Need tips for kneading dough

Since I don't have a stand mixer, I need to knead dough by hand. When I do this on my floured wood table, I end up with a sticky mess. The dough sticks to the table like glue. Does anyone have any tricks/tips for kneading dough by hand so that the cleanup is not so bad? I made olive foccacia today. The cleanup was very bad. I did not want to put the flour on the table too thick because I did not want to add to much flour to the dough.

I have a fairly heavy vinyl tablecloth that covers our wooden table so I can use it for pastry and breadmaking. It's a messy job, no two ways about it, but it's easier to clean up off plastic by scraping it with a ruler. I also sometimes put down our large cutting board, which helps with the gluey bits but not with the flour that goes everywhere.

You might also want to consider modifying your kneading procedure to include autolyzing or rest periods which allow the flour to absorb some of the moisture for a more workable and less sticky dough without as much bench flour. For example, you could mix the dough in a bowl just until the ingredients are combined. Let it rest for 20 minutes. Then turn it out onto your work surface and begin kneading. You should find less flour is needed to achieve even better results.

As MHays noted, when kneading on a cutting or pastry board, the flour tends to stray beyond the board. I have a supply of inexpensive flour sack kitchen towels. I always put one beneath the board. When the kneading is done, the board goes into the sink for clean up, and the towel is shaken out on the back porch, and then tossed in the laundry. Makes for fairly easy clean up.

Definitely take Bill's advice to give the dough a rest before kneading.

Foccacia is a very wet dough - meaning that it has a lot of water relative to flour. This makes it really difficult to kneed by hand. So, one tip is that you'll likely have better luck kneading by hand if you make breads that have a higher ratio of flour to water.

Another tip is to get a dough scraper, or something similar, that will let you periodically scrape the dough off the table as you kneed.

If your dough is really wet, you could also kneed in a large bowl.

Finally, a lot of recipes seem to have people kneed more than they need to. A few minutes of good kneading is usually sufficient. So don't worry about quitting early.

I also don't own a stand mixer, but for wet dough like focaccia or ciabatta, I do a technique called stretch and fold (links to my site).
Basically, you mix the dough in the bowl just until the flour is fully hydrated and let it rest to develop gluten on its own. The stretch and fold helps it develop structure even further.

How long is the bulk fermentation in your formula? I usually try to squeeze in 1 or 2 stretch and folds before the final proof.

Thanks for all of your advice. I am going to try to knead the dough in a big bowl.

You may want to put a very thin layer of oil on the inside of the bowl.