Delicious and Easy Guinness Bread Recipe (2024)

FAQs

Can you use beer instead of water in bread dough? ›

Beer is grain, yeast and water—it's liquid bread! —so it really compliments a loaf, and as a replacement for water, it adds something special to the most humble bake. It couldn't be simpler to try this out: just get your normal loaf recipe and change out beer for water, 1:1.

Lighter beers, such as lagers, ales and pilsners, will give your bread a lighter color, and mild taste that just about everyone loves. Darker beers like stouts and porters make a darker-colored loaf and have a stronger beer flavor. Hoppy beers like IPAs will give your bread a more bitter taste.

It adds nutritional value to baked goods. Mainly protein, calcium, and vitamin B12 which are all necessary for a heathy diet. But we don't only look for the nutritional benefits when using milk in our bread dough. The fat and lactose in milk help with tenderizing the crumb of the bread making it softer and sweeter.

When you add beer to your bread mix, the beer's yeast content reacts with the baking powder and starches in the flour, causing the dough to rise and start to leaven. When you add the beer, you might notice the dough bubble and foam—that's the yeast working its magic!

While bread flour is the best option, it can sometimes be used if you don't have bread flour. “Check the protein content,” advises Chef Jürgen, since it can vary from brand to brand, and an all-purpose flour that contains protein on the higher end of the range, 12 to 13 percent, will produce a better outcome.

Problem: Your bread has a fermented, alcoholic smell or taste to it. Causes: Too much yeast. Over-proofed.

If you bake an overworked dough, it will come out hard. Even though you aren't kneading beer bread, the same principle applies. It can be harder to tell when the dough is overworked, though, since you won't feel it in your hands and the mixture isn't supposed to be smooth. Instead, rely on your eyes.

Alcohol has a mild diuretic effect, especially if you're not acclimated to it. Because it contains a few carbs and electrolytes, beer on average isn't particularly better or worse than plain water for rehydrating after a workout.

Yeast activity: Beer contains yeast, which can ferment the dough and help it rise. This can result in a softer, lighter texture compared to dough made with just water. Color: The beer can darken the dough, giving it a deeper golden color compared to dough made with just water.

Bread recipes call for yeast because carbon dioxide is the key ingredient needed to puff up the dough and make the bread fluffy. Since most beers still contain yeast cells at the end of the fermentation process, you can substitute a can of beer for yeast for a denser result.

What does alcohol do to bread dough? ›

This causes it to rise. During baking the carbon dioxide expands and causes the bread to rise further. The alcohol produced during fermentation evaporates during the bread baking process. After some time you should notice that the balloon starts to inflate and the yeast mixture turns frothy.