You can go about making pizza with any old flour. I've done it with lots of brands like King Arthur, Bob's Red Mill, Caputo, Gold, Shepherd's Grain and others. Each varietal of wheat lends its unique flavor and behavior to the pizza dough. There are so very many factors that go into making good flour, which I was blissfully unaware of before we went to Cairnspring Mills headquarters in the Skagit Valley. I now make the trip out there once every couple of weeks to pick up flour from them, and I love getting to talk flour with the flour nerds of Cairnspring. They make the best flour around, and not only is it great flour, they ensure that their grains are coming from local farmers who are being compensated fairly, and are treating their land with respect and with future generations in mind - using regenerative farming practices is the new cool thing, and if you're not with us, you're living in the past, man.​​

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On our mill tour, we got to see lots of top-secret stuff that we can't show, but we did get a few cool pictures of us with some of the less secret stuff:

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Would you believe us if we told you that they still use a windmill to power their millstones? That would be pretty gullible of you - of course they don't do that. They actually utilize some cool physics to get the flour milled to just the right consistency, and to remove as much bran as they want for each blend. It was a treat to see it all, and we have to thank them for giving us such a detailed tour.

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I want these blog posts to be useful to you, so I think this would be a great time to describe some of the key metrics that flour has.

 

We'll start with the easy one, "ash content". The ash content is essentially how much of the wheat hull, or bran is left in the flour mix. Bran adds some flavor, but it breaks up the gluten structure at higher levels. The bran acts like little razors, cutting the beautiful webs of gluten that form the structure of bread and pizza.

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Next is another easy one - "protein content". This refers to the amount of gluten in the flour. This comes down to the varietal of wheat, and also the conditions in which the wheat is grown (this surprising fact is one of many that I learned from the flour nerds.) Certain types of wheat have higher gluten content than others, and a good mill will blend their wheat in a way to maintain consistent amounts of gluten so that we can have a consistent product for you! Gluten is the key to a good stretch, and it's what sticks together when the steam tries to escape after you put the pizza in our hot oven. High gluten means stretchy, chewy, low gluten means flat, crunchy, potentially cracker-y dough.

 

Finally, the last piece of dough-making wisdom I'll spill has to do with the uniqueness of each wheat varietal from which the flour is made. Believe it or not, there are over 30,000 - that's right, thirty THOUSAND - species of wheat out there, and each one has its own character which adds to the flavor, stretchiness and texture of the bread from the flour made from it. If you're interested in a neat read, you can check out the Kansas Farm Bureau's Wheat fun fact sheet. Now, believe it or not, each strain of wheat will have its own properties which affect how it "wants" to be kneaded, which will affect the texture of your bread or dough. You can get something called a farinograph for your flour, which will tell you how long to knead before the gluten structure is no longer benefiting from your work, which will help you to make better product. It's all interesting stuff, and you can absolutely nerd out on it, starting with this wikipedia page if you'd like. I can tell you, the people at Cairnspring have, and do, nerd out on this stuff, and it is really fun to learn about. For us, all we need to know is that each flour will have its own character, and you should know that so you can find out how to best use it.

 

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