needs to be in metric weight to scale properly.

Thank you, your help is much appreciated.
I'm a novice amateur hand , rather than bread machine, baker and I've just bought Paul Hollywood's '100 Great Breads'.
I'm a bit nervous about trying even his basic recipes because they predominantly include 20g of fresh yeast in a 500g loaf, which is way in excess of the 14 g (or or 7g of Allinson's Easy Bake type) yeasts that have worked well in my bread efforts to date.
Furthermore, he states that, whilst all his recipes include the use of fresh yeast, the fresh can be substituted with instant yeast at a rate of 75% of the quantity of fresh yeast.
Again this contradicts all the recipes I've tried to date wherein the instruction is to to use either 14g of fresh yeast or 7g of instant and this ratio has worked well for me.
I understand the author is a respected baker but do struggle with the above.
Any insight you can offer would be very welcome.

 

[retired baker]

Thank you, your help is much appreciated.
I'm a novice amateur hand , rather than bread machine, baker and I've just bought Paul Hollywood's '100 Great Breads'.
I'm a bit nervous about trying even his basic recipes because they predominantly include 20g of fresh yeast in a 500g loaf, which is way in excess of the 14 g (or or 7g of Allinson's Easy Bake type) yeasts that have worked well in my bread efforts to date.
Furthermore, he states that, whilst all his recipes include the use of fresh yeast, the fresh can be substituted with instant yeast at a rate of 75% of the quantity of fresh yeast.
Again this contradicts all the recipes I've tried to date wherein the instruction is to to use either 14g of fresh yeast or 7g of instant and this ratio has worked well for me.
I understand the author is a respected baker but do struggle with the above.
Any insight you can offer would be very welcome.

it won't make a huge difference but temperatures will.
Ice cold liquids for fresh cake yeast, warm fluids for dry yeast.

 

[Norcalbaker59]

Thank you, your help is much appreciated.
I'm a novice amateur hand , rather than bread machine, baker and I've just bought Paul Hollywood's '100 Great Breads'.
I'm a bit nervous about trying even his basic recipes because they predominantly include 20g of fresh yeast in a 500g loaf, which is way in excess of the 14 g (or or 7g of Allinson's Easy Bake type) yeasts that have worked well in my bread efforts to date.
Furthermore, he states that, whilst all his recipes include the use of fresh yeast, the fresh can be substituted with instant yeast at a rate of 75% of the quantity of fresh yeast.
Again this contradicts all the recipes I've tried to date wherein the instruction is to to use either 14g of fresh yeast or 7g of instant and this ratio has worked well for me.
I understand the author is a respected baker but do struggle with the above.
Any insight you can offer would be very welcome.

The total weight of the loaf isn’t the standard to determine the fresh yeast to dry yeast conversion. It's the weight of the flour AND type of dry yeast AND protein levels in the flour



First, there are different types of dry yeasts; some examples include



SAF Red: ascorbic acid*; not osmotolerant; short fermentation time; no rehydration required



SAF Blue: osmotolerant (sugar 10% - 30%); no oxidizing agent*; short fermentation time; no rehydration required



SAF Gold: osmotolerant (sugar 10 - 30%); long fermentation; no oxidizing agent; no rehydration required



SAF Premium: use 30% less yeast; short fermentation; not osmotolerant; no rehydration required; I don’t thing this one has an oxidizing agent...



SAF Active Dry: rehydrate; long fermentation; no oxidizing agent.



*Ascorbic acid is added to some yeast to inhibit naturally occurring glutathione in the yeast. The structure of wheat dough is permanently damaged by too much yeast due to naturally occurring glutathione.

The formula (recipe) determines the type of yeast. A brioche dough has a high fat and sugar content. So an osmotolerant yeast works best.

Low protein flour (I.e., bleached white flour; plain flour; all-purpose flour) are usually made into doughs with short fermentation times, so an instant dry yeast is more suitable.

The strain of yeasts in instant dry is different from active dry yeast. Instant dry yeast is a strain of yeast that develops rapidly. It is not recommended for long fermentation doughs as it will gas out.

So for doughs with long fermentation times and/or higher protein and high extraction (like wholemeal flour) a slower developing yeast like active dry yeast is more suitable.

When making the conversion from fresh to dry, you need to consider the weight of flour. The standard conversion is 7 g dry yeast or 18 g fresh yeast is used for 120 g (1 cup) to 480 g (4 cups) flour.

But those are just guidelines. As I mentioned above, the recipe also determines the type and amount of yeast. A recipe that contains a lot of high-protein flour will require more yeast than a recipe with lower protein flour. Enriched doughs require osmotolerant yeast.

We assume the recipe developer tested the recipes before publishing a recipe book. And if Paul Hollywood recommends a specific conversion of fresh to dry yeast for HIS recipes, I would recommend you follow it. I would not recommend using someone else’s standard to recipes they did not develop.

 

[Purdyhorse]

The total weight of the loaf isn’t the standard to determine the fresh yeast to dry yeast conversion. It's the weight of the flour AND type of dry yeast AND protein levels in the flour



First, there are different types of dry yeasts; some examples include



SAF Red: ascorbic acid*; not osmotolerant; short fermentation time; no rehydration required



SAF Blue: osmotolerant (sugar 10% - 30%); no oxidizing agent*; short fermentation time; no rehydration required



SAF Gold: osmotolerant (sugar 10 - 30%); long fermentation; no oxidizing agent; no rehydration required



SAF Premium: use 30% less yeast; short fermentation; not osmotolerant; no rehydration required; I don’t thing this one has an oxidizing agent...



SAF Active Dry: rehydrate; long fermentation; no oxidizing agent.



*Ascorbic acid is added to some yeast to inhibit naturally occurring glutathione in the yeast. The structure of wheat dough is permanently damaged by too much yeast due to naturally occurring glutathione.

The formula (recipe) determines the type of yeast. A brioche dough has a high fat and sugar content. So an osmotolerant yeast works best.

Low protein flour (I.e., bleached white flour; plain flour; all-purpose flour) are usually made into doughs with short fermentation times, so an instant dry yeast is more suitable.

The strain of yeasts in instant dry is different from active dry yeast. Instant dry yeast is a strain of yeast that develops rapidly. It is not recommended for long fermentation doughs as it will gas out.

So for doughs with long fermentation times and/or higher protein and high extraction (like wholemeal flour) a slower developing yeast like active dry yeast is more suitable.

When making the conversion from fresh to dry, you need to consider the weight of flour. The standard conversion is 7 g dry yeast or 18 g fresh yeast is used for 120 g (1 cup) to 480 g (4 cups) flour.

But those are just guidelines. As I mentioned above, the recipe also determines the type and amount of yeast. A recipe that contains a lot of high-protein flour will require more yeast than a recipe with lower protein flour. Enriched doughs require osmotolerant yeast.

We assume the recipe developer tested the recipes before publishing a recipe book. And if Paul Hollywood recommends a specific conversion of fresh to dry yeast for HIS recipes, I would recommend you follow it. I would not recommend using someone else’s standard to recipes they did not develop.

That's really helpful. Thank you for taking the time to provide such a comprehensive response. Sorry for the delay in acknowledging your post - I had a, fortunately minor with no lasting damage, stroke from which I am currently recovering

 

[Norcalbaker59]

Yes, if you're reducing the quantity of ingredients in a recipe proportionally, you should also proportionally reduce the amount of yeast used in the recipe.

The amount of yeast used in a recipe is typically based on the total amount of flour in the recipe. So, if you're reducing the amount of flour and other ingredients in the recipe by, say, 50%, you should also reduce the amount of yeast by 50%. This will ensure that the dough rises properly and that the final product turns out as intended.

Keep in mind that reducing the amount of yeast will also affect the rise time of the dough. So, you may need to adjust the rise time accordingly. A good rule of thumb is to let the dough rise until it has doubled in size, regardless of the amount of yeast used.

This is incorrect.

When you use baker’s percentages the ratios will always adjust accordingly. It doesn’t matter what amount of flour is used because all ingredients are weight of the flour.



Flour 100%

Butter 70%

Sugars 105%

Brown sugar 60%

Granulated sugar 30%

Invert sugar 15%

Egg 30%

Vanilla extract 10%

Salt 1.5%

Leavening 1%

Chocolate 125%



Total baker’s percentages 442.5%



Let’s say you want 3” cookies. You will need a dough ball that weighs about 60g.



You want to make two dozen (24) cookies.

1. Multiply the weight of the single cookie (dough ball) by the number of cookies for the total weight of the dough.

60 g x 24 = 1440



You need 1440 g of dough


Divide the total weight of dough required into total baker’s percentages


1440 g dough ÷ 442.5% Baker’s percentages



1440 ÷ 442.5 = 3.25



3.25 is the multiplier.

1. Multiply 3.25 with the Baker’s percentages for each ingredient.

Flour 100% x 3.25 multiplier

100 × 3.25 = 325
Use 325 g of flour


Butter 70% ×3.25 multiplier

70 x 3.25 = 227.5 g butter



Just repeat with each ingredient.



It doesn’t matter if you are making cookies, bread, cake, better; this use of bakers percentages is used to determine the weight of every ingredient, which keeps the ratio of each ingredient to flour the same no matter how many cookies, how large/small the loaf. No matter how much flour is used.

 

[Mona]

Yes, you should definitely reduce the amount of yeast proportionally when you're scaling down a recipe. Yeast is a key ingredient in the rising process, so maintaining the correct ratio is important to ensure your dough rises properly. Just be sure to also adjust the rising time accordingly, as smaller batches can sometimes rise a bit faster.

 

[Jessie_Roos]

Yes, if you're reducing the quantity of a recipe by scaling down the ingredients proportionally, you should also reduce the quantity of yeast accordingly. Yeast is crucial for the leavening process, and using too much or too little can affect the texture and rise of your baked goods. Just make sure to keep an eye on the dough's rise time, as it might vary slightly with the reduced quantity.

 

[Mona]

Yes, if you're reducing the quantity of a recipe, you should generally reduce the yeast proportionally as well. However, yeast can be a bit tricky since it’s more sensitive than other ingredients. A small amount of yeast can still work effectively in a reduced recipe, though it might take a little longer to rise.

For example, if you’re halving a recipe, you can safely halve the yeast, but if you’re making a much smaller portion (like 1/4 or 1/3 of the original), consider using a little more yeast than the exact proportion — this helps ensure the dough rises properly. And always keep an eye on the dough rising times!

Hope this helps and happy baking!