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Tried putting my bread dough in the fridge overnight to save time the next morning and it actually rose better than my usual counter method

After 4 failed attempts with my usual room temp rise turning into a sticky mess, I stuck the covered bowl in the fridge for 12 hours and pulled out a perfectly puffy loaf ready to shape, so has anyone else found cold proofing gives you a better crumb or what?

3 comments

3 Comments

averyc9412d agoMost Upvoted

Same here, cold proofing totally saved my sourdough game too.

alex82012d ago

My first batch of cold proofed dough was a total mess though. I left it in the fridge for like 36 hours because I forgot about it, and the flavor was super sour but the texture was weirdly dense. My kitchen is super drafty too, so my fridge temps are all over the place. I actually switched to using a dedicated mini fridge just for proofing, and it made a huge difference. But now I have this random mini fridge in my basement that's basically just for dough and maybe some cheese.

the_ben12d ago

Whoa yeah, I had basically the same experience. My first few cold proofs were a gamble, some came out great, some were flat and sticky. I found that the real trick is to let the dough warm up a bit on the counter before shaping, like 30-45 minutes. And @averyc94 is totally right that it saves the sourdough game, but you gotta keep an eye on how long it sits. My perfect window is 10-14 hours in the fridge, anything past that and I get that dense sour thing too. The cold definitely makes the crumb more open though, I get way bigger holes than room temp.