What is the Baker's Percentage

In the first video of our bread baking series, we discuss what a baker's percentage is, how to use it, and why it will make you a better bread baker. Show notes for this episode, including Q&A, can be found at www.stellaculinary.com/sb1

[@lucisue53]

I discovered this video almost a decade after it was posted, but wanted to tell you how very helpful it is. I had a basic understanding of baker's percentage from my trials of sourdough, but I didn't understand how it could be applied further. Your final chart comparing the percentages for different breads is immensely helpful. Thank you!

[@philipboardman1357]

This is the single best bread baking video. I baked bread a couple times years ago. Now I'm back to the same video. This unlocks creativity for anyone who wants to bake bread

[@valeriebardascino4970]

Thank you for explaining the baker's percentage simply and concisely.

[@claudetteleblanc5273]

Jacob, you are one great teacher. Easy to understand. THANK YOU!

[@NickHuiMedia]

My mind exploded with flashbacks of all the best moments of the different types of bread I’ve had throughout my life. Thank you

[@souzanir]

Always come back to your percentage. Excellent work.

[@carolinehonse35]

Wow, what a wonderful explanation. You just enlarged my bread world by a couple extra galaxies.

[@JacobBurton]

When using poolish to ferment your dough, simply add the flour and water to the equation. This is why I favor poolish starters; since they're equal amounts water and flour, it makes it really easy to know how much flour and water you're adding to the equation. For any given loaf of bread that uses packaged yeast in the recipe, you can omit the yeast and instead use 30% poolish starter as a starting point to leaven the bread. Continued...

[@SweetcreationsbyRT]

Simply the best video on explaining the baker's percentage! Thank you for taking the time to make this video.

[@jasonwhite7452]

This was very helpful! Thank you! I am a baker in New York and I’ve recently started to learn the science of baking!

[@suzh4639]

This explanation of Bakers percentage is the best I have seen. Just perfect...thank you Jacob.

[@kathrynodell8299]

So helpful! I'm using what I've learned to scale my recipes for different size pans! Thank you!

[@raulquiroz7492]

This was so detailed and thorough while still sticking to the basics. Great video!

[@dailycrumbsbakery2009]

Thank you Chef Jacob. Your detailed explanation is so good and systematic.

[@wendyellis6402]

This is a wonderful thing. I’m a chemist who loves to cook, so you’re speaking my language. This is going to change my bread baking life. Thanks so much!

[@dumodude]

New to breadmaking (COVID quarantine driven?) and enjoying it. I started to piece together ratios, but this video makes it wonderfully clear to me. Thanks for producing it. I'll be looking for more of your content. Cheers!

[@audriussapola1596]

I knew about baker's percentage, but I watched this video anyway and learned a few new things. Thank you, chef Jacob, you are so much better than some celebrity chef in that regard that you explain the theory behind different cooking techniques and methods. And since I come from that part of the woods where we use grams, thank you for that, too!

[@jennygreen2601]

Finally a video that clearly explains all this!!!!! Thank you!! And I love you too!!!

[@kedanpie4409]

Really useful info. Very clear looking forward to the series.

[@mogbaba]

I already knew the baker's percentage. I just looked at it to adjust my understanding if necessary but I learned a lot more, thank you.

[@gullreefclub]

This was the single most informative video I have watched on the basic theory of bread baking. I new to baking and have heard the term Baker's percentage mentioned but until now articles and videos I have read or watched did not explain the why just the how and most times badly.

[@GigaBoost]

Very interesting video, easy to follow along and helpful! Thanks!

[@willie_mccoy]

This was one of the harder things for people to grasp in culinary school (Baking/Pastry major) especially when using a baker's scale, but it's critical to know. It is invaluable when scaling formulas up/down. Great video! :)

[@Gerbera726]

This is one of the best videos I've seen on baker's percentages.

[@kickback73]

That was so amazing thank you very much. I have been going back and forth trying to figure out the percentage method. The way you described it was perfect and I thank you.

[@JacobBurton]

Thanks Dan. Glad it was helpful. If you want to dive deeper into bread baking, check out my free bread resource page found here: StellaCulinary.com/sb. At the top of the page are links to my podcast series on bread, which will give you a great technical foundation, as well as all my bread videos. All the best.

[@fischek]

makes a lot of the stuff so much clearer and more understandable - thanks a lot :)

[@manondunham4197]

Good sir you are a great teacher and I so appreciate you spending time to make these videos.

[@c.lyttle3017]

This was the most informative info I have read in many, many years. I found it mind blowing & I'll tackle bread making again. Thank you!!!!

[@abdullaalsheraifi5485]

It’s really helpful, I agree

[@geraldarcuri9307]

Agreed. I've read and listened to many "explanations" of the baker's percentage. None are as clear, concise, and thorough as this one. Now, I just need to ask Jacob how to calculate the BP accurately for sourdough, which includes a starter of unknown hydration.

[@JacobBurton]

Thanks! I have a video for that too. Convert your sourdough starter to a 100% hydration polish, which means it's made up of equal parts flour and water. Then convert any bread recipe into sourdough using the method I laid out in this video here: kzbin.info/www/bejne/rYbNm2etg7h4mJI If you want to take a deeper dive, check out my bread baking resource page which lists my five audio lectures plus all my bread videos here: stellaculinary.com/sb

[@geraldarcuri9307]

Jacob Burton Thanks, Jacob!

[@HippieMae]

Awesome! That was a great break down.

[@writereducator]

Excellent instructional video!

[@2002adeabraham]

Very helpful. Thank you so much for taking the pain of figuring the ratios out

[@ykdickybill]

Thank you Jacob. You have helped me understand something fundamental to my painful bread making learning curve. Subscribed

[@JacobBurton]

Welcome aboard!

[@sunnyfriday8677]

Thank you so much for all your excellent hard work to share with us. God bless you🙏

[@sandhunba]

Try Android App Called 'Recilator' .very easy to use for recipe calculations

[@gustavojavier2353]

Crystal Clear. Thanks!!

[@macyhanks4623]

I just decided to start baking so this really helped!

[@Othermails08]

Very informative information. Thanks so much.

[@shaddapforever]

At first I was worried because I knew lots of numbers will be used. However, it was clear and very easy to comprehend. Thank you

[@good-questions]

Thank you for this video it's awesome!!

[@peterc2697]

Just watched a crumpet recipe. That was a basic bread recipe with 130% hydration, poured into molds. Great information here.

[@Papillon_2010]

Great explanation. Thanks!!!

[@kevinportillo5751]

Thank you for the video chef.

[@falseavatar8046]

Best cooking channel ever!

[@Veeluvstocook]

Excellent tutorial...

[@StupidGoodProduction]

Awesome video, thanks!

[@brownmasao]

SO cool! Very good explaination!

[@dickb2128]

I recently viewed a similar explanation of the baker's percentage. Unfortunately the narrator did not explain how there can be more than 100%. Your explanation made it perfectly clear. Thank you

[@ThursdayDog]

Thank you this is very useful. Could you help explain the percentage of the starter? Does the percentage of the starter make a difference in the sourdough? Thank you in advance

[@birbilomata]

thank you, great video.

[@sameerasumar7663]

Thank you for a lovely lesson - thank you

[@fionn5305]

Amazing somebody was reading my mind. I just upgraded my scale yesterday which has a precentage button and the explanation was still hard to understand and you just answered it fully. I do have a question some pizza recipes do have olive oil and I love Irish Butter in my cooking will it work the same with more flavour. THANK YOU and I also just subscribed to you.

[@LimbsStuff]

Wow. I am mathematically challenged and this is perfect. Thank you for your slowly working this out!

[@gernblenstein1541]

Brilliant video explanation of baker's percentages and different dough recipes. Well done, chef. Finally, I can baker math.

[@pronavsandhu]

try the app called 'Recilator' .it will make ur life very easy

[@tracey278]

Thank you I’m not the sharpest tool in the shed and have really been struggling with this, I get it now 😘👌🏻❤️

[@juneyoon4432]

I'm watching all your videos. thanks a lot. A LOT lol.

[@angelaasencion397]

This is so helpful! I love you!!

[@stevendiraimo3315]

Hi Jacob excellent video thank you very much very well done simple easy right to the point fanatic

[@JacobBurton]

Thanks Steven. Glad you enjoyed the video.

[@aintgonnahappen]

Amazing video! TY! I had no idea about any of this.

[@sandhunba]

Try Android App Called 'Recilator' .very easy to use for recipe calculations

[@BrendansReasons]

very helpful, thank you!

[@Barelyaesthetickitchen]

Thank you, Chef!!

[@writereducator]

Thank you!

[@sumiah26]

Thank you for the informative video .. I have a question, if I want to use instant yeast in making the bread how much would be the percent for each bread type?

[@TheInquisitiveFarmwife]

Thank You!!!

[@EllaeenahJadeFire]

Thank you for the chart at the end of the video. very helpful. I use 50% wholemeal flour and 50% bread flour for my breads. Incl the sourdough breads that I make most often. Does the hydration have to be varied keeping this in mind?

[@cooolathanlife]

Love all you videos, I've gone from baking to searing to brining lol. Can't get enough!! Quick question, how do I translate how much sourdough starter I would need to use or ratio to determine how long my bulk fermentation will take and second rise will take as well? I'm worried about under or over fermentation. I'm sure I could just stick to the recipe and learn through trial, but it be nice to determine how much starter to accommodate my work schedule.

[@JacobBurton]

It's hard to say. It really depends on your environment and starter. But if you use 100% starter as I demonstrate in our basic sourdough loaf video, the bulk ferment will usually take about 3-4 hours and the proof about 2. Obviously, the more you scale back your starter, the longer the fermentation will take. I'll be talking about this subject in depth in our next audio podcast. You can listen to the podcasts I've already done on bread here: www.stellaculinary.com/scs or search for "Stella Culinary School" on iTunes. Glad you're enjoying the videos.

[@exodus20ful]

Thank you so much for your video. I had the same question. So if understand correctly. The baker's percentage chart can't be used for sourdough.

[@xmen2pondy]

Excellent :-) Thank you for the video :-)

[@aronchas]

you are a genious!! thanks a ton!

[@luksurias]

just wow and ty

[@Rozay_Roses]

Clearing a lot of things! Thank you!

[@JacobBurton]

700g flour, 300g water, 600g poolish. As you can see, the amount of flour and hydration rate are the same, we're just substituting some of the flour and water in the recipe for the equal amount contained in the poolish. I hope this helps. Let me know if you have any follow up questions.

[@samueljulio9230]

Can i add some eggs and milk in 300gram water content?

[@dayadesilva7144]

Thanks for the video, If i want to add sugar and yeast for the dough, what is the percentage should be?

[@youngtake]

Chef, as I was looking at your percentage formula for lean breads, how did you come up with the percentage amounts? And what about a recipe that gives you the weight amount but the flour weight is not presented? How can you find the flour weight when all others are are weighted?

[@ashleighjaimaosborne3966]

Thank you. 😊🇨🇦

[@nrawson66]

This is amazing!!! I had no idea. Is there such a thing as a Bakers Percentage for cake / cookie / pastry?

[@JacobBurton]

Yep. Any professional level baking and pastry book should provide baker's percentages along side their cake, cookie and pastry recipes. Check out the baking books by Le Cordon Blue and the Culinary Institute of America.

[@JacobBurton]

Thanks Mark. Glad you enjoyed the video. Welcome to Stella Culinary.

[@chinson525]

Wow bread looks nice

[@JacobBurton]

The lean dough percentages are just classic formulations for those breads given, but you can adjust the formulation up or down to suite your needs. As far as finding the weight of the flour goes, I would have to look at the recipe. When using the baker's percentage, your flour weight is set at 100%, so you would not only need to know the weight of the other ingredients, but also what percentage they make up based on the flour's weight. Shoot me the recipe and I'll check it out.

[@mailynlantingan9564]

What do u mean by Fat? New sub here Thanks so much Fan from philippines

[@fatimaalhubail5055]

Do croissants and puff pastry have percentage dough that I can follow

[@GrantRussell]

How do you work it out when adding a sourdough starter?

[@TheOsx86]

Hi, for formula with oil, do we add it up with water to make up "hydration" percentage? Thanks

[@mr.g.culinary]

Nope! Oil would just be part of its fat content. That said some fats, such as butter, do have some water in them that should be taken into consideration for hydration levels; but oil does not have any water in it so you don't need to consider that into hydration. Hope this helps!

[@mieKeLien1991]

nutrition knowledge :) Nice

[@md.habiburrahman1950]

How can I determine the ppm of using additives?

[@Amanda-nq5hu]

Hi Jacob, thanks for your awesome videos and podcasts. I love your scientific approach to cooking. I need your advice pls. Now with the lock down due to Covid 19, yeast is in short supply. I've been experimenting with using tiny amounts of yeast to make a poolish, get it bubbly and doubled before using in my regular recipes. I haven't quite nailed it as yet. This got me thinking that Im sure I'm not the first person to have encountered this problem. Are you aware of a way that I can extend my commercial dry yeast so it doesn't run out quickly? At present, in South Africa, where I live, 1 satchet of instant yeast ie 10g is sufficient for 1kg of flour. Please help. My family hates sourdough bread or I would have used that. I'm now have to be very frugal with instant yeast. Our epidemic is just starting and I forsee problems on the future.

[@JacobBurton]

1 gram of yeast is enough to make a preferment overnight to leaven at least a couple loaves of bread. From there, you should be able to expand that preferment by feeding it more flour and water the next day. Check out my podcast on preferments which should be helpful: stellaculinary.com/scs21. Another approach is to save about a third of your dough each time you bake bread. Use that 1/3rd of raw dough each time you bake, and you'll never need to buy yeast again. Pull the third of dough from the batch right before shaping the dough (before final proof), and place your starter dough in the fridge. Should last up to 3 days. So as long as you're baking bread every 3 days, you should be able to keep this starter going indefinitely. Also, the reason why a lot of people don't like sourdough bread, is because it's too sour. However, this can be controlled by how you feed your starter and store it. Young starters fermented at warmer temperatures and fed white flour are much less sour than starters that are cold fermented and fed whole wheat / whole grain / rye flour. I go into depth in episode 22 on sourdough bread making, which you should listen to after episode 21: stellaculinary.com/scs21

[@robertslocum2555]

I heard a tip: Use coarse kosher salt, not iodized table salt. Especially if following recipes that go by tsp. and tblsp. Finer grain salt means more fits in measuring spoon which makes your bread too salty.

[@JacobBurton]

It's hard to say exactly. It's kinda weird that the recipe lists everything except for flour. However, based upon my experience, because of the additional fat, a dough like this will be around a 50-55% hydration rate. So divide 12oz (water weight) by .5 and you get 24oz. Divide 12 by .55 and you get 21.8oz. This should at least be a good starting point for you. Once you make the dough, you'll immediately be able to tell if its too loose and then adjust your hydration rate for the next time.

[@babitarawat8294]

sir I want to open a bakery . want to know how much burger bun I will get if I add 600gm water on 1000gm flour

[@bobpattison1739]

Is there a formula for when you want to end with 2lbs of dough at 68% hydration as to how much flour you would need to start with? Thanks

[@phandacrafts9633]

Hi I got a bread recipe and I don't have bread maker and don't wanna knead it manually. So I'm thinking to convert it to no knead dough by making it high hydration. Can you make a video on how to convert a recipe to high hydration dough? Thanks a lot. And this video really help me to understand more about breads.

[@JacobBurton]

Phanda Crafts using the bakers percentage, raise the total hydration of any given recipe to 75%. Reduce yeast 0.25 - 0.5%. Bulk ferment for 12-18 hours with some stretch and folds thrown in. Should do the trick.

[@zulj.1643]

Hi Sir. How about sugar. Do we add in to the percentage?

[@Missin44]

If I want to convert a cake recipe written in volumes to bakers percentages it seems the one unknown is the weight of a cup of flour. Looking online it seems that a cup of flour ranges from 4.75 oz to 5.25 oz, most say 5 oz (142 grams). What say you chef? Thanks

[@tertiary7]

if you're in the US, look at the nutrition label on the box/bag. it will list the weight in grams of each serving size.. just adjust/convert from there. e.g. 1/4 cup (28g) for swan cake flour, based on it's label. shazam!! 1cup = 112g (most likely sifted ~ more volume per gram)

[@karenreneelyles261]

How do you take into consideration to se alternate flours…coconut or Almonds, sorghum? Doesn’t the grams estimated have to do with the weight of the type f paper used?

[@JacobBurton]

By "whole flour" I assume you mean "whole wheat." Because the bran in whole wheat flour can absorb more moisture than the starch (or endosperm) of the wheat kernel, you will need more water, usually about 1% more hydration for every 5% of whole wheat flour used. But because the wheat bran has sharp, "hard" edges, it will actually slice into your gluten strands when the bread ferments, shortening the strands. A flour combination above 20% whole wheat will yield a denser loaf... Continued..

[@MsK-xm7vw]

Would this work to calculate cheeses as well? If I want to make say, 10 wheels of cheese from a 2 wheel recipe, would this formula work?

[@JacobBurton]

Yep. This formula is used universally in professional kitchens to scale recipes up and down. It started in bake shops where precision is key, which is why its called the baker's percentage.

[@allen_graphics]

How about using this method for cake?

[@spqr701]

How about the % analysis for sourdough bread?

[@johncipolla8335]

I wish would do whole meal or brown bread. I heard that whole meal bread needs more water. I want to learn how to do a whole wheat loaf

[@86hj49gt]

Algebra for the dim, or a genius way to make this powerful concept widely accessible? Pure Genius in your delivery. Thank you!

[@MrDipsoda]

what would be ratio for whole wheat bread or brown bread in terms of hydration and yeast

[@sandhunba]

Try Android App Called 'Recilator' .very easy to use for recipe calculations

[@hunglafung2948]

You lecture is so great that I watched again and again. I have no scale for bread, would you mind also use the cup and spoon measurement?

[@_theaven_5907]

How is it with cakes? Could you make a chart about different cakes?

[@JacobBurton]

Same thing. With cakes you'll see the hydration percent is over 100%, because that's what makes it a batter. Then you'll have varying degrees of fat for texture, and egg for structure.

[@_theaven_5907]

@@JacobBurton thank you!:)