I too need advise on making bread.
I am trying to make German sourdough bread and it says I need..........
Rye flour
wholemeal bread flour
now I have both of these but its the ..........
Unbleached white bread flour I cant obtain in shops,I have tried Tesco/sainsbury etc but to no avail.
I can get it on line but wondered if there is an alternative I can use to keep this simple.
Any suggestions.
Thanks
Gazza
I would just sub in Doves Organic white flour - sainsburys do it...
Gazza..I make Finnish type sourdough rye bread that is not that much different from the German.
I suspect that there is only small amount of 'unbleached white' in a recipe and its used to 'bind' all other flowers together as on its own rye and wholemeal makes quite crumbly bread. If it is a small quantity you need..
unbleached flour is not something that you 'must' use, just replace it with ordinary white.
If the main incredient is rye..don't knead as you would 'normal' bread. Rye dough don't like it and it resulting bread almost falling apart...more you use rye..less kneeding. Just gentle kneeding to get the dough smooth and that will be enough..and rye will alway be more sticky than other flours. If it stops sticking into your hands when kneeding..you've use too much flour... ;)
Rye is 'lazy bakers' dough...it is not difficult to deal with but you knowing few 'tricks' will help you getting 'rock loaves'.
If you list the amounts of incredients, I can give you more details.
Ok................
It asks for
10oz of Rye
5 oz of Wholemeal
5 oz of Unbleached white bread flour.
These is also a Polish Rye bread im considering too.............
That says...........
8 oz of Rye
8oz of Unbleached white bread flour.
Cheers
Gazza
Yep...you can use just ordinary strong white...bleached or not doesn't make any difference to the bread itself..there might be slight difference in depht of the colour when using bleached white. The main purpose for the small amount of white is the 'binding' bit and making the dough teeny bit lighter.
I suspect the reason they have put 'unbleached' into recipe is that like in Finland..unbleached is the 'normal' sort of flour there rather than then otherway round like in here.
There is some difference between bleached and unbleached flours in terms of gluten formation. Bleached flour is preferred for cakes, where you don't want a "bready" texture.
So unbleached will be (marginally) better for bread, where you're looking for maximum gluten, especially if you're mixing it with low gluten flours like spelt or rye.
Ok thanks for the advise,Ill have a go at it.
Gazza
QuoteThere is some difference between bleached and unbleached flours in terms of gluten formation. Bleached flour is preferred for cakes, where you don't want a "bready" texture
Which makes me wonder..are bread (strong) flours generally bleached?..I've never noticed any bread flour packets mentioning the word unbleach/bleached.
I've noticed some plain flour packets using word 'bleached'...but that sort of flour is for cakes.
I've used 'normal' strong/white bread flour with sourdough rye and its been absolutely fine.
Oh..I've just noticed something while looking for some flours...
http://www.dovesfarm.co.uk/flour-and-ingredients/?productOffset=1
"Please note: All of our flours are unbleached. The addition of bleaching agents is not permitted in the UK. "
From that I understand that all flours sold in UK..should not be unbleached... ???
Re flours and wheats,there are basically two types of wheat used in flour, hard wheat and soft wheat.
Hard wheat has a higher gluten content than soft wheat.
Bread flour has a higher gluten content as it is made from hard winter wheat.
Plain flour is a mixture of hard and soft wheats therefore less gluten and is great for pastries and most cakes.
Cake flour is made with a higher % of soft wheats and has a low gluten content and best for delicate cakes
Just use bread flour , bleached or otherwise,in your bread recipe and you will be fine.
Oh and if using a US/Canadian recipe at any time, plain flour is called all purpose flour.
XX Jeannine