Deciphering King Arthur Flours
I'm poking around the King Arthur Flour website (Danger, Danger! Danger Will Robinson!) AHEM. Anyway... they have
1) King Arthur Sir Lancelot Hi-Gluten Flour - 3 lb. (14.2% protein) $6.95
2) King Arthur Unbleached Bread Flour - 5 lb. (12.7% Protein) $4.95
3) King Arthur European-Style Artisan Bread Flour - 3 lb. (11.7% Protein) $7.50
They labeled the Sir Lancelot as being the best for working with whole grain breads. Obviously the regular unbleached bread flour is preferable, price-wise. Couldn't I just put in a couple of tablespoons of vital wheat gluten into my rye bread flours if I'm having problems with gluten development for a fraction of the cost (especially as I can buy it at Whole Foods for less than half the price of KAF's package) when I'm wanting to deal with a heavily whole-grained bread?
Hi Sula...
You forgot to add the $6.50 shipping fee to each of those three flours. Yowzer...
Unbleached bread flour works when you're using a higher percentage of rye. I've been using 40 percent KA bread flour with 60-percent Arrowhead Mills organic rye with very good results.
Admittedly, I've been waiting for KA to have a free shipping deal so I can place a big order. In the interim, I'm looking at other sources.
If you are going to add vital wheat gluten, other threads on the topic have suggested a ratio of one tablespoon per pound of flour.
Even though I live about 15 minutes from there, I often wait for free shipping. I live on the NH side of the river (no sales tax) so I save if they send it to us.
Do they have a certain time of year that they do that, or do I just need to keep popping in? As it is, even with shipping, what I can order from KAF is still cheaper than what I can buy at the store from the bulk bin, at least as far as bread flour goes.
The question though is which of those do I really want/need for making whole grain breads? My bread has been fairly dense and I'd love to be able to get a more open crumb. I think part of it is that my sourdough starter is still fairly young.
Right now it's around 93% humidity so I'm not even going to TRY and make bread for the next couple of days!
RE, above: Is that $6.50 shipping -PER BAG-?! They don't have the bread flour in 25# bags yet. Grrrrr! I was basing my shipping off of the $8 that I'd gotten toted up for a 25# bag of the AP flour.
I just went and looked at the site and if you order $60 or more you can get $3 shipping, which isn't bad. But then again, I don't really need $60 worth of stuff! On the other hand, there's such a fine line between 'want' and 'need' and they do have some nice non-flour items...
but I receive e-mails from KAF and that is how I find out when the free shipping occurs. I can buy their AP and bread flour at all of our local stores including the large warehouse stores. I'm surprised they don't sell the large bags (25lbs) on their retail site.
I just got the email that KAF is now offering free shipping on orders of $80 or more, and $3 shipping on orders of $60 or more.
I won't be ordering after all, though, as my local grocery just had KAF Bread Flour on sale for $3.09/5lbs bag.
I just went to the Super Wally world up North here today and they had the KAF bread flour for 3.59/5lb bag.
Doesn't your grocery store carry KA flours? I certainly do not live in a very populated area and my store carries a variety of KA flour, even the white whole wheat which I love. Even if you had to drive a little ways it's still cheaper than all that shipping! Also, the white whole wheat has over 13% protein, more than their bread flour so maybe try using that.
AP flour, but I don't recall seeing the blue bread flour package. Then again, at the time I wasn't looking.
Not only do they have it, it's more than $1/5 lbs. cheaper than ordering it direct from KAF. How weird is that?