• Skip to main content
  • Skip to header right navigation
  • Skip to site footer
Umami Days

Umami Days

Meaty with a dash of veggies

  • Pick a meal
    • One Bowl Meals
    • Breakfast
    • Lunch / Dinner
      • Appetizers
      • Salads
      • Soups
      • Main Courses
      • Side Dishes
      • Sweets
    • Snacks
    • Drinks
      • Summer drinks
      • Cold weather drinks
      • Cocktail hour
  • Pick your protein
    • Chicken, duck & turkey
    • Meat
    • Seafood
    • Eggs
    • Mushrooms
    • Tofu
    • Vegetables
  • Pick your carb
    • Rice & grains
    • Noodles
    • Bread
  • Newsletter
  • Sidebar
    • Kitchen
    • Dining
    • Edible Garden
    • Food Tales
  • Newsletter sign-up!
  • Recipe index
    • By Meal
      • One Bowl Meals
      • Breakfast
      • Lunch / Dinner
        • Appetizers
        • Salads
        • Soups
        • Main Courses
        • Side Dishes
        • Sweets
      • Snacks
      • Drinks
        • Refreshing summer drinks
        • Cold weather drinks
        • Cocktail hour
    • By Main Protein
      • Chicken, duck & turkey
      • Meat
      • Seafood
      • Eggs
      • Mushrooms
      • Tofu
      • Vegetables
    • By Carb
      • Rice & grains
      • Noodles
      • Bread
  • Sidebar
    • Kitchen
    • Dining
    • Edible Garden
    • Food Tales
  • About
  • Privacy
  • Copyright
  • Contact
Ingredients Kitchen

Baker’s yeast

Published: 02.13.2021 » Last updated: 03.24.2022

There’s yeast that infects the skin, there’s yeast for brewing (beer, for example) and there’s yeast that’s used for baking.

Yeast bubbling in jar

This is about baker’s yeast — the stuff that makes bread dough expand and become lighter and softer.

You may have come across bread recipes with instructions to sprinkle yeast over lukewarm water and leaving it there until the mixture is bubbly. Is that always necessary? Yes, BUT ONLY if using dry yeast.

Kinds of yeast

In the most simple terms, there are two kinds of baker’s yeast: fresh and dried.

Dry and compressed yeast: illustrated

Fresh yeastis either wet (cream yeast) or compressed. I won’t bother with wet yeast since it’s not really sold for home use. Compressed yeast is wet yeast with most of the liquid removed. It is sold in blocks. We don’t use compressed yeast at home because it is highly perishable and we don’t bake bread all that often.

Dry yeastis sold as eitheractive dryyeast orinstantyeast. The granules of instant yeast are smaller than those of active dry yeast. There is alsorapid dryyeast but we don’t use that at home.

Dry yeast is what most home bakers use as it is the kind available in groceries and supermarkets. The obvious question, of course, is whether active dry yeast and instant yeast can be used interchangeably. The short answer is yes. The long answer is yes BUT preparation differs.

Rehydrating dry yeast

Active dry yeast is sprinkled in lukewarm water, left until bubbly (also known as leaving it to bloom) and only then can flour be mixed in. And remember — it’s lukwarm water. If the water is too cold, the yeast mixture will not turn bubbly. If the water is too hot, you kill the yeast and it becomes unusable.

Instant yeast does not require rehydration. You can measure it and add it directly to flour and water to make a dough. However, if you’re working with a very dry dough (meaning the recipe calls for a very small amount of liquid), it might be a better idea to first allow instant yeast to bloom in lukewarm water.

Storing dry yeast at home

The best practice is, once the packet is opened, transfer the yeast to an air-tight jar and keep the yeast in the refrigerator where it will last for a couple of months. Some say that keeping dry yeast in the freezer prolongs it life for up to a year, but that’s not something we’ve tried.

More recipes, cooking tips & food tales

Bacon, pancakes and egg

The better way to cook bacon

Slices of skin-on calabaza in a baking tray

What’s the difference between calabaza and pumpkin?

Baking pab bottom coated with caramelized sugar

How to caramelize sugar

Apetina

Is apetina the same as feta cheese?

Grilled burger with cheese oozing out

How to grill perfect burgers

Cilantro / coriander on bamboo chopping board

What’s the difference between cilantro and coriander?

Sidebar

Connie Veneracion, Chiang Mai, 2020

Hi, I’m Connie!

Welcome to Umami Days, a blog that advocates innovative home cooking for pleasurable everyday dining. No trendy diets, no food fads and definitely no ludicrous recipe names like crustless quiche, noodleless pho or chocolate lasagna.

  • About
  • Recipes
  • Privacy
  • Copyright
  • Contact

Umami Days is powered by Apple, Canon, coffee & one bowl meals · Copyright © 2023 Connie Veneracion · All Rights Reserved