Tuesday 14 April 2015

Flour Is Not Just Flour

After reading on several blogs about bread flour from Lidl being so cheap I bought some as I was coming to the end of the flour I had, well you get what you pay for I just didn't like the bread it produced, I then went on to try some from Tesco again a dense heavy bread, so I return to buying my flour from the mill
Last year I had a sack of brad flour from this mill and I was impressed with the quality, the previous year I had flour from another mill who's name I cannot remember.
My previous sack run out about a month ago that is when I tried the alternatives.
I buy it in 16kg sacks this time round I had  Rustic Crunch brown which has seeds in it cost £27.13 works out at roughly 85p a loaf and the White cost £30 roughly 94p a loaf, it came with free delivery it may work our slightly dearer but the quality is far better.
I have stored it in these barrels
labelled so I know what is what and they can be kept in the side porch were it is nice and cool, flour should be stored in airtight containers and kept in cool conditions I think that is part of the problems with shops, they are so warm.
This is the loaf is made today with the seeded flour
I also made a batch of bread rolls from the white and they are in the freezer for the week-end

While I had the labeller out 
I labelled the animal food bins, they usually stay in there order but sometimes when they are getting refilled they get shuffled around the you ave to open them to find the one you are looking for.

As I was in the barn I decided to cover the top of the brooder with chicken wire
I can now leave the barn door open when I am coming and going and not worry about cats or Kara taking a fancy to the babies, Wednesday is on the left, Friday in the middle and little Sunday following behind on the right, what a difference a few days make between them.

I made a start with planting out one of the borders
This summer jasmine was desperate to get into the ground, I have strung wire across the fence for it to scramble over.
I got more seeds sown today, Beans in the greenhouse, celery snowball turnips and bulb fennel outdoors. While sowing seeds and doing some hoeing I noticed this little splash of colour
Almond blossom, there is a good handful open and more buds to come on, we got a nice few Almonds last year off our tree while it was being grown in a container, I did get it in the ground some time ago.

That's my day today just lots of little jobs one leading to another :-)

19 comments:

  1. I love days when lots of little jobs get done, so rewarding. Ducklings look so cute!

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    1. As long as I complete them and dont get distracted jumping from one job to another

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  2. That flour sounds interesting. I recently got a 16kg bag of malted wheat flour from Approved Foods for £5.49 its made some lovely bread. My favourite "local" flour is Marriages from a Mill in Chelmsford in Essex. There is a small producer local to us but the price is silly expensive.

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  3. Your bread looks lovely and light. I want to make my bread when I retire. I have experimented and found I need a fifty fifty mix of white and brown.

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    1. The seeded bread flour is a not a strong wholemeal flour so it is nice and light and very tasty

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  4. Jealousy bites, the ducklings are so cute and your blossom is open, mine is still just tight buds of colour. I am using lidl white flour but am mixing it half and half with some good stoneground wholemeal flour from a small mill, I get it from a place just outside Cardigan, the name escapes me.

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    1. My tree is planted in full sun perhaps that's the difference

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  5. I didn't know that different flours could make such a difference, I guess that it is down to the quality of the wheat and the way that it is ground. The ducks are very cute in their little group! xx

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    1. Also the age of the wheat and flour and how it has been stored

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  6. I have used Lidl bread flour for some years now and must say that my bread hasn't been so good recently, so maybe I need to change.
    Iv'e noticed that our peach tree has flowered for the first time this week. (we have had the tree three years) so fingers crossed that we have no frost.
    Pretty ducklings

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    1. fingers crossed keep an eye on the forcast and throw a fleece over it if frost is perdicted

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  7. Lidl bread flour isn't a flour...
    it is a complete bread mix...
    yeast, salt and all....
    if you use it following a normal recipe...
    you will get a very strange over-yeasty, over-salty taste...
    quite off putting!!

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    1. Thanks I will keep that in mind if I ever try it again

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  8. Waitrose Canadian flour is really good and you can use it for pasta as it is a 00 flour.

    Pattypan

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    1. I dont think we have a Waitrose near here

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  9. I agree with you about flour quality - I love the Bacheldre Mill flour for bread too. Do you get yours through the shop Co-op in the village? I always think you are what you eat, so go for the best flours.

    I've not thought of growing Almonds, so that's definitely a planting for when we've moved.

    Pam - is it the water mill at St Dogmael's? I had some lovely organic wholewheat flour from them when we were visiting last summer.

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    1. I order it through Amazon, they trade on there and get free delivery :-)

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  10. I have contemplated a sack of that flour from amazon, now might be the time to buy some :) I laughed at your feed labelling system(in a nice way) we did similar but now we label the base instead of the lids because one day I left hubby in charge for a day all the lids were mixed up!!!

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