bread flour options - hard red vs. hard white

Jul 09, 2004 1 Replies

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I have access to a local mill with a factory store. I'm considering baking more bread. And not using AP flour. (oh, the horror, the horror)

Here's the thing, though. They offer a "strong baking flour" which I presume is a blend. I can get that in quantities from 4 to 80 pounds. What has me thinking is the fact that they also offer bags of all-hard-red and all-hard-white, in 45 and 50 pound quantities.

Short of marching in there and requesting to see a recent farinograph for each variety, I'm wondering what sort of qualities i'd get with all-hard-red vs. all-hard-white.

This would be degerminated but not bleached or bromated. I've zero interest in purchasing whole wheat flour - unless I get to watch them mill it, and I'm baking it that day.

Eric, you are very lucky to have a mill with a choice. I have not used all-hard-white, but I use hard red wheat. I grind it in my vitamix each time I want a loaf. I don't know if it is de-germinated. My bucket just says hard red wheat. I have never tried making it other than in a bread machine because I'm afraid of failure, and wasting my labors, but it is always devine. I use the dark setting.

When I grind it myself, it doesn't have the taste of the wheat already ground at the flour mills - my opinion - so after you try their already milled packaged product and if it is available to you to buy in a full grain and grind it for yourself, give it a try. Nothing gained, nothing lost.

Here is my own recipe.

100% WHOLE WHEAT BREAD / NO OIL - Whole Wheat Setting (3hr 40 min)

13 oz. water

1-3/4 teaspoons salt

4 Tablespoons of Honey or Molasses or Organic Sugar

4 cups whole wheat flour

1 Tablespoon of Hodgson's Wheat Gluten

2 teaspoons fermi instant yeast

I will use either Australian Honey or Date molasses if I want a different taste. Australian Honey has a middle eastern flavor. By using different honey's, you can really change the taste of this bread because the usual wheat flour semi-bitter taste is NOT prevalent in your own ground whole wheat.

Dee

bread flour options - hard red vs. hard white

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