I see a lot of discussion about how high temperatures various mills produce, as if it is of vital importance.  I understand higher temps my destroy enzymes and such, but is is very important since you are going to bake the bread anyway?   (This has probably been answered before but I had no luck in finding it).  Thanks,

I have a little experience making sourdough, and thought I'd branch into using home milled flour. I usually make the starters at 100% (ish) measuring the flour so I know the running weight of the starter but just adding water till it looks right - a thick gloopy paste. I have some questions - it seems the more I learn, the less I know!

I feel that throwing away the starter during feeding is a waste, and came across this recipe http://www.sustainweb.org/realbread/sourdough_starter/  for a no throw starter that I am trying with a more or less 50:50 mix of organic wheat and rye. I am curious to the opinion of those more 'soured' than I - why are recipes that require throwing out so popular when this seems so easy? To me it looks like the starter might be a bit hungry but is that counted by the rye being more 'yeasty'?

Also, this is my first time making a starter in Perth AU, much hotter and humid than my original town of Christchruch NZ - I'm thinking this will speed up the process, what else do I need to be aware of?  In terms of proof/retard times?

I have read somewhere, I think on here, that home milling can damage the starch in the flours, but adding acid like pineapple juice, grape, or vinegar can help counter this? Or is this only with 'quick' breads, and souring is going to counter any damage anyway?

I'm also considering using commerical organic flour for the first bake, as from what I've read home milled can be so different in behaviour. So perhaps get my starter going with home milled, and use commerical in the bread recipe to lessen chance of a flop. Or am I being too cautious and if I use a bit of common sense should be fine all the way with home milled?? Oh the decisions!

Thanks very much to those who can give advice and experience, it's so interesting I have to watch myself that I don't get carried away!

Nicola

A couple weeks ago, I posted my bake of the Whole Wheat Bread from Reinhart's BBA, made with fresh-milled flour. A reply by Karin (hanseata) prompted me to bake the “100% Whole Wheat Bread” from Reinhart's newer Whole Grain Baking book. I had made this bread once before leavened with sourdough starter and didn't particularly care for the combination of sourdough tang and whole wheat flavor, but I thought I really should make it again using instant yeast and with fresh-milled whole wheat.

The differences between the formulas for whole wheat bread in BBA and WGB are clearly evolutionary and illustrate where Reinhart has gone with his thinking about drawing the best possible flavor and performance from whole grain flours. In the WGB version, essentially all the flour is either in a biga or a soaker, with an optional additional small amount used to adjustment dough consistency, if needed.

I followed the recipe in WGB closely, with these choices where there were options: For the liquid in the soaker, I used about 2/3 Greek-style yoghurt and 1/3 2% milk. For the fat, I used canola oil. I added less than an ounce of additional WW flour during kneading.

After bulk fermentation, I shaped a single bâtard which was proofed on a linen couch then baked in a Le Creuset oval roaster (in which it barely fit).

I baked at 425ºF (convection bake) with the cover on the roaster. After 10 minutes, I reduced the temperature to 350ºF, and, after 10 minutes more, I removed the cover. I baked another 20 minutes with the roaster uncovered. At that point, I felt the crust should be darker and firmer, although the internal temperature of the loaf was 185ºF. I removed the loaf from the roaster, placed it on a sheet pan and baked for another 10 minutes. I left the loaf in the turned off oven with the door ajar for another 10 minutes before transferring it to a cooling rack.

The crust is thin, slightly crunchy and chewy. The texture of the crumb is moist and chewy – hard to describe but very pleasing. The chewiness is from the larger particles of grain, rather than from the gluten in the crumb. The crumb is otherwise quite soft – almost cake-like. I milled the wheat to the second finest setting. Next time, I plan to mill it at the finest setting, at least for the biga. The flavor is very similar to that of the BBA whole wheat bread but even better. There is no grassiness or bitterness from the bran, just a little sweetness from the honey and the wheat itself and good wheaty flavors. I much prefer this yeasted version to the sourdough one. 

This bread does not need any spreads or other enhancements. It is very satisfying plain. But I'm anticipating it will be equally delicious with almond butter or with eggs.

I also baked a couple boules of sourdough bread today. I used one of the formulas from the SFBI Artisan II Workshop, which calls for a liquid levain fed twice a day. These were baked in Lodge Combo Cookers.

David

Submitted to YeastSpotting

I have been searching high and low for information on home milling and mixing my own bread and all-purpose flour to no avail. I realize that there are all sorts of factors from environmental to the mechanics of milling in a particular machine. What I don't get is why anyone doesn't ever seem to answer the question of "how to do it" with a basic-get-started-in-the-right-direction recipe or instruction. It seems to me like it is some great secret right next to Area 51 or something. I don't mind messing with the flour or grind or any of that. But let's get real...no one can eat that much bread to discover how to do it in a short period of time. I don't want to spend the rest of my life guessing whether I am doing the right procedures or steps or not. I am hoping someone will have mercy on me and help me get moving in the right direction. I don't want them to do it all for me, just help me get moving. If I sound a bit frustrated, well...I am. Here is what I don't understand... When I use King Arthur all-purpose flour for example in my recipe, I get a poofy, soft, spongy tasty bread right.? What I know is King Arthur flour is like 12% protein. When I try to grind my own wheat to make flour, I mix soft white and hard white and sift out the bran to try to duplicate it and make my recipe I end up with a PUCK!!! It tastes great, but does not have the textual qualities. What am I doing wrong? Will a veteran please have mercy on me?

Blessings!

Just thinking of treating myself to something nice, so I decided on a mill for my home. Whole flours are definetly the best as fresh as possible and I do a bit of home brewing where I would also like to use fresh milled grains. I would really like a stone mill and I see there are some available online. I would probably get a manual one as the machine ones are a bit out of my price range. So any information on the subject would be greatly appreciated.

Tom Georgalas

Anyone have a good online source for whole corn? I've tried Pleasant Hill and Wheat Montana. Amazon has some 25 pound bags for $400+, which makes me think that the corn has been gold plated first...

I tried popcorn, but it's too wet (Retsel w/ steel wheels).

Thanks!

Loyd

It only took 3 months! /rolleyes

Just ran a quart of hard white wheat through it, I'll do another quarter before I start using the flour.

It did let me establish that my finest seive is almost a perfect 85% extraction when I need 'white' flour.

Retsel Electric Grain Mill on Sale Now on eBay

CAVEAT: I don't know if it is permissible to link to an eBay auction on this forum. However, for those in the market for a high-end grain mill for home use, this may be of interest. I have no connection with the seller and no intention of buying this mill. (webmaster - please feel free to delete this post if you wish).

The grain mill being offered on eBay is the USA made electric Retsel Mil-Rite. The basic design of this mill is a fixed grooved grinding plate and a rotating grooved grinding plate. This design allows the miller to adjust the fineness of the flour and produce anything from cracked grain to very fine flour. It also allows the truly dedicated home miller to create speciality flours by sifting out the bran and remilling the flour (something that the more popular micronizer mills cannot do).

The Retsel mill has a good reputation for quality workmanship and durability. This mill is great for the dedicated home miller (as long as you have the space) but it would be equally appropriate for a small, speciality bakery or a co-op that wishes to mill whole grain for it's members.

The eBay mill is advertised as  "buy it now" (not an auction), which means the purchaser pays the advertised price. It is being sold for $400 USD plus shipping costs.  It looks as though the seller can only ship within the USA.

This is a photo of a Retsel mill from the Retsel's site www.retsel.com

Two independent reviews of the Retsel are here and here

 For the few of you following this adventure in milling, I thought I would post the baked results.  I used my standard baguette formula which is posted elsewhere on this site, but briefly is all levain, 65% hydration with 15% of the flour pre-fermented with an inoculation rate of 25%.  This is a formula that I have been baking every week for years with fairly consistent results.  My standard baguettes are pictured elsewhere in my blog.

 The flour used for this bake was the first batch, milled on 25 February and has been aging in an uncovered plastic container since then.  It was about 70% extraction and contained very fine flecks of bran.  Since I could not get a Falling Number measurement on this flour, I did not attempt to correct the Falling Number by malting the flour.  Details on the milling process are posted in earlier blog entries.

 My first observation is that the levain build was somewhat different than that made at the same time with commercial flour.  I would have to say that it was more fluid than the commercial flour, and matured with larger bubbles.

 Although I was attempting to go strictly "by the numbers," after the autolyse phase the dough was very stiff and I added additional water.  The dough developed "pretty much like" my normal dough after that, and bulk fermented "about like you'd expect."  The color of the dough was distinctly more grey than normal, probably reflecting a higher ash content in the flour (since it did contain some bran.)

 After dividing, I shaped the dough as normal.  It was at this phase that it felt "different."  I would describe it as being just slightly less elastic than my normal dough.

The final ferment had a duration of one hour - which is the standard length for this formula's final ferment.  I felt that the dough was somewhat under "proofed" but wanted to try to keep the process as close to "by the numbers" as possible, so I went ahead to scoring and baking.

 The crumb was a bit tight - probably reflecting my skimping on the final ferment or the lack of malt - but not horribly so.  The taste is quite nice.  I'm not good at the "notes of grass" sort of language, but it tasted "more" than my normal loaf.  A bit more there there, as it were.  Again, it may not show well in the pictures, but the crumb color was a bit deeper than my normal loaf.

 The results are pictured below.  Despite all the good advice on these pages - photography continues to elude me, but I gave it my best shot (as it were.)

Would I hand mill this flour again?  I might. It does not have nearly the taste impact of fresh milling a whole wheat or a near whole wheat flour, but it is a nice flour with nice baking results.  Next time I might add just a pinchlette of diastatic malt.

I will say that I normally dust my peel lightly with flour and this particular flour - being a bit more "sandy" than commercial flour makes a great flour for dusting the peel.

I ate a half baguette as I typed this up.  I usually have pretty good self control around my normal baguettes.  I'm guessing this one WAS pretty darn tasty.

Hope this is of some interest to those of you contemplating advanced home milling.  I still have my second batch of "pure white" flour to bake - hopefully next week.

Happy Milling!

"Do or do not...there is no try." Yoda

And so it is finally time to actually make a "white flour" milling run. This is a project that I have been mulling over for some time - and it is not a small one.

Here are some specifics as to my milling setup.  I use a Diamant mill with steel burrs.   The mill is hand cranked.  For sifting, I use plastic classifiers from Legend, Inc.  I have #12 (screen openings of .07"), #30(.02") and #50 (.01").  I also have a #100 (.006") but have not been using it.  I use a Delmhorst G7 grain moisture meter to measure grain moisture.

The objective for this first "white flour" run was simply to get a generic "all purpose" white flour.  I do not currently have the equipment to measure ash content, and the method described by bwraith in his blog requires a 12 hour waiting period.  I can see how this would be useful, but at this time the project seems monumental enough.

The first step in the process is tempering.  I am hoping to produce enough flour to make a recipe of baguettes, so I started with 32 oz (Oh, me and my pound and ounces, but this is a low precision operation and they should be good enough) of hard white wheat berries.  To this I added 0.8 oz of water.  After 24 hours I took a moisture level measurement and found the grain to be at 12.7% moisture.  This is close enough to the desired 13% so the berries were left in the tightly sealed container for another 24 hours to continue the tempering process.

My target extraction level was 70%.  Some of the weight of the grain is lost in the process, so my goal was to obtain 20 oz of "white" flour.

My first pass through the mill was what I define as a "medium sized" cracked wheat.  This is a little finer than typical cracked wheat, but still more of a meal than a flour.  This pass was sifted through the #12 sieve which is part of my process to remove the bran and then through the #50 sieve (which is the sieve through which I normally sift my high extraction flour) to see how much "flour" resulted from the first pass.  On this first pass I obtained 1.5 oz of flour (from 32 oz of grain...)  Not much, just not much at all.

My second pass was a 'fine" cracked wheat.  This pass took all of the material that had not passed through the #12 sieve and milled it again.  Again I sifted it through both the #12 and the #50 sieve.  I obtained an additional 1.15 oz of white flour.

Since, frankly, I am just making this process up as I go along, I had to take a moment for quality thought.  I already have what I consider to be a successful process for obtaining my high extraction flour and my objective was to get as much bran out of the process before I started doing the finer passes.  So I switched to my "high extraction" process.  I did one more pass to "very fine" cracked wheat and sifted it through the #12 sieve.  This resulted in about 10 oz of "bran like" material left in the sieve.  This would be about a 70% extraction, however noticing that some "bran like" material had passed through the sieve and would be sifted out at finer siftings, this would not result in my target extraction rate.  So I put the material remaining in the sieve through the mill again at the same setting.  Sifting through the #12 sieve left 4.35 oz of material in the sieve.  This material was removed from the milling process.

I then sifted the remaining material through the #50 sieve to get 2.95 oz of flour.  Clearly I had to continue with finer grinding.

The next pass through the mill was at what I call "hippie whole wheat" coarseness.  This is starting to look like flour, but at a texture that bakes up into the doorstops we convinced ourselves were good bread a few decades ago.  This was sifted through the #30 and the #50 sieves.  From this pass I obtained an additional 2.95 oz of white flour.  There was more milling to do.  There was 5.25 oz of bran like material left in the #30 sieve.  This was removed from the milling process, making the total bran removed 9.6 oz - somewhat below my target, allowing for some more material to be removed in later siftings.

The next pass was to the fineness of coarse ground whole wheat.  Again it was sifted through the #30 and the #50 sieves.  I obtained an additional 4.6 oz of flour.

At this point I had obtained, in total, about half the amount of white flour that was my goal.  I needed to grind finer, but frankly at this point a small amount of bran was working its way through the mill and into my flour.  It was a very small amount, but it was there.  Oh well.

The next pass was essentially typical flour.  I grind finer, but this is very like commercial whole wheat.  This was sifted through the #50 sieve to obtain 4.05 oz of white flour.  The material remaining in the sieve was returned to the mill and put through at the same setting.  This was sifted through the #50 sieve to obtain an additional 3.95 oz of white flour.  All of the remaining material was returned to the mill.

At this point I put my mill on its finest setting.  Once again I sifted the output through the #50 sieve to get an additional amount of white flour of 2.5 oz.

That was it - I had my 20 oz of flour.  I returned what remained in the sifter to the mill and did an additional pass.  What went through the #50 sieve, however, was clearly loaded with bran and so was removed from the process.

All of this took about an hour.  Coming soon to an infomercial near you "Milling and Sifting Your Way to Fitness."

What were the results?  Unfortunately the combination of my snapshot camera and my photography skills result in unedifying pictures, so sorry, no pics.  I have 20oz of whitish flour.  It is clearly, but very lightly flecked with bran.  Compared side by side with King Arthur All Purpose flour, it is a bit more yellow in color and just a bit grittier, but not unpleasantly so.  The flour from the first couple of passes was distinctly greyer than the rest of the flour.  Here is our treasured "clear" flour perhaps, but at such a low volume that I don't think I could justify milling it.  I could put the results through the #100 sieve to attempt to get my "white" flour even whiter, but that would result in a much lower yield.  I may have to tolerate the flecks of bran.

Right now I have two paths I could take for the next batch: stay with this method and send the next lot off to the lab for some test results, or try another method.  The key, of course is to get the bran out before it gets ground too finely.  I am considering doing more passes at coarser settings, but the flour yield from those is just a bit discouraging.  I must remind myself that these burr mills are not roller mills and in general are not designed for milling white flours.  I can be terribly hard on myself.  Inspiration is welcome.

As for the baked results?  Now we wait.  Four weeks.  For while there is much ambiguity about aging whole wheat flours, there is none for white flours.  What I have is green flour and it needs to be aged prior to baking.  I'm not going to let my lack of patience mess with the results...

Happy Milling!