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Gluten Development in Quick Breads

Appears in
Professional Baking
Professional Baking

By Wayne Gisslen

Published 2008

  • About
Only slight gluten development is desirable in most quick breads. Tenderness is a desirable quality, rather than the chewy quality of many yeast breads.
In addition, chemical leavening agents do not create the same kind of texture yeast does, and they are not strong enough to create a light, tender product if the gluten is too strong.

Muffin, loaf bread, and pancake batters are mixed as little as possible, only until the dry ingredients are moistened. This, plus the presence of fat and sugar, keeps gluten development low. Overmixing muffin batter produces not only toughness but also irregular shapes and large, elongated holes inside the muffins. This condition is called tunneling.

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