Doubling Bread Recipes - Double The Yeast?

[mamatide]

Hi all,

I was making the Submarine Sandwich bread which I said was excellent - has good " bread " taste and texture, but when I'm making 2 loaves at once, am I supposed to double the yeast? I have the Fenster Gluten Free 101 book and when you double the bread recipe in that one you don't double the yeast (and some other ingredients are increased but not doubled).

Can someone tell me how to double Annalise Roberts' Submarine bread recipe?

PS yesterday I doubled everything (the yeast included) and not sure if it's just because I left it rising too long but it overflowed the pan and went everywhere. The bread still baked ok but it was like a half-loaf probably because so much of the batter had overflowed.

Thanks in advance,

mamatide

[queenofhearts]

I always double the yeast for a double recipe, but since I always double bread recipes, it's hard to compare rising times for me (in fact I frequently quadrupled recipes in my wheaty days... we eat a lot of bread in this house).

In any case I NEVER just go by the time in a yeast recipe, because the timing changes so much depending on how warm or humid the room is, how warm the liquid in the recipe is, how "lively" the yeast is...

oh, by the way, make sure you haven't used Rapid Rise yeast in a recipe that calls for the regular kind... that will definitely cause an overflow!

I always go by how high the dough has risen. (Yes, that means you have to check more often.) And on the advice of a gluten-free book (I forget which) I put the loaves in the oven just a little sooner than I would for a wheat bread, because it is all too easy to break down the structure of a gluten-free bread if it over-rises (as you discovered!)-- then the whole thing collapses & you have a dense, low bread with irregular grain. Gluten is what holds traditional doughs together; that's why gluten-free is especially hard for bread, which has to support much more height, hence weight than a cake layer or muffin.

Hope that helps! By the way, I've only been gluten free for about 2 weeks, but I've been baking bread for over 35 years, & I've been experimenting in the kitchen like mad since my doctor told me I might have Celiac-- I simply couldn't survive without baking!

Happy baking,

Leah