Home-milling is a baking game changer
Using a mill isn’t any more challenging than using a toaster
Chris Wright pours a bowl of wheat kernels into a stone grain mill, an appliance about the size of a coffee maker. With the flick of a switch, the mill rumbles to life, quickly turning the pebbly, auburn grains into silky, beigecoloured flour that’s good for bread, pancake mix, pizza dough — almost anything that calls for flour.
“It’s like when you have a garden, and you can harvest everything and put it immediately to use,” Wright says. “This is as close as you can get to that fresh-picked tomato, in terms of flour, where the nutrition and flavour are at their peak.”
Last year, Wright launched the Pasta Lab, through which he sells a variety of fresh pastas made with 50 per cent self-milled flour.
But you don’t need to be in the commercial food business to mill your own grain.
“Milling is literally as simple as grinding some seeds with a bunch of stones,” Lost Bread Co. founder Alex Bois says. “And the mill is doing it for you.” Claire Kopp McWilliam s agrees, saying that using a mill isn’t any more challenging than using a toaster. “You set a setting and press a button,” said the head baker and miller at Philadelphia’s Vetri restaurant.
Still, compared with buying flour, why go to the trouble? For most millers, the answer is simple: flavour and nutrition.
“There’s no comparison. Eat a pinch of any commercial white flour, and it won’t taste like anything,” Bois says. But try fresh-milled grains, he says, and you’ll discover a spectrum of flavours. Milled rye has spicy and earthy characteristics, and barley’s taste is reminiscent of the smell of hay. Wheat, depending on the variety, can be nutty or grassy.
Even home-milled white flour is more flavourful, Wright says, because it contains the grain’s germ — the nutrient-rich part of the wheat kernel that commercial producers remove to make flour shelf-stable. Commercial whole-wheat flour also lacks the germ, which contains a small amount of healthful fat that can turn flour rancid.
To make flour at home, you need a countertop mill. Handcrank versions are available, but electric mills work easiest. Two of the most popular brands are Mockmill and KoMo; prices start about $500 (U.S.), but you can find cheaper options online. Nutrimill also offers compact mills, and its Harvest Grain Mill is available for $260. If you have a stand mixer, you can invest in a milling attachment for about $200 or less.
To make all-purpose flour, you’ll need two additional pieces of equipment: a sieve for sifting out the bran, and a bottom pan for catching the fine flour. Wright recommends a setup from online distributor Hogentogler, featuring a 12-inch fullheight brass-bottom pan ($34) and a 12-inch full-height brass test sieve, No. 60 Mesh ($77).
“If you have a small apartment with limited storage space, this might not be for you,” Wright says.
Home-milled flour starts with whole grains, such as wheat berries, rye, barley, spelt, oats and corn. All options have different protein contents, so base your choice on what you plan to make. (The website Foodal has a handy guide to grains you can use at home.)
Hard red wheat is best for bread, according to McWilliams. “It may be named something like redeemer or red fife or warthog or turkey red.” “Soft” wheat berries are lower in protein and typically gluten as well, making them better for biscuits, pancakes, crackers, cookies and pies — foods that don’t need a firm structure. If pasta is your goal, reach for durum or emmer, two types of hard wheat. Corn and oat groats work well for porridges.
The fun of home-milled flour is in experimenting. Rye, buckwheat and spelt flour can be incorporated into breads and pastries. Baked goods made with whole-grain flour can be dense, so you can mix them with all-purpose flour (storebought or home-ground) to lighten them up.
If you aren’t going to use the flour immediately, put it in the freezer; it will keep for several months. For recipes and expert answers, check out the Fresh Loaf, an online resource and community forum.