Accuracy in measurements- how important is it really?

Hello Theyrenotourgoats,

I sort of wonder whose they are :)

My feeling is that it depends a bit on the individual.  Some people like to think of it a bit like science class when everything had to be just so while others think, what the heck, it will all turn out in the end.

Whilst you are right about humidity and moisture content of flours varying, I think it helps for beginners to err on the side of 'accuracy' until they get the idea of how it looks and feels.  Then, if it suits your style, you can go for the 'dash of this and a dash of that approach' or you can persist with the precision approach.

I recall my mother making magnificent sponge cakes with her decidedly non-standard 'polly' (handles broken off - cf 'poll' cattle with horns removed ) china cups as the only measure of flour and liquids and eggs as they came from the chook while others, with accurately measured ingredients and standardised eggs, made what could best be called pale imitations.  But, she never made bread and when questioned, the reply was - she had tried it once and it didn't work!

And, as you say, it is rare for whatever production to be so bad as to be inedible and looks aren't everything.

Good luck with your projects.

Farinam

Hey,

I gave up measuring anything a long time ago.  Once I had down in my head roughly how the dough should look and feel I gave up measuring and decided to to wing it.  It's way more fun and means that in one week I may eat cheese bread, cherry bread, cocnut bread, buckwheat with seeds and plain.... it's very rare I end up with something inedible and from every baking I learn something.  Dough really isn't delicate stuff.  It's a lot more fun to experiment!

For me it's really about being able to get consistant results. Flavor profiles can come down to how much of which items you add.

Howerer that being said, I also go by feel when it comes to moisture. If the dough feels a little dry, will add a bit more water. Like Farinam said, "if it suits your style"!

I never measure what goes into my sourdough culture, but can be obsessive about measuring ingredients for doughs. I think it is best, either way, to concentrate on the feel of the dough because batches of flour, humidity, etc. vary. Of course, one gambles that a bread won't come out well, but it is good to experiment and have successes as well as learning experiences.

good to experiment is good but unless you document the weight you risk of creating something fantastic that you will never be able to reproduce or share with others.

For many years as kid I used to watch my mother her friends, relatives all been shocked how with same recipe everyone end up with different end result. in Poland it is almost tradition to write down recipes without specific measurements and once I discovered that you can weight up your ingredients all my issues were gone, other than forcing my mother to come up with numbers instead of "little bit of that, and bit more of this" or "add enough of this or that so it looks right", talk about crazy land!!!!

when you consider that cup can be different from India to Europe, spoon can be serving, table, dessert or tea size and let’s not forget that many countries have them come in different sizes as well you really should measure things with digital scale 

I myself ignore most recipes unless they have all listed by weight, if it is recipe that I really want to try I will ask author to clear it up or convert myself from cups, spoons to grams but as soon as I see anything listed "to taste" "to look perfect" I walk away and it is a shame because it creates possibility of losing things that are really great, just like some of my mother recipes