Well I only bake about once a week
and then usually with onions or tomatoes or olives or something else in, so not just standard loaves. And I note that at my local bakery they also just slosh water into their enormous bread making machine with gay abandon, and not a single set of digitial scales in site.
(Smale is stuffed, Thu 3 Jun 2010, 15:03, 1 reply, 14 years ago)

i doubt they're only baking on or two loaves at a time therefore any error in measuring will be reduced %wise.
i also doubt that they don't measure their water.

if making a batch of dough for say 10 loaves, using 5kg of flour, that would call for 3.5l of water for a regular dough.
applying the same maths as i used above the error would equate to 500ml of water too much.
if using a container of a known volume, even if not a "measuring jug" just a vessel you have previously calibrated with eg a 1l bottle, even if you are out by a relatively large volume you would struggle to be out by a whole half litre.

perhaps my original post was a little ambiguous. perhaps i should have made it clear that i was referring to domestic rather than commercial baking. although to be fair to myself i did specify 350ml/350g which is obviously not large scale.

you hit it right on the head mind you when you refer to how they "just slosh water into their enormous bread making machine". hardly the kind of craft baking i do myself.
also i should point out that i hardly ever bake "just standard loaves" myself. the dough is a starting point. i could list a dozen or more loaves that use a strong white dough as a starter, without touching on sourdough or rye or wholemeal or whatever.
( blaireau69 , the Cumbrian Travis Bickle., Thu 3 Jun 2010, 15:26, Reply)