In order to convert recipes from store bought flour to freshly milled, you must understand three things about grain. Protein, Wet Gluten and Water Absorption Capacity percentages. Read below to find out more about these three elements.
How does protein percentage affect baking? Read below to find out or click the link below to view various grains and their protein content.
Protein content in grain is essential to achieving the desired result in your bakes. The primary protein components in wheat, glutenin and gliadin, come together when mixed with water to create gluten strands providing structure in your dough. Protein contents 12% and below are suitable for cookies, cakes, batters like muffins, pancakes and delicate pastries. Grains with 12% protein and above are necessary for leavened doughs like breads and rolls.
Grains high in Protein, like Hard Red Spring Wheat, will have more gluten development and create strong doughs for breads like baguettes, sourdough and other artisan breads.
Lower protein grains like Soft White Winter Wheat are going to have a weaker structure allowing for soft, tender, crumbly textures in cake, and delicate pastries.
When converting a recipe to Fresh Milled Flour, it is essential to consider the protein content. In general, grain protein content range from 8% - 16.5% with the exception of gluten free grains which can reach 18% protein but lack gluten potential. The higher the protein, the chewier and stronger the resulting bread will be. The lower the protein the more tender and crumbly the texture will be.
Selecting your grain is personal preference but you will want to keep this scale in mind so that you can achieve the desired texture in your baked goods.
Gluten potential is important when choosing your grain. Modern wheat grains have been genetically modified to produce more gluten potential in it's protein allowing glutenin and gliadin to come together easier and create stronger bonds. Gluten free flour does not have the same gluten potential and therefore another agent needs to be added to achieve the desired results in breads. Ancient Grains are known for being high in protein but not all have good gluten potential.
Wet gluten content is essential to determining the gluten potential in your grains protein. Click below to see a breakdown of grain and their wet gluten content.
When a dough is made from milled grain and "washed" to remove the starch and soluble components, all that remains is wet, rubbery gluten. It is then weighed and this determines the gluten percentage in the grain. The higher the wet gluten percentage, the more gluten potential is available in the grain.
When choosing grain for specific recipes, it is essential to take into consideration not just the protein, but the wet gluten content as well. Modern grain has been genetically "steered" or modified through selective breeding to allow the glutenin and gliadin to connect and form gluten easier, and remain together better creating stronger doughs. Glutenin provides the framework for the dough, providing strength, while gliadin fills in the gaps, providing elasticity. Some ancient grains may have high protein but the gluten network will not be strong enough to allow proper gluten formation.
Just like choosing grain based on a protein scale, you must also consider the wet gluten like a scale. The higher the wet gluten percentage, the greater the strength and elasticity, while the lower the percentage, will yield a more tender, delicate crumb. Consider what you wish the desired texture to be and choose your grain based off of both the protein and wet gluten percentages.
Here we start getting technical! This is not something you need to know in order to follow a FMF recipe, but if you are interested in converting your existing recipes, Water Absorbency Capacity is vital to understanding the necessary hydration levels. Click below to view various grains' WAC
Water absorbency capacity in grains is the amount of moisture the flour from the milled grain, can absorb and still maintain a workable consistency. . Knowing a grains WAC percentage will allow you to substitute a different grain than a recipe calls for and adjust the liquid accordingly.
Adjusting recipes require a basic understanding of bakers percentages.
Bakers percentages are a method of expressing a recipe in percentages, with flour being 100%. Everything is is based off of the flours weight. To determine the hydration of your recipe, take the weight of your liquid in grams (water or milk) and divide it by the flour weight in grams. Then multiply it by 100. for example. In a recipe with 425g AP flour and 300g water the equation will look like this:
300/425=0.7 0.7x100 =70 Therefore the hydration is 70%
Every grain has a different water absorption capacity. In order to substitute a fresh milled grain for AP flour in a recipe you need to know the WAC percentage in AP flour and adjust the hydration according to the WAC in your grain.
AP flour has a WAC content around 60%. Knowing this will allow us to adjust the liquid in our recipe. Lets take the above recipe of 425 g bread flour and 300g water. I would like to substitute Hard White Wheat for AP flour in this recipe. Hard White Wheat has a WAC of 65%. That is 5% more than AP flour so I need to increase the water by five percent. That would make the hydration level of my dough 75%.
To find out how many grams of water that is, lets reverse our formula. Take our goal hydration percentage, 75 and divide it by 100, then multiply that number by our flour in grams which is 425. The formula looks like this.
75/100= .75 .75x425=318.75 I round to the nearest whole number, therefore we will need 319 grams of water in our recipe.
Combining grains gets a bit more complicated. To make things easier I tend to just ignore the additional grain if it is under 25% of the total flour volume. For example. In my Basic Sandwich Loaf I use 400 grams of Hard White and 40 grams of Khorasan. 25% of 440 grams of combined flour would be 110 grams. I am well under that so my hydration will be minimally affected by the Khorasan.
But what if I want to do 50% Hard Red and Khorasan? In this case take your WAC percentages of the two grains. HRW 65% and Khorasan 72% Now take the recipe above of 425g AP flour and 300 grams water. Take half the flour (212.5 grams) and adjust it to the hydration of the Hard Red then adjust the other half to the Hard White. It will look like this:
AP flour has a hydration of 60% and Hard Red has a hydration of 65% that is 5% difference. The hydration of that recipe, as we found above is 70% we want it to be 75% . Using the formula above 75/100=.75 .75x212.5=159.375
AP flour has a hydration of 60% and Khorasan has a hydration of 70%, that is a 10% difference. The hydration of the above recipe is 70%, and with HWW we need it to be 80% so using the formula above 80/100=.8 .8x212.5=170
Add the totals together: 159.375+170=329.375 round to the nearest whole number for 329g grams of water will be used in our final recipe. The recipe will now look like, 212g Hard Red, 212g Khorasan and 329g water.
In a recipe like cookies, you will not have water or milk, instead take the grain you are using and adjust the flour up or down instead of the water based on the moisture content. Use the 60% WAC in AP flour and adjust the flour up or down based on the grain you are using. For example, if you are using Soft White Wheat with 52% WAC you will need to decrease your flour by 6%.
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