Using and storing a variety of flour

[Aloha Steve]

I bought Pumpernickel flour thinking Oh Boy I'm going to make a favorite bread of mine. Looked at the recipe and saw I needed potato flour, Deli rye flavor, non-diastatic malt,......where does it end ? Should I get a chemistry degree ? LOL

Does one need all the different flours ? Can I use Wheat instead of spelt ?

What do you do ?

Edited October 16, 2009 by Aloha Steve (log)

[Lior]

A lot of those flours are great for gluten free recipes. I keep glass jars with different flours and labels in my pantry. I like the way it looks! I need a good recipe book that use these flours!! I just experiment and substitute, and it is far from perfect!

[Beth Wilson]

I too am starting a collection of these unique flours. I have a mother-in-law who is gluten intolerant and I have been trying out some new recipes with these flours.

It has been quite a challenge and there have been one or two chocolate cakes that were baked, cooled, tasted and tossed I haven't even attempted bread yet!

I see these new flours as a new challenge. That there are a few books on the market and a few websites that offer help, but it all seems in it's infancy.

I would say that at least once or twice a day in the summer time rush of my store, that I got asked what had gluten in it. Five years ago I had only one customer with this problem. It is starting to become more prevalent and I am trying to educate myself on the topic.

I would love to learn more about substitutions too, but I can say, it isn't as easy as you think - personal experience and all.

Loir - you have given me a good idea for organizing the flours now! Anything is better than the drawer of ziploc baggies I have now!

[baroness]

You might need a freezer - not a warehouse - as the whole grain products do not have a very long shelf life at room temperature. And then there is the need to defend against insect invasions.

[andiesenji]

It is better to keep these flours in your freezer - if you don't have a lot of room, consider buying one of the small chest freezers just to store them.

They are all great flours and can be incorporated in many recipes - there are numerous web sites with recipes and good advice on how to use them.

I have all of those listed above and in addition, sorghum flour, teff flour, cassava flour, brown rice flour, millet flour, flax flour, triticale flour and mesquite flour.

Most of these were purchased from Barry Farm: http://www.barryfarm.com/flours.htm

And they also have some excellent recipes and hints for how to use some of their products, in addition to very good descriptions of the various flours and suggestions for their use.

All or most of these flours are milled from the whole grain (or root) and will go rancid quickly at room temp. Storing them in the freezer will allow you to keep them for an extended period - I have kept them well over a year with no problems.

[Aloha Steve]

Thanks Andie for the resource, as usual; you are so very helpful.

I do have a 2nd freezer for storing and can make room for a bunch in there.

I'll need to figure out what i need and put an order together.

Edited October 17, 2009 by Aloha Steve (log)

[Lior]

How does one know when flour is rancid. I keep in glass sealing jars for ages. Never noticed anything odd...

oh dear...

[prairiegirl]

I have a grain grinder so I have the actual grains in large 20 pound bags! I now store them in a huge plastic container to keep mice out. I thought my garage was mouse free and they got into some of my grain and I had to throw everything away. Once I have ground my grain I put the left over flour into the fridge or freezer because they do contain fresh oils that will go rancid if left in the cupboard. If you make a cake or whatever else, if the taste is off that is a good indication of rancid flour. Most commercially purchased flour has been stripped of most goodness with very little added back.

[andiesenji]

How does one know when flour is rancid. I keep in glass sealing jars for ages. Never noticed anything odd...

oh dear...

Dip a finger into the flour and taste it. If you have ever got hold of a walnut gone bad, you will know.....

[Ciao Ling]

Restimulated by eGullet, for the last several weeks I have been on a bread baking binge. I have multiple flours, adding to the standard KA AP white I always stocked, unfortuntely adding flours almost like a collection trying different breads and trying to improve the results. I have to take a step back and ask whether I really need that many. Currently I have organic white and whole wheat from Bread Alone, KA French Style, KA European Style, KA Bread, Gold Medal Bread, KA white whole wheat, Arrowhead Mills Rye, Arrowhead Pasta (semolina and Durum flour), Bob's whole wheat, Bob's whole wheat pastry, Bob's Spelt, and Caputo 00 (for pizza), not to mention vital wheat gluten and wheat bran. As long as I continue to bake all the time, they will for the most part be used, but I might not. I heard of people trying to increase the freshness of flour by freezing, but that's a lot of freezer space. I don't do it, but people who grind their own flour will tell you that the nutrient flour drops immediately after grinding.

How many flours do you have and how do you store yours? When do you consider throwing it away short of the obvious insect?

[Snadra]

I live in a warm and humid climate where little insects love to grow, so storing all dry goods is an ongoing problem for me.

I buy one flour 5kg at a time which I keep in a sealed plastic container in the cupboard. It's my go to all purpose flour so I go through it fairly quickly. That's an organic 'white' flour (which is really more of a flecked tan). For specialty products I tend to buy small quantities (here that's a 1kg bag/box, usually). If there are any leftovers I store them in the freezer. At the moment I've got 2kg rye and 1kg each buckwheat, cake & pasta flours in the freezer. Bar the cake & pasta flours, I get the rest mail order from Santos Trading. It does take up some space (my only freezer space is a side-by-side), but it means I've got just enough on hand for a spur-of-the-moment project and I KNOW that I won't find any extra protein in the flour. And at least I've got less room to destroy meat through freezer burn...

I'm not an expert baker, but I haven't noticed any difference. I assume there could be problems if your freezer was liable to build up large quantites of frost, in that it might increase the moisture content of the flour.

I have read somewhere that storing flours in the freezer for a period of time then in a sealed container will reduce any potential insect hatching as well, but I can't remember the source so I'm not sure how reliable this is.

I do keep semolina and polenta in sealed jars at room temperature (ie anywhere between 1C and 44C in my house!) and have had no trouble with them gaining protein content.

[Blether]

At the moment I have strong wholewheat, strong white, not-quite-so-strong white and white cake flours. The volume is in the first two, and the big bags sit out on the kitchen floor, under the 'eaves' of a table. They go quickly enough to be safe that way - the only flour I've ever thrown out, still in the bag, was some wholewheat that went off, stored too long in room heat (6 months). Once or twice I've tasted it coming and been able to finish a bag off (until recently I was ordering wholewheat, 4 x 5kg bags at a time).

One thing I do to keep the varieties down is mix strong and cake flours for pastry and other things, typically 1/4 - 1/3 cake for an AP kind of flour, but it's pointless giving a ratio when flours themselves differ so much.

There's no room in my own freezer, but I could see the attraction of having a stock of pastry flour in there.

[Darienne]

I can't personally add to this topic, since I am not much of a baker at all. However, fall and winter of 08-09, we lived in Moab UT, a very small unsophisticated town basically, about 5,000 swollen by a factor of gosh...I don't know what...for the tourist trade. 61 motels at last count. Tourists don't bake.

Now I live near a small city in Canada, 75,000, and in any given grocery store you'll find only a very few flours of any kind: white AP, white pastry, WW...not much choice. Ditto for the sugar.

However, in Moab I was stunned to find so many many different flours and sugars also. Who uses them in a town so small that there's no Wal-Mart even (a sign of shopping excellence ) and folks travel 2 hours to Grand Junction, CO to buy much of ANYTHING? I couldn't even buy a lollipop stick.

Very curious.

[qrn]

I buy 50 lb sacks of flour from a rest. supply place and store them in 20 Quart pails from another rest.equipment supply house. You can get 46 pounds in each pail if, as you are filling, it you pick it up and drop it from 3 or 4 inches to pack it in. I buy one bag of High gluten, and one bag of a lower gluten and mix them in near equal parts to make a white crusty bread. Since they have air tight lids I have had no bug problems,,, best of all ,depending on the current prices, a 100 lb is only about $35...

Bud

[andiesenji]

I use several different kinds of flour, some purchased, some ground from whole grains in small amounts because they turn rancid rapidly and I keep the whole grains in the pantry freezer - reserved for them, nuts and seeds, etc.

I buy specialty flours from King Arthur and others and depending on shelf stability keep them in the pantry or the freezer.

I always transfer them to containers that can be tightly sealed and with those that are very iffy, i.e. nut flours, vacuum seal them. I spend a lot of money on them and do not want to waste it by having to throw them out.

Here's a photo of my pantry flour shelf during a baking phase - some will go back into the freezer after I have finished.

[Aloha Steve]

At present I have KA: AP, WW, Sir Lancelot (High protein), Rye fine, Pumpernickel (Rye med. grind), Queen Guinevere (cake flour), Rice flour, Potato flour, Semolina flour, (and one more I cannot remember) Whole Grains and yesterday in a moment of weakness, being completely out of bread flour, bought Gold Medal Bread flour with RLB's picture on the front.

I keep all in 99% air tight plastic containers in the extra fridge with the exception of the AP, because I use it so fast. I am hoping to get 6-8 months out of all.

[andiesenji]

Steve, how do you like the pumpernickel from KA?

I've been using the organic rye from Barry farm.

http://www.barryfarm.com/nutri_info/flours/ryepumpk.html

And like the texture and flavor.

I tried the rye from KA several years ago and wasn't impressed with the results but I understand they have changed sources in recent years but I have yet to try their pumpernickel.

I'm trying to stick to organic as much as possible because I am trying to use only non-GMO ingredients as much as possible and I am happy to see that KA now offers the organic pumpernickel.

[Ciao Ling]

Andiesenji: I am impressed at your neat organization! No pictures of my cupboard.....

[abooja]

Most of my flours are from King Arthur, with the exception of a box of Softasilk cake flour, a bag of white rice flour, and one 5-lb. bag of Wegmans (store brand) whole wheat flour that I use for suet making for the birds. The rest are all-purpose, bread, white whole wheat, potato, high gluten, unbleached cake flour, semolina, durum, pasta blend (A/P, semolina & durum), medium rye, first clear, pastry blend, whole wheat pastry (graham), tapioca, almond and toasted hazelnut. The bulk of these are kept in the freezer, with a bag of A/P, bread and cake flours at room temperature at all times.

[RobertCollins]

Up thread, somebody ask about avoiding insect infestation in grains and flours.

A few years ago I had the little moths coming out of my grain sacks and filling my pantry. I wrote to Lundberg Rice Co. in California and ask what to do about them.

They said that freezing the grains for 2-4 weeks would kill the eggs. So grains coming into the house to stay awhile are frozen immediately. After that time I put them into the pantry in jars and have not had the problem again.

Flours are kept in the freezer except AP which gets used up before it could have a rancidity problem and I've never seen any moths from White AP.

My old Missouri Farmer father-in-law once ask me,"If the bugs won't eat it, are you sure you want too?"

ed: sp

Edited March 2, 2010 by RobertCollins (log)

[andiesenji]

Andiesenji: I am impressed at your neat organization! No pictures of my cupboard.....

The organization is a desperation measure. Otherwise I can find myself with too much of one or more of the more "exotic" flours because it was too difficult to find the on-hand supply and I purchased more. (And all too often I am an impulse shopper.) Before I began using the wire racks with everything fairly visible, I found 4 containers of teff flour in different cupboards and none was still usable. (Rancid)

Other items that were often duplicated: Wheat berries, rye flakes, oatmeal.

Also, the advantage of transferring a flour to a container as soon as one gets home from shopping, is that sometimes one finds "hitchikers" in the bottom of the box or bag. These items are promptly returned to the store. If you keep them more than a couple of days the store is less likely to accept it because they can say the bugs were already in your house.

[Blether]

...

A few years ago I had the little moths coming out of my grain sacks and filling my pantry. I wrote to Lundberg Rice Co. in California and ask what to do about them...

If we're mentioning rice in passing, I'll repeat what I've previously posted in another thread. I had trouble with rice weevils here. The kindly Indian gentleman who sold me my Indian spices and supplies at that time, advised putting a single unpeeled clove of garlic in the rice (5kg bag). Never had any trouble since, with rice from India or Thailand.

[Cookwithlove]

Hi,

Good morning, I am seeking professional advice on the proper storage of flour, I know it should be elavated up to 6 inches, what about the recommended temperature living in a country with high humility?

Thanks and cheers!

Alex

[Darienne]

Elevated 6" from what? I don't know about this and could you please explain?

Edited June 22, 2011 by Darienne (log)

[pastrygirl]

Elevated 6" from what? I don't know about this and could you please explain?

The floor. Standard for commercial kitchens, prevents contamination in case of floods/sewage backup, allows floors underneath shelving to be cleaned, harder for vermin to reach.

If you have high humidity, try to keep the flour airtight, like in a large cambro with a tight fitting lid: http://cool.cambro.com/CamSquares_Poly_CamSquare_Storage_Containers_and_Lids_Storage.ashx

Otherwise, room temp is likely going to be the easiest, and if you use your flour quickly enough, shouldn't be a problem.