Making the switch to organic flour - need advice
Hello, I am new and this is my first post. I have making this white bread recipe for about a year now with great success using Gold Medal unbleached AP flour. It always turns out beautiful.
http://www.rockrecipes.com/homemade-white-bread/
I recently bought 2 bags of Arrowhead Mills unbleached, organic AP flour. I noticed the dough had an unusual feel to it and needed more flour than usual because it was too sticky to knead. The first rise took longer than the usual 1 hour. The second rise, which usually took between 1 to 1 1/2 hours, was still not risen enough after 2 hours. I put it in the oven anyway, hoping it would rise a bit more in the first few minutes of baking, but it came out of the oven looking a bit deflated and not as brown as I would expect.
I have tried twice and the first time came out just a tad better. I think I added less flour that time, but it still did not turn out was well as I would have liked.
I really want to stop using GM flour and switch to organic. Please advise what I am doing wrong, or not doing to get a nice, high loaf.
Thank you!
I don't think it is so much a problem with the organic flour but more an issue with changing flours.
Being off a few points on protein content and ash can create a learning curve for the end user. I think this is where you are finding yourself, in an experimental stage with a new flour. I looked up the protein content of the Arrowhead organic flour and it appears to be around 11.7% - not too shabby for bread making. Arrowhead may include more of the bran or middlings in their milling process and this can change the hydration requirements.
You may find that it will take several bakes with modified formulas to nail down a final product that meets your standards. Once you have it dialed-in you may find the quality superior - or maybe not. If organic is important to you consider an organic white flour from another miller. There may also be a learning curve with the new flour too.
Jim
Thank you. I realize I need to change things in the recipe, I just don't know what. I was hoping for specific suggestions.
Anyone? Please?
But I'm unfamiliar with both of those flours. When changing flour you have to consider that their properties can change too. One might need more water than the other and/or the gluten % differs.
The only way around this is to experiment. It's always easier to add in extra water if needed rather than extra flour. So I suggest holding some water back and slowly adding more till it feels right.
Really hope this helps.
For replying. --
I'm still "anyone"!
It looks to me like the main difference in the two flours is that the Gold Medal version had malted barley added. The diastatic barley malt will allow for a higher and faster rise, as well as adding more colour to the crust when baked. You can get similar results with your organic flour by adding in some barley malt yourself, or some ascorbic acid (vitamin C), or both.
There may also be a difference in the specific type of wheat or wheat blends used (hard red, hard white, soft white) which will impact the amount of protein (gluten) as well as how much liquid the flour can absorb, the overall flavour and texture, and, of course, rising times and height. You would have to contact the manufacturers for that specific information.
All of that said, though, it is also very likely that your change in flours just happened to coincide with a change in weather for you --- and there are a lot of us in the Northern Hemisphere who took some time to learn how to modify the hydration of our recipes to deal with the dough being stickier and the rise times changing and overall different results than what we were used to as summer rolled in. As a general rule, we're all having to drop the hydration of our dough since the flour isn't able to absorb as much liquid.
You may find that using less liquid has a better result for you than adding more flour, since you are less likely to end up with a more dense loaf when you keep the flour to yeast ratio the same. Keep notes on exactly what you are doing, though, since it is likely that you'll be able to increase hydration again as the weather cools, but will have to change it again next spring / summer.
So - specific suggestions:
- try adding 1/2 to 1 tsp of ground diastatic barley malt (cheapest source is your nearest home-brewers store)
- try adding some ascorbic acid
- try dropping the hydration a bit (start with holding back 100g or so of liquid, and add gradually until the dough feels like you want it to)
As Jimbtv said originally, there is a learning curve any time you start working with a new flour, since you need to work with it to see what it is going to do with your recipe, in your kitchen, with your weather. Modifying the amount of liquid is always the easiest thing to do, but nobody can tell you precisely how much since they aren't in your kitchen!
Good luck and remember to have fun with the experiment as you play with the dough and learn how to get the best result from your ingredients
for your comments and suggestions. Re barley malt: I recently bought some in syrup form. Could I use that?
While I have no direct knowledge of the malt syrup the malt you need must be diastatic malt.
There are at least two different types of malt and diastatic is key for bread development. The malt syrup won't hurt (might add some flavor ... good/bad) but the diastatic malt has the active enzymes that help in dough development. The enzymes break down the maltose (malt sugar) into fructose which can serve as additional nutrition for the yeast.
The bacteria benefit from the additional maltose and the yeast benefit from the resultant fructose. A win/win.
Diastatic malt also causes a slight red hue to the crust (sugars again) but will turn the crumb grey when used in excess. A little diastatic malt goes a long, long way. Think in terms of 0.2% baker's percentage.