Great bread requires great ingredients, but you can’t always find freshly milled or high quality flour at the grocery store. The following are products that we love to bake with, but they are not by any means the only flour brands to try! Keep an eye out for unique products from small mills and specialty farms. Who knows, you may have one such operation close to home.
Just so you know, as an Amazon Associate, we earn from qualifying purchases if you choose to buy these flours through the below Amazon links. Regardless--we really do enjoy using these flours!
Great River Organic Milling Lily White
At Fourneau, we really tear through the Lily White. This flour makes up the bulk of our bread and is the foundation we rely on and to which we add other full-grain flours. It is available in smaller bags but the 25 lb bag is worth ordering if you bake with frequency.
This heirloom whole wheat flour adds a wonderful warmth to loaves. We generally pair it with rye and higher protein bread flour. The grind on this flour is quite fine, so the bran flecks are small and they don’t add a lot of coarseness to the dough.
More about Einkorn wheat from Jovial: "A delicate plant with a yield one-fifth that of modern wheat, einkorn depends on nutrient-rich soil. This is achieved through crop rotation, which also reduces the need for synthetic inputs to control pests and disease while increasing biodiversity. Indeed, jovial is committed to sustainable organic farming despite einkorn’s smaller yield and growing challenges because of the nutrition it provides to consumers and how it gives back to the land."
Arrowhead Mills Organic Rye Flour
Some of us at Fourneau like the cinnamon flavor of vetch in our rye flour. Others, not so much. The Arrowhead Mills Rye is a very straightforward rye with great flavor and texture and no vetch flavor. This is a regular in the battards that we bake. It is also what our Mom uses in her walnut rye breakfast bread.
Bob’s Red Mill Organic Dark Rye
This rye on the other hand is pretty vetchy. We have really good luck using Bob’s rye as a component in our starter feeds (20%, 80% bread flour). There will often be 100g or so of this going into our 1kg doughs when making a sourdough batard.
Okay, if we’re talking about vetch and flour that is rich with enzymes, then we have to include Janie’s Mill Dark Rye. We’re pretty sure this is the flour that introduced us to the powerful flavor influence of vetch. Fellow Illini, the team at Janie’s Mill make great products across the board and make a major contribution to the growth of sustainable organic farming in Illinois.
We hope you find these links helpful. Again, keep an eye out for flour mills in your area--they are around and they’re great to support. And as always, happy baking from all of us at Fourneau!