October 25, 2018 - 7:42am
Central Milling Flour
Can anyone share w me their opinion of the Central Milling Organic Artisan Plus flour? I've been using the white from Montana Flour and Grain, which I love. But I also love experimenting.
Any pros and cons are welcome.
Thanks in advance
hester
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Hi, Hester.
Do you mean "Organic Bakers Craft Plus" flour? If so, I have used this and the un-malted version extensively over the past several years. I cannot compare it to Montana Flour and Grain product. My comparison flour is KAF AP (Sir Galahad).
CM's "ABC" flour is lovely to work with. It is finely milled. Compared to KAF AP, the biggest difference I find is that the CM ABC flour makes a more extensible dough. That makes sense when you know its history. I have been told it was originally formulated for Acme Bakery to use for their baguettes. The protein content is 11.5%, essentially the same as KAF AP flour. I generally order CM ABC in 25# bags - easier to handle than the 50# bags for my aged back.
I hope that helps. If you have more technical questions, CM is a very personal operation. They are responsive to telephoned questions. E-mail used to be less promptly answered, last I tried, which was years ago.
David
Of the ABC with and without malt, which did you favor? The Montana flour is unmalted and behaves just fine. It is much higher in protein than the ABC (like ~13%) so if I combined them I might get a nice product. Cannot decide if I should try malted or unmalted.>... which is why I asked the question of You.
Thanks again
hester
No particular reason. I'm not avoiding malt. It's just that un-malted flour seems to do fine. Maybe since I always use pre-ferments - almost almost always sourdough - there are plenty of enzymes in play already. But I've never done any kind of experimental comparison.
David
for which I thank you. Yeah, I'm just doing pre-fermented breads also, so I'll give the unmalted a try. Thanks so for your prompt and helpful reply.
hester
ABC+ is my standard white flour and has been for a couple years in my small bakery. Great stuff. I do mostly long fermented sourdoughs, but also a traditional sweet baguette. Works really well for all that (and I add additional malt to the baguettes).
I asked the same question (ABC vs. ABC+, and my instructors at SFBI advised to go with the malted, so I did). Would be interesting to do a side by side...but you can clearly make good bread with either, and will work out how to do that...
I haven't compared falling numbers between the two, so I'm not sure how much they differ...
so much for your reply. I appreciate it.
hester
price is one con of the ABC+...it costs more
which has me stunned, it's the shipping!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
hester
I also exclusively use Central Milling flour (ABC+, T85 and Beehive) but I have 2 of their mills within a 10 minute drive in Utah or otherwise I probably wouldn't because shipping is high.
I haven't bought flour from Honeyville but have bought their Cracked 9 Grain and like it. Their shipping is much easier on the budget too. It was 4.99 per order but looks like it went up to 8.99.