Enrichment · Arts and Creativity · Baking

Flour is 100%.
Everything else is
measured against it.

Type a dough by weight. The calculator shows every ingredient as a percentage of the flour, tells you how wet the dough is, and works out the grams for exactly as much dough as you want.

Work out the formulaWhat you get

The baker's percentage calculator

The worked example is a made-up sandwich bread scaled to two 900 g loaves. Nothing you type leaves this browser.

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What you get

Enrichment · Arts & CreativityFree

What you finish with
Each ingredient as a baker's percentage, the hydration and salt level, and the grams for the dough weight and number of pieces you want. It prints as a summary and downloads as a spreadsheet.
Who it is for
Students learning to bake, culinary arts classes, and home bakers who want to compare, adjust or scale a formula.
Format
Browser calculator for a phone, tablet or computer, by touch or keyboard. Up to 24 ingredients. Prints a summary; downloads a spreadsheet (.csv); export and import a file.
Access
Free. No account, no sign-in and nothing to install. Everything you type stays in this browser; nothing is sent to Caveat.
Where it lives
The Arts & Creativity space in Caveat Enrichment.
Support
Questions, a correction or a request: team@caveatacademic.com.

How to use it

  1. Name the dough.
  2. Add each ingredient with its weight in grams and mark the flours and the water.
  3. Read the hydration and each baker's percentage.
  4. To scale, type the total dough you want and how many pieces; the grams column changes.
  5. Print the formula for the bench.

Work out the formula

How baker's percentages work

Everything over the flour.

The worked example: a sandwich loafFlour1,000 g800 bread + 200 whole wheatWater650 g650 ÷ 1,000 = 65%Whole formula173.2%1,732 g of doughFor 1,800 g×1.039flour becomes 1,039 gThe worked example: a sandwich loafFlour1,000 g800 bread + 200 whole wheatWater650 g650 ÷ 1,000 = 65%Whole formula173.2%1,732 g of doughFor 1,800 g×1.039flour becomes 1,039 g
Flour is the 100% that everything else is measured against. Because the percentages stay fixed, a formula scales to any batch by one multiplier.

The arithmetic

Add the weights of every flour: that total is 100%. Each other ingredient's percentage is its weight divided by the flour, times 100. Hydration is the water over the flour. Because the percentages add to more than 100%, a whole formula of 175% means 1.75 g of dough for every gram of flour, and any batch is the same percentages times a new flour weight.

Reading the numbers

Hydration under about 58% makes a stiff dough (bagels), 60 to 65% a firm sandwich dough, around 70% a soft hearth loaf, and 75% or more a wet, open crumb (ciabatta, focaccia). Salt usually sits near 2%. Whole grain flours absorb more water, so the same hydration feels firmer. Milk, eggs and butter carry water too; they are counted as Other here.

Sources

  1. Bread Bakers Guild of America. Baker's percentage: formula presentation standards (bbga.org).
  2. Gisslen, W. Professional Baking. Wiley: baker's percentages and formula conversion.
  3. Hamelman, J. Bread: A Baker's Book of Techniques and Recipes. Wiley: hydration and dough consistency.
  4. U.S. Department of Agriculture, FoodData Central: water content of milk, eggs and butter (fdc.nal.usda.gov).

The worked example is made up. Hydration ranges are typical, not rules; flours vary. Your formula stays in this browser. Support: team@caveatacademic.com.