alt Hacker NewsCaught me at the right time.
I've been baking on and off for twenty years, but it's only recently I've started to consider what I'm working with in any detail.
I'm absolutely aware of the difference between British and imported wheat. Results are very much improved and work is made easier by using very strong Canadian flour, but supporting British business (I'm a Londoner) add complexity to the choice.
I buy flour made from British wheat, but it requires extra effort to achieve an almost-as-good result as when working with imported flour.
This difference is particularly interesting for me. The industry that provides my current career (I'm a CG artist) is undergoing significant changes. I look to the future and a contemplate a possible change of career.
Do I buy Canadian flour and deliver a product that people expect? Do I sacrifice a little of the result, at least while I learn how to work more effectively with British flour, in order to be able to promote myself as a small business supporting UK enterprise.
Decisions, decisions.
What an odd morning on HN.
Replies
You can buy pure gluten powder (sold as "vital wheat gluten") and add it to get the equivalent of the Canadian flour.
A mixed strategy of say 75% British / 25% Canadian wheat could be an interesting point to explore.
Then, you would get 75% of the local support benefit while having a potentially better product.
(ratios theoretical; you know more than me!)
Any reason you can't just add whatever is missing from the British flour?
Amateur bread baker here.
Ships three times a week from Halifax docked at Birkenhead's grain elevator. The flour was then transferred to the mill over the road. British wheat flour (refined) at that point in history (60s) could not get to more than about 9% protein, not really enough to raise a loaf.
Common Market (? 1975) and we have tariffs &c so British wheat gets some serious cross-breeding attention. And now you can get home grown strong white flour above 11.5g. I think there was a similar story with Sugar cane and beet. The old Spillers mill is now flats, and the grain elevator was demolished decades ago.
But, yes, a few of the ships still come and yes you can get Canadian flour at 14 to 15%. One local artisan baker uses French flour as a matter of principle. Others don't specify the source. I'd say develop your recipes and go for it.
As an American, I found the protein situation and the whole “Canadian” flour concept bizarre.
In the US, most high quality flours will state their protein percentage reasonably prominently on the label. It’s not particularly hard to buy commercial flour at a fairly wide range of protein levels - 13.5% and even higher protein flours are available and inexpensive. And (lucky for us?) they’re basically all farmed in the US.
But in Europe, the labels seem more interested in ash content and the milling technique, and, at best, the protein can sometimes be inferred from the nutritional information. The last time I shopped for bread flour in Europe, I found a Canadian flour with sort of acceptable protein at a very high price, and I found a Croatian “Pizza” flour that was even better at a lower price.
Do not take American mass-produced sandwich bread as any kind of product that Europeans should wish they had :)