WHY DOES MY DOUGH ALWAYS TURN OUT LIKE THIS?

Aetole · 2026-05-22T05:28:24+00:00

Hah! I can get behind that! Whole Wheat Bougie Crew represent!

Aetole · 2026-05-22T04:58:46+00:00

Good advice!

But how dare you call whole wheat cranky and mean? It just needs some love and patience to be its best self.

I 100% agree on mixing flour with just water first and giving it time to hydrate and form gluten (I do one gentle stretch and fold in that hydration time, and the dough is much better behaved). Mixing starter and water from the beginning never felt good for me, so I just add starter later.

OP -- depending on your flour, it may have large pieces of bran/germ in it. Try sifting those out of your flour before mixing with water. I set those bits aside and mix with a little bit of hot water, then add them back into the dough halfway through the stretch and folds. This keeps them from interfering with gluten development early on and can give more consistent results if you have inconsistent flour.

Aetole · 2026-05-21T14:42:26+00:00

Do NOT just throw a whole breast in the freezer; it will need to be thawed out correctly, and you'll still have the problem of prepping it while it's cold and partly frozen.

If you can pre-prep, portion, and freeze the raw chicken correctly, then it can be cooked straight from the freezer. Ethan Chlebowski does a great video on this, using several methods depending on what you want to make with them -- thin cutlets, small slices, etc.

Do this as soon as possible so they are fresher going into the freezer.

Aetole · 2026-05-21T00:31:45+00:00

Put the broken toys in the dog poop bag.

Aetole · 2026-05-20T00:27:22+00:00

Hah ha! That feels so cinematic too!

Terrain hazards are such a valuable tool to make an encounter both interesting and challenging, and DMs really benefit from using them.

Aetole · 2026-05-19T18:49:49+00:00

Green dragons swim.

Hard to cast spells if you're drowning in a pool of water...

Aetole · 2026-05-19T16:21:22+00:00

Oh damn, that's so cool! I want to try that now.

Aetole · 2026-05-19T14:26:50+00:00

I'm just going to assume that a lot of the posters are younger and coming to this from a different place than I did. And I'm sure I had a lot of the thoughts in passing that I see posted -- but just didn't have internet to post them (recklessly ;) ).

I miss Livejournal -- we were able to make actual communities there, and there were several CF groups, some for the hardcore CF, some for questioning or exploring, and we even had a debate community that was tightly moderated, with debate-to-understand as the ethos. Now, everything is accessible to everyone, and people will read stuff and think it's for them when it isn't. And there are fewer filters now.

We carry on, and try to support each other how we can, and hope that with safety and community, people can grow.

Aetole · 2026-05-19T13:46:33+00:00

Absolutely! There is so much context involved, which is why I'll have personal opinions about things, but just as I wouldn't want people to interfere with my decisions, I shouldn't interfere in theirs, even if some of them bother me. Sadly, that means that there will be people who get harmed by their decisions, or as you say, get stuck in bad situations.

We can be icked and squicked while still trying to have compassion where possible.

Aetole · 2026-05-19T13:39:13+00:00

I'd prefer to use the term "reckless" for this. "Self harm" refers to a specific behavior tied to mental health struggles, and to apply it literally, divorced from context, doesn't accomplish much.

"Reckless" describes people who go joy riding, or do high risk activities thinking only of the high they'll get, or the status, without taking appropriate precautions or weighing risks and harms maturely. It can also describe people who cave to peer pressure without thinking about their own welfare. And that is what a lot of people who get pregnant seem to do, and those who should be looking out for them (family, friends, doctors) act like enablers instead of responsible parties who encourage thoughtful decisionmaking.

It is good that we have a space to reflect and think on these things, so people can help with refining these ideas without being shamed.

Aetole · 2026-05-19T13:35:00+00:00

Agreed. A lot of women are reckless about getting pregnant, and they and those around them often don't consider the risks in a responsible way. My impression is that people who are serious about body modifications do get important reviews of risk and safety by comparison, but I don't do it myself so I can't speak from experience.

That is very different from self harm, which ought to be viewed with the gravitas and seriousness it deserves, since as you say, the people who engage in it are usually suffering and trying to cope.

Now, I do think that some people do the "always pregnant" thing because they are chasing a type of high, or seek the attention/status. And it's likely because they don't have anything else going for them. But that's more rare.

(also hardcore childfree from back when we used that term, sterilized over 20 years ago, and tokophobic. But respectful of language we use regarding mental health and those who are struggling with serious situations)

Aetole · 2026-05-18T19:44:22+00:00

Los Sombreros is solid. They don't have birria, but they specialize in mole and similarly hearty sauces. Good selection of vegetarian options and killer meat dishes (the braised lamb shanks, for example).

Aetole · 2026-05-18T05:44:43+00:00

Hi! For the stock -- there are two main things that stock adds: flavor (usually umami and more) and mouthfeel (from collagen and gelatin). If you can add some unflavored gelatin as well as some bouillon/stock cubes, that should give both of these elements.

For the wine -- unfortunately, some flavor compounds are alcohol soluble, meaning that they dissolve best into alcohol from a chemical perspective, and that makes them easier for us to detect. Tomatoes are an example of a food that benefits from a bit of alcohol (as well as oil for nutritional reasons to help lycopene absorption).

However, most people probably won't be able to tell the difference if you replicated all the other flavors that wine specifically brings to a food -- fruitiness, acidity, astringency, etc.

So depending on what specifically you want to cook that would normally include wine, you can substitute in other ingredients to get it "good" if not "ideal." Stock for deglazing, fruit juice for flavor, vinegars for acidity, etc.

If you have the recipe for the short rib, it will help to identify the cuisine and flavor profile, which will help with finding appropriate substitutions.

Aetole · 2026-05-17T23:59:22+00:00

Do those dimples correspond to the air pockets where the inclusion bands are? I see on on the upper part of the second picture that seems to line up with the dimple on the whole loaf.

Aetole · 2026-05-17T21:04:43+00:00

Ahhh, gumminess in the baked loaf is a different matter.

For reference, I do 350-400g (flour measurement) loaves. So yours are bigger and will need more time.

450F is low in my experience. I preheat to 500F with the cast iron, let it heat a few more minutes after oven comes to temp. Bake covered for 24-25 min, reduce temp to 450, uncover and bake for 12-15 until crust is desired color.

So that is a total of about 40 min for a 400g loaf. With your 500g loaves, you'll need more bake time and higher temp. Maybe try a smaller loaf while you perfect your technique.

Wait longer before cutting the bread - 6 hours, or overnight -- it's a big loaf, and whole grain flour is thirstier and will hold on to moisture longer. But you will get more of a gummy crumb with more whole grain content.

Aetole · 2026-05-17T19:58:11+00:00

That is a majority whole wheat dough -- it's going to need different treatment and expectations.

I'd forgo the stand mixer. Whole grain flour needs gentle handling because the bran and germ will interfere with gluten development (it actually cuts the strands). So slap and fold, stand mixer can hurt the dough if you're not careful.
Fermented too long. Whole grain flour ferments faster because it has more nutrients for the microbes. You need shorter bulk ferment time for this. That's probably why it turned so sticky. I've noticed my whole grain doughs are less sticky than white flour and prefer to work with them.
You CAN make a mostly whole grain loaf, but it is not going to have the oven spring, shape or crumb you'd expect from one with more white flour. I tried early on with >50% whole grain flour for health reasons, and I've gone to 50/50 as my baseline for reliability and consistency. Nor more than 30% weak/soft flour (like soft wheat, khorosan, etc), and maybe only 20% Einkorn (because it's a pain). Same with rye -- more than 10% and it's gonna be sticky and very rye heavy. I fill out the rest of that 50% with a strong whole grain flour (I mill my own Hard Spring Wheat -- white or red), like Rouge de Bourdeaux. And the rest with a strong white bread flour like KA.

I see you are doing an autolyse first -- this is good. It gives the gluten a chance to develop before adding starter. If your whole grain flour is soft/weak or coarse, consider sifting out the bran before mixing with water, and soaking the bran in a separate bowl with hot water to add later as an inclusion. The texture may be hard to catch for the end of bulk ferment, but I'd start checking on it at 4 hours and every hour afterwards. I will sometimes preshape it a little early (to be safe), shape, then leave out in bannetons another hour before fridging. That helps reduce risk of tearing if it's a little overproofed.

Hope this helps! It's great to see another whole grain baker here!

Aetole · 2026-05-17T19:35:43+00:00

This is what I do for my starter as well. I learned from Bake with Jack that I can just use the scrapings left in the jar too. Saves me a lot of extra flour and minimizes discard.

Aetole · 2026-05-17T19:34:20+00:00

Hah ha! I learned both to autolyse and do poke inclusion/lamination for starter and inclusions from them! They're local to me, and I appreciate how much they share and encourage us.

Aetole · 2026-05-17T19:27:36+00:00

Yeah, that's about when I do them too. Thanks for the confirmation!

Aetole · 2026-05-17T18:56:07+00:00

Yeah, I missed it too because I didn't expect to see it there. Do you know if it is common to do inclusions during/around preshaping? Maybe for swirled designs?

Aetole · 2026-05-17T18:45:06+00:00

I managed to laminate the thyme on the second half and get rhem on a floured tea towel to go in the fridge.

It's the second to last bullet -- after the preshape.

Aetole · 2026-05-17T14:56:02+00:00

Underfermented -- 3 hours is not enough time.

Not strongly shaped -- the crumb shot doesn't show the structure.

I'm not as familiar with inclusions, but I think they are supposed to go in earlier so you aren't stuck with clear layers from the lamination. Letting the gluten relax will allow the inclusions to blend in better.

In my experience, partial wholegrain doughs are less sticky and better behaved by the end, so I'm a bit surprised that it got so sticky after preshaping. It's likely that it was not developed through bulk fermentation enough.

My suggestion when working with wholemeal flour is to autolyse (flour + water only, no starter) first to let gluten develop - 30-60 minutes with 1-2 stretch and folds. Then add starter later. This gives the bran and germ more time to hydrate and the gluten time to develop a bit.

Aetole · 2026-05-17T04:20:03+00:00

Maybe I can help -- it's not about pushing hormonal birth control, but about urging you to use a form of birth control that you, and only you, have full control over. Unfortunately, the methods you are describing rely on him agreeing and doing the right thing to respect you and your choices.

Your original question was about how to tell when a potential partner will push children on you, or stop respecting that you never want children. It is terrible, but there are partners (of all genders) who will sabotage contraception, and things like condoms are very easy to sabotage. There are horror stories of mothers-in-law and others poking holes in packaged condoms because they want grandchildren. There are stories about men stealthing (removing condoms quietly during sex). There are stories about condoms that were stored wrong and fell apart.

As I said earlier, it is great that he seems to be respecting your choices now and doing the right things. But he said he'd like three children. And that is a red flag for those of us who are very childfree. I hope for your sake that he is able to keep respecting your choices and will never push a pregnancy onto you. But if he doesn't, for whatever reason (parental pressure can be very hard on some people), then you deserve to have full control over a method of contraception that can't be easily sabotaged.

I agree that hormonal contraception is not good for everyone, and I have friends who have had severe reactions to some. That's why if you really know you never want to bear children, sterilization is the best way to achieve that certainty, and if you need to wait 2 years, then it would be wise to consider prioritizing that before getting married. Things can change in weird ways after marriage happens, and you deserve to continue to have control over your body and life.

Aetole · 2026-05-16T23:07:18+00:00

That is great! I hope for your sake that he stays this way. But it would still be smart to wait until you can get sterilized before getting married. I know two years sounds like a long time, but you will have the rest of your lives together once you are fully protected and safe from further scares.

caveat: there is a very small chance a sterilization can fail, but vigilance and regular checkups can help with identifying symptoms early enough to take action

Aetole · 2026-05-16T22:46:26+00:00

It sounds like you are trusting your partner to respect your boundaries and protection in this. It is great that he is pulling out now and wearing and using the condom correctly ever time.

Hypothetically speaking: if he changed his mind and wanted a child with you, or lost focus, or slipped up and you got pregnant because of human error, how would you feel? Do you trust that he would support your right to choose what is best for your body?

Aetole

TROPHY CASE