Bread Faults And Possible Causes

I came across this while having a look through some of my old catering college papers from the early 90s. I have copied it here exactly as printed on the handout so don't ask me what 'Flying Tops' are, it was a long time ago I can't remember?

Faults and possible causes

                                             

1) Good and bad loaves from the batch                                    

a) Bad Moulding

b) Mixing of two doughs together
c) Position of bread in the oven

2) Ugly shapes                                                  

a) Incorrect size of tin
b) Bound dough carrying too little water 
c) Soft dough with oven bottom bread ??

d) Bad moulding

e) Lack of proof
f) Oven too hot 

g) Under ripe dough

3) 'Flying Tops'                                          

a) Lack of final proof
b) Under ripe dough
c) Oven too hot

4) Excessive crust colour

 a) Insufficient fermentation to utilize sugars
 b) Excess salt
 c) Too hot an oven
 d) Excess sugars in the dough

5) Pale Crust Colour 

a) Over-ripe dough
b) Insufficient salt
c) Deficiency of sugars in the flour
d) Oven too cold
e) Dough excessively skinned

6) Rough side surface 

a) Over ripe dough
b) Bad moulding
c) Over handling with insufficient recovery time

7) Small Volume 

a) Excess salt
b) Over-ripe dough
c) Insufficient yeast
d) Insufficient gassing power??
e) Too weak a flour
f) Too hot an oven 

8) Holes In Crumb - Large Holes

a) Too weak a flour- partial collapse 
b) Too much yeast used
c) Over proof

8a) Holes In Crumb- Slits 

a) Using too much dusting flour or using too
much oil (common on machine bread)
b) Too tight a dough
c) Skinning of dough prior to final moulding
d) Under proof (small holes fine and even) 

9) Streaks And Seams 

a) Tins too hot or too cold when dough put in
b) Under baking
c) Banging loaves to release from tin
d) Bad stacking

10) Soggy Bread 

a) Too much water
b) Under proof after over machining
d) Under baking
e) Bad stacking

11) Quick Staling

a) Over fermentation

b) Too hot a dough

c) Too much salt

d) Baking too long

12) Crumbly Bread

a) Over fermentation

b) Weak flour

c) Excess fat added to dough

Having read through this now almost 30 years later, I can see that there are quite a few points that are missing from this list. A quick search on Google for 'Flying tops' led me to this very useful site: www.fabflour.co.uk/fab-baking/what-went-wrong/what-went-wrong-bread/ from The Flour Advisory Board  which gives some other reasons for faults in bread and answers the mystery of the 'Flying Top', of course, now its obvious!