Shaping bread dough is the step in the bread-making process when you physically transform divided and preshaped dough into its final form, with the intention that the form is retai… See more

While not always necessary, I usually preshape my bread and pizza dough. At the end … See more

Strictly speaking, shaping bread dough isn’t mandatory. Some styles of bread are simply cut and loaded for baking (I see ciabatta as one that has little or no shaping at all). How… See more

For the type of bread I typically make, the step right before shaping is preshaping, but right before then is bulk fermentation—the dough’s first rise. Let’s look at each case. 1. End of bul… See more