help with grain milling

The stuff coming out of your mill is never going to be as fine as commercial unless you sift it. As you point out, sifting kind of defeats the purpose of whole grain. When I want something fine, I use a #30 seive that leaves me with about 80-85% by weight from my milled wheat berries -- but mostly I use it as-ground, in a huge variety of recipes, from biscuits to gumbo.

I'm not familiar with your mill -- I assume you've adjusted it as fine as it goes? I also suggest grabbing Peter Reinhart's book Whole Grain Bread, it may help you produce a better loaf. 

I second Loyd's suggestion about PR book plus Laurel Robertson has one too.  (Both are available at libraries.)

I mill my own grains on 'fine'.

I do not have the mill you do.

I use: hard red or white wheat, spelt, Kamut, rye and a 7 grain mixed blend.

I do not sift.

I use soakers and bigas as suggested by PR in his book and my loaves are wonderful - or so says my family and all the friends I give loaves to.

Main thing to watch for is that whole grains need more water and they take longer to absorb it so don't adjust until you have kneaded your dough for awhile.  A 30-60 minute autolyze really helps allow the grains to soak up the water and helps to develop the gluten - kind of like a head start.

Have Fun!

Janet

One issue is the type of wheat you are using.  Soft wheat has lower protein than hard wheat and is a challenge when trying to make artisan breads.

http://www.wheatfoods.org/AboutWheat-white-wheat/Index.htm

A portion from it is printed below:

"Soft white wheat is used mainly for bakery products other than bread. Examples include pastries, cakes, and cookies. It is also used for cereals, flat breads and crackers. Both white wheat classes make quality 100% whole wheat products."

FF

ON ATTEMPTING TO MAKE BREAD WITH ALL SPELT FLOUR

I used spelt flour with this recipe.

Spelt is a difficult grain to work with. It does not have the gluten forming ability of hard wheats commonly grown in the USA or Canada. It may seem to create a good dough during bulk rising and the final proof but, during baking, the dough tends to flatten out and not produce much (if any) oven spring.

My suggestion would be to purchase hard wheat to mill into flour for your bread. Hard wheat is available in 3 basic types - hard white spring wheat; hard red spring wheat; hard red winter wheat.

Several years ago, on a different forum, there was a bread baking challenge to bake bread using spelt flour. Only the most experienced bakers could produce a good loaf. If you want more info on baking bread with 100% spelt flour, do post back and I can give you the link.

ON ALTERNATIVE GRAIN MILLS

My grain mill has 4 levels of grind....I used the setting above the finest and ran the grain through 3 times. I saw from one of the other posts that running through mutiple times doesn't help if you don't adjust the grind. My flour didn't remotely resemble store-bought flour (which is okay....I'm trying to get away from that) but I am clueless as to what it should look like. Mine has very little "flour" in it and looks more like chopped grain. Any suggestions on an affordable (trying to stay under $400) mill that will yield a better quality grind?

The whole grain flour produced by your mill should feel similar to a standard, commercial white bread flour. It should feel only faintly gritty if you rub some between your fingers. It should not show obvious flecks of bran after lightly stirring the milled flour. It should definitely not look like "choppped grain" nor should it feel "sandy" when you rub some between your fingers.

For an affordable grain mill that is within your budget, is easy to use and can mill most of the grains that home bakers use for bread, my suggestion would be the Nutrimill. This is an electric mill that is designed to mill common grains for bread in one pass. I own (and use) 3 grain mills, of which the Nutrimill is one. I find the Nutrimill very satisfactory for most milling. There are many home millers on TFL who own the Nutrimill and you can search the site for their evaluations. This is just my opinion (as there are other TFL members who own, use and love other types of grain mills). I am simply trying to point you to one alternative grain mill that might serve your purpose.

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I hope you find these suggestions helpful. If you would like more information on home milling, please post back to this thread. I can give you links to previous posts on home milling and baking artisan bread with home milled flour that I have found particularly helpful. If you do post back, please try to be as specific as you can with your questions

Best of luck to you in your baking. Baking bread with home milled flour does take some experience but can be very rewarding - SF

Robkaro,

I also own a couple of mills.  The Nutramill is one and is within your budget.  I did like mine.  It has a great customer service back up and they do back up their product!  I had to send mine in and all was fixed for no charge and was back to me within 2 weeks time. (It wasn't milling as fine as it had been and they switched out the whole grinding section of the mill at no cost!)

While it was being worked on I purchased a KOMO and it has now become my primary mill due to the ease of operation - super simple with lots of settings from fine to really coarse and the clean up is a since which is a big deal to me as I mill several times throughout the day on a regular basis - small amounts for leaven feeds, medium amounts for soakers and large amounts for final doughs.

 My chief complaint with the Nutramill was the cleaning when milling so frequently.  IF you are only going to mill a large amount at a time it is perfect.  Handles just about anything you can toss into it except oily seeds!

Good Luck in your search!

Janet