Development of wheat dough by means of shearing

- Dough production and examination was combined in a conventional rheometer.
- Different rheometer geometries were compared.
- Standard dough analysis is hardly applicable to shear mixed dough.
- CLSM and relaxation spectra are useful tools to determine dough development.
- The predictability of standard dough rheological properties from shear mixing is of medium quality.

Wheat dough is transferred from the mixer to the rheometer in order to perform rheological measurements. During this step additional energy is inserted in the dough by stretching or squeezing, which causes an alteration of the gluten network. To avoid an unwanted additional energy input water and flour were mixed directly in a rheometer. The rheological data of reference dough and shearmixed dough were compared for correlations. The dough consistency during shear mixing was similar to the standard mixing method but the dough breakdown occurred faster. Relaxation spectra and the visualization of microstructure revealed that the gluten network development did not coincide with the indicated dough development of the consistency curve. A rheometer is capable of producing dough which is comparable to the standard procedure. The correlation of rheological properties between standard and shear mixed dough is of medium strength but the basics for a short dough characterization method were established.