Since I have moved to Italy, everything is different. In America basically we have all-purpose flour, bread flour, self rising flour, cake flour and whole wheat. Not bad. ok, I’m very familiar with all of those and when to use them. When I got here in Italy, I went to the grocery store to stock up on all my basic pantry needs. I got to the flour aisle and oh my god, there was a whole aisle of flour. Type 1, 2, 3, 4, 00, 0, manitoba, added leivito (self rising) and that is just to name a few. Nothing said “all-purpose”. I had a little mental breakdown and decided I knew what 00 was and that we had used that in our pizza dough. So I got that, and went home. So after a bunch of trial and errors, I’m good I know what I need to do what. And yes I have tried them all!
But, dealing with flour, at some point you know you are going to make pizza or bread or something that needs yeast. Again, I went to the grocery store expecting to find my little packets of active dry yeast or instant yeast….. nope, as you expect, that is not what I found.
here is the selection I found: O.o
Yes I bought them all and one other.
Now here, I see signs for Pizza made with the “mother”. And I kinda figured yeah, made with fresh yeast from an active culture from back when times were simpler.
And this lead me to make pizza with the fresh yeast… And to do so, I had to do some research that humbled me, because I thought I had a grip on bread…. and I also found out I will tackle this “madre” yeast another time
I figured, there has to be a forumula…A formula to convert active yeast to live yeast and then.… to make things worse…also a formula for that formula to convert from U.S. Customary Units to Metic Units after that.
Active dry yeast is what we find in the small cute little packages in the store, and apparently it is less concentrated than instant yeast. The instant yeast is for the bread machine, I don’t have one, so I’m not getting to in depth on this but you can add this directly into a recipe without re-hydrating first, it just takes the water from the dough, that’s why the recipe usually says “hot water”…
If you think your active dry yeast is dead (expired) you can do a quick check but adding some of the water from the recipe, heated up, into a little bowl, with a pinch of sugar and then add the little packet of yeast. if it starts foaming in about 10 minutes, it is still good to go.
Note here is the start of the equations: (they are all over the internet just google it)
- 1 package active dry yeast = about 2 1/4 teaspoons = 1/4 ounce = 7 grams
And you can substitute active dry yeast for the instant yeast, say you need to.
You just multiply the amount of the instant yeast by 1.25 and that is how you get the amount you need in teaspoons..
- 1 tsp instant yeast = 1 1/4 tsp active dry yeast.
- 1 tsp active dry yeast = 3/4 tsp instant yeast
- 1 package instant yeast (2 1/4 tsp more importantly (for me) 7 g) = 1 1/4 package active dry yeast (2 4/5 tsp or almost 9 g).
This also goes backwards, you can substitute instant yeast for active dry yeast.
Multiply the amount of active dry yeast in the recipe by 0.75 to figure out how much instant yeast you should use.
- 1 package active dry yeast (2 1/4 tsp, 11.25g) = 1 2/3 tsp instant yeast (6,65g)
- 1 tsp active dry yeast = 3/4 tsp instant yeast (3.75g)
And this brings me to Fresh yeast…
They say, this is called cake yeast because it’s compressed into a cute little cake/block. It has more moisture in it than the dry yeast and so it is less concentrated and also comes in bigger blocks, 25g at my grocery store.
And they say it should give off a nice flowery yeasty aroma in comparison to dry yeast. But many articles say they all act the same.
You need to use 3 times fresh yeast than instant yeast and 2.5 times for active dry yeast.
- 7g (1 pkt) instant yeast = 1/4 oz instant yeast = 2 1/4 tsp instant yeast = 21 g fresh yeast or 1 1/4 blocks (.6oz size, 17g) or about 1/2 block (2oz size, 56g) fresh yeast.
- 1 tsp instant yeast (3g) = 1/2 block (.6 oz size) fresh yeast.
- 7g of active dry yeast = 2 1/4 tsp active dry yeast = 17.5g fresh yeast = 1 block (.6 oz size) or 1/3 block (2oz size) of fresh yeast.
- 1 tsp active dry yeast = 1/3 block (.6 oz size) of fresh yeast.
Getting technical, the scientific name for yeast is Saccharomyces cerevisiae, this is the most common used one, but, companies and homemakers alike have made all different strains of this yeast. i.e. Sour Dough. Think Beer, how many home brews are out there that use different yeasts for fermentation.
Yeast is a living thing. Yeast eats, glucose, which is sugar, and it will use starches or alcohols to make enzymes to make glucose. Yeast needs Oxygen, so it also breathes and if it doesn’t have oxygen it ferments.
When you make bread you use both fermentation and respiration of the yeast. as you knead the bread you oxygenate the dough. and depending on how much fermentation goes on and this changes the dough and the crust.
Temperature changes the way yeast acts, to cold makes it dormant and too much heat is no good either.
Putting dough in the fridge. I read some stuff on this subject and there was controversy around it, as in what it really does. But a lot of artisans use this. I know Pizza tastes different if I put it in the fridge for like 3 days, my uncle used to say it ferments and gets happy. And I really can taste the difference if I put it in the fridge or cook it directly after it’s proofed and risen.
When Proofing Dough They say if you house is not climate controlled the dough will do crazy things. My house is not climate controlled, as in, I do not have an air conditioner and the wood stove is used for heat. So they say ideally to proof your dough at 86-96F or 30-35C. In the summer this is no problem for me and the bread rises well, in the winter, my bread takes an hour or two longer to rise. But, the longer it takes to rise will produce a tighter bread. you can also let the dough rise longer and it will get that yummy yeasty smell to it, but then you run the risk of it deflating. and the crust will suck, and lets face it….. bread is all about the crust, even pizza.
The biggest different between all of these yeast types that I seen is the shelf life. And what you are comfortable to use. I have stepped out of my comfort zone and made a pizza dough with fresh yeast. I always use the active dry yeast…. It has been sitting in my fridge for 3 days.. and Tonight.. pizza is on the menu, and I will let you know how that goes in another post, after I have cooked and eaten the beautiful pizza.