Bread – the purpose of making a preferment for yeast doughs

breadyeast

I have found a number of bread recipes that call to prepare first a preferment – a very simple dough with half the flour, water, sometimes sugar, and the yeast to be used. This is left to rise for an hour or two and afterwards it is mixed with a dough made with the rest of the ingredients including fats, additional sugars, and eggs. This second dough is then left to rise again and later split into the loafs and baked.

What is the purpose of the preferment and why is sponge made with such basic ingredients?

Best Answer

In addition to allowing fermentation to begin before the addition of fermentation inhibiting other ingredients, as @J.A.I.L. said in his answer, according to Bread Secrets, after explaining the benefits to flavor of a long, slow fermentation:

A quick, warm fermentation will allow time for the yeast to produce enough carbon dioxide to raise the dough, but not enough time for the enzymes to work or for the development of the other flavour compounds. If we ferment our dough for too long, however, the gluten becomes too weak to hold the shape of the loaf. So artisan bakers generally use a preferment (pre-ferment, not prefer-ment!) as part of their dough. This allows the bread to gain flavour from the longer fermentation, but still maintain a strong gluten network for a good rise.

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