Hydration: How Water Affects Your Dough
Bonus - Calculators and Simulations
As the name implies, hydration is related to the water in dough. A hydration percentage is a common characteristic bakers use to quantify how “wet” a dough is based on the recipe. Hydration percentage is a baker’s percentage which means that it is relative to the weight of flour in a recipe. For example, a dough made with 500g flour and 500g water is called a 100% hydration dough because the water weight is 100% of the dough weight. It can be calculated as:
When making sourdough, the starter contributes to the hydration too since it contains water. Generally a starter will be 100% hydration, equal parts flour and water. The math starts to get a little bit harder, but it is still straight forward.
Sometimes your starter is not equal parts water to flour. Maybe its a dry starter at 80% to boost acidity or a wet starter at 120% to increase the activity of the yeast. Here the math becomes a lot more complicated - so I built a calculator to make it easy.
Dough Hydration Calculator
The amount of water in the dough changes its characteristics and plays a major part in the final product. Lower hydration serves to make the bread denser. The crumb is tight and has a nice firm chew to it. Think bagels and pretzels. Low hydration dough is very easy to shape. As the hydration percentage increases, the crust becomes thinner and the crumb opens up. At moderate hydration levels you’ll get a slightly open crumb and a thin crispy crust. Artisan sourdough batards and rustic country boules typically fall in this 70-75% hydration. High hydration doughs that are over 80% are light and airy with huge holes in the crumb. The epitome of a high hydration dough is Pan de Cristal. This is a 100% hydration french bread that translates to “glass bread” because the crumb is so thin and translucent it resembles glass. Play with the slider to learn about the characteristics and examples of doughs across the spectrum of hydration.
Sourdough bakers will often chase a higher hydration percentage to achieve a more open crumb. This can lead to the false sense that higher hydration is always better than lower hydration. The hydration percentage is a tool that the baker can use to adjust the characteristics of the final product. Tuning down the hydration percentage makes great sandwich bread because the crumb is tighter and condiments won’t fall through large holes in the bread. A high hydration pretzel would be nearly impossible to shape. Play with the hydration simulator to see how adding a little bit of flour, water and 100% hydration at a time affects the final hydration of the dough.
Hydration Simulator
| Ingredient | Amount (g) |
|---|---|
| Flour | 0 |
| Water | 0 |
| Starter | 0 |
The same hydration percentage does not always result in the same dough characteristics. Flour type, salt water temperature and fermentation time has an effect on how the dough feels at a given hydration percentage. High ash flours like rye, whole wheat and spelt have a lot of bran that absorb water and make the dough feel less hydrated than the amount of water in the recipe would imply. High protein flours like bread flour have a similar effect. Because they can form stronger gluten networks, they feel less wet. Warmer water temperatures make the dough looser, feeling like a higher hydration dough. Long fermentation times will do the same thing - causing the dough to be more slack and feel wetter. A recipe can give you a good idea of where to start for a hydration percentage for a particular style of bread, but you should adjust it according to what feels best for you.
Have fun, experiment and enjoy the journey of learning.
