Flours of Ireland
This forum is for all of you who, like me, live in Ireland and face daily challenges with the choice of flours. I hope to find other people in Ireland who share their experience and sources.
I would like to start by sharing my experience with Irish flours and will tell you what I can find in our supermarkets and health food stores. I need to add that I live in a little village in County Wicklow, namely Blessington. I don't live too far from Dublin and would be more than happy to head to the Capital to cover my needs.
The flours I've found so far:
Plain White (also known as all purpose flour) - Generally a protein content of 9%
Strong White (also known as bread flour) - Generally a protein content of 11%
I haven't come across a very strong white flour and would love to get hold of it.
Wholemeal and coarse wholemeal flour - 10% protein
And now, I also found strong wholemeal with a whopping 15.3% protein (found it at our local Dunnes Store. The flour is from Odlums)
I'm not getting into the self raising or cream flours, as I don't use them often.
I'm looking for high protein flours, which seems to be rare in Ireland. I've now read that traditionally Irish flours were of poor quality with low to very low protein content, that's why Irish breads are generally made with soda and not yeast, as yeast needs a lot of protein. That makes sense. I don't mind the odd slice of soda bread and have even published a recipe on my own webpage, but I do need some yeast or sourdough bread in the house as well.
I'm looking forward to hearing from you guys and wonder how many of TFL users are actually located in Ireland and are able to share their experience.
Kind Regards and Best Wishes,
Wolfgang
Rye flour is of course also availble - not widely, but it is available in our health food store with a protein of 7.6% and in our local Super Valu with a protein content of 8.5%.
Best Wishes,
Wolfgang
Hi Wolfgang,
I live in Dublin and I've spent a while looking out for different styles of flours. I don't know if you necessarily want your flour to be Irish in origin but if not your options are a bit better.
Dove's flour is available in some Tescos, also in lots of Health food shops like ones in Dalkey Village and Fairview. Dove's has flours labelled as for bread making, both wholemeal and white which both contain approximately 12.5% protein. They also sell gram, spelt and rye flours.
Dublin Organic Food Coop, open on Sundays and Thursdays in Newmarket Square in the Liberties stocks Dove's as well as various other speciality flours like rice and things like that. They also sell Ballybrado which is an organic brand from Tipperary but it's flours are basically just an organic version of the normal Irish low protein flours, the company has a website but I don't think the spam filter is going to let me submit it. Ballybrado does sell Irish rye flour which could be same as you mentioned. I recommend you try the Food Coop in any case, as well as having a decent range of flour it's an all round veritable haven for foodies.
I've used that Odlum's strong bread making flour you used, although I've found it's almost too strong at times. I intend to try mixing it with other lower protein flours but I haven't got around to it yet.
I'll be intrigued to see what anyone else says on the subject.
Hope this helps,
Daniel
Hi Daniel,
That's exactly the kind of advise I was looking for. I'll check out Tescos and definitely the Organic Food Coop. I'm surprised that I haven't come across it sooner.
I would be delighted to find an Irish flour which suits my needs, but if it has to be flour from further afield, that's okay with me, too.
Thanks again and have a nice weekend.
Wolfgang
Hello all. Sorry to be late to this party, but 3 years on I am wondering how much this situation has changed. Rather than posting my questions here, where traffic may be slow, I posted them there instead:
http://www.thefreshloaf.com/node/35169/ireland-again
Cheers