This is a post I created elsewhere and thought I would post here as well just to get some feedback. It is my first post at TFL, though I have been lurking on the fringes for a bit. I got into sourdough baking roughly 18 months ago and have gleaned much from this site. I also have received much help from Teresa at Northwest Sourdough, where I originally posted the following:

A small story, with a recipe...

I have been out of town for a few weeks. Prior to that, I had neglected my starters for a month or two...maybe even three. Feeling guilty, I decided to refresh and feed them and get them all back on track. I have five starters – a San Fran, Teresa's NW, Teresa's Desem, Ed Wood's South African WW and my own rye from scratch – all kept at 166% hydration except the desem at 80%. Refreshing them would be an undertaking entailing no small amount of excess starter waste. 

Which I also felt guilty about. So...

I collected all the excess (~700g total) in a single 1.5L jar. I then added about 100g of the desem into the jar. Just for fun I decided to play mad scientist and see what kind of bread this strange brew could create. Now, I know this is not conventional, and it is way too much starter to use in a recipe...I'm an amateur and don't know any better... but I figured I'm tossing it anyway and proceeded thusly, aiming for a 70% hydration dough:

700g of mixed and varied starters at 166%
100g of Desem starter at 80%
64g of warm filtered tap water 
462g of bread flour
180g King Arthur Flour Harvest Grains Blend http://www.kingarthurflour.com/shop/detail.jsp?select=C74&byCategory=C90&id=3602
16g kosher salt

I began by soaking the KAF grain blend for 5 minutes in 2 cups of boiling water and then straining.

I mixed all the ingredients, except the salt, by hand until just blended and let autolyse for 20 minutes. I then hand kneaded for around 10 minutes (but FORGOT to put the salt in) and stuck in the fridge. It struck me about an hour later that I forgot the salt and I went back, added it to the dough and kneaded/folded for another 10 minutes and stuck back in the fridge.

14 hours later I took it out of the fridge and left at 68°F for 3 hours. I then dumped the wet dough out on a heavily floured board and pre-shaped into 2 pan loaves and let them bench for 10 minutes. I re-shaped and stuck into oil-sprayed loaf pans and covered with plastic wrap and proofed until doubled (2.5 hours) at 72°F. Pre-heated the oven to 450° at 1.5 hours in.

I slashed the tops 1/2 inch deep down the center lengthwise, sprayed with water, stuck in the oven and put a cookie sheet on top for 15 minutes. Turned the oven down to 400° and baked another 30 minutes, rotating the pans halfway through. They actually had a fair amount of oven spring. Dumped on wire racks and cooled for 1.5 hours before cutting into my creature.

I can't believe it, and it doesn't make any sense, but this bread turned out absolutely amazing. While it doesn't have big holes inside, the crumb is very light, very moist and deeply flavorful. The crust is thin, crispy and has a divine flavor that is certainly enhanced by all the seeds/grains in the harvest blend. We even made heavenly toasted cheese sandwiches for dinner using this bread. It is now about 5 hours after the loaves came out of the oven and there is only 1/2 loaf left. I guess that's better than throwing away almost 2 lbs of starter.

I'm not sure this can be replicated with any success, but I may have to try...

Here's a couple of pictures from what was left the next morning:

Looking at the crumb again, while it has no large holes anywhere, it is airy throughout and is almost lighter than most breads I've made. It really doesn't make much sense to me that this worked, but there you go...

John

Wheat: Red vs White; Spring vs Winter

Home millers have definite preferences when it comes to wheat. Many favor hard spring wheat over winter wheat for it's somewhat higher protein value (and stronger gluten). Furthermore, some prefer the red variety for it's robust flavor while others prefer the milder taste of white.

Some Background: Hard Red Wheat vs Hard White Wheat

Hard white wheat was developed from hard red wheat by eliminating the genes for bran color while preserving other desireable characteristics of red wheat. Depending on variety, red wheat has from one to three genes that give the bran its red cast; in contrast, white wheat has no major genes for bran color. The elimination of these genes results in fewer phenolic compounds and tannins in the bran, significantly reducing the bitter taste that some people experience in flour milled from red wheat. Nutritional composition is the same for red and white wheat.

Spring wheat is planted in April to May, makes a continuous growth and is harvested in August to early September. Winter wheat is planted in the fall. It makes a partial growth, becomes dormant during the cold winter months (hopefully protected by ample snowfall), resumes growth as the weather warms and is harvested in the early summer (June and July).

Flour from hard red winter wheat is often preferred for artisan breads.

Artisan bread flour, which is milled from hard red winter wheat, resembles French bread flour in its characteristics, that is, it is relatively low in protein (11.5–12.5 percent). The low protein content provides for a crisper crust and a crumb with desirable irregular holes...Artisan bread flour often has a slightly higher ash content than patent flour. This creates a grayish cast on the flour and is thought to improve yeast fermentation and flavor. (source: How Baking Works by Paula I. Figoni)

 

This photo shows hard red wheat on the left and hard white wheat on the right

(I don't find the color contrast as marked as in this photo, so be sure to keep your grains clearly labeled.)

The Test

I wanted to see if the slightly higher protein of spring wheat made a signficant difference in gluten development and rising power. A secondary interest was whether there was a marked difference in taste between white and red wheat.

I decided to do a two pronged test of home milled wheat flour: red vs. white wheat and winter vs. spring wheat. I used my tried-'n-true recipe for a fifty percent whole wheat loaf bread. I made the bread four times - twice with home-milled hard red winter wheat and twice with home-milled hard white spring wheat. The baker's percentage was the same for all trials, as were the other ingredients and the procedure followed.

Here are few recipe details...

• The dough is leavened with instant dry yeast.
• The recipe uses a biga, which constitutes about 30% of the dough.
• Flour is 50% home-milled whole wheat flour, 50% commercial (white) bread flour (including bread flour in biga)
• total hydration (including water in the biga) is 64%.
• The recipe includes a small amount of oil (3%) and buckwheat honey (4%) in addition to flour, water, salt and yeast
• Wheat is milled very fine with a Nutrimill. Flour is used within a few hours of milling.

Fresh Milled Four

I get an equally fine flour from winter and spring hard wheat using my Nutrimill grain mill. As expected, red wheat is more tan than white wheat, though the real life difference is somewhat more obvious than the photo below shows. Bran flecks tend to concentrate in the center of the flour receptacle, which accounts for the darker color in that area.

Final Dough

By the time the final dough is ready for bulk fermentation, the color differences have become more apparent. Since the wheat is finely milled, the bran pretty much disappears into the dough. I made no adjustments in water content for the two different grain flours and could find little difference in water absorption, feel or gluten development. All doughs passed the windowpane test.

Baking

For all trials the dough was baked in loaf pans in a 350F oven using the cold start / no preheat method. Total baking time was same same for both kinds of whole wheat flours. There was no difference in oven spring; all loaves rose about one inch during the bake. The photos below show the loaves at the start of baking and after about 15 minutes in the oven.

The Final Product

Doesn't look much different on the outside, does it?

Only way to tell the difference is to cut it. Crumb is virtually identical. The red wheat looks like what most of us think of when we think of whole wheat bread. The white wheat looks a lot more like 100% white bread.

Evaluation

I should have believed the North Dakota Wheat Commission. Their brochure on hard white wheat says...

Before I started this test, I'd never worked with hard white wheat. While others frequently comment on it's mild taste, I wasn't prepared for a fifty percent whole grain bread that tasted like - ummmm - white bread! OK, not exactly like white bread, maybe an eensy bit denser and an eensy bit more taste but close enough to make me question the wisdom of purchasing 25 pounds of the stuff.

A lot of posters here use only whole grain flour, mixing white and red wheats to get the flavor profile they prefer. When they describe white whole grain as mild, you'd better believe it.