Great River Organic Milling, Lily White Bread Flour, All-Purpose, Orga

Customer Reviews

Infested with worms and bugsThis was my family s second 25lb bag, so we were obviously pleased with the first bag and bought more. It was great to use for a variety of recipes to include Dutch oven bread, cookies, quick breads and pancakes. However the rest of this review will be based on our second and worm-nfested bag that we received. I store my flour in a large food-grade sealed bucket in our pantry. It is a cooler room too. I take about 5lbs of flour out of the larger bucket to store in a container in our kitchen to use in baking. About 4 months after receiving the flour, I went to make something and noticed that there were tiny worm holes everywhere and silk strings in my kitchen flour container. It was infested with worms. I then checked the larger container in my pantry and that had the bugs in addition to the worms too. The bugs were either in the bag from the manufacturer, or were picked up somewhere along the way in shipping it here. I sanitize my flour containers in between old/new bags, and did not open the larger pantry container in 4 months. I filled it directly from the flour bag it was shipped in. The fact that both containers had worms in them means that we ate some of the flour with worms in it unknowingly in other recipes in the months before the worms were noticeable. I am so disappointed and disgusted, especially considering that my family s health could have been negatively impacted by ingesting this food.1It isn't called Bread flour, but works great for artisan breadI was trying to find an organic flour for the breads I bake for the Farmer's Market. I really love King Arthur's but the organic version of King Arthur's is even more expensive than this brand. So even though I didn't have the option to buy a smaller amount to try it out, I thought I would give this a shot. Even though it isn't advertised as a bread flour, it is very light and fluffy like bread flour. I make sourdough, so maybe part of the nice crumb can be attributed to that, but this flour gives me a very nice crumb with varying whole sizes and a nice crust. Actually the crust after it has sat is not as hard as the King Arthur's so my customers actually like it better. I would buy it again. Wish the price was a little less. This was over two dollars a pound. That is the only reason I wouldn't give it 5 stars. I know Amazon does some kind of discount if you buy 5 things a month on a subscription basis, but I can't think of five things I need on a regular basis.4Although I have baked leaven risen loaves with this product very happily in the pastTake this review with a grain of salt or two. Although I have baked leaven risen loaves with this product very happily in the past, my most recent several attempts to bake bread with this flour have been utter failures (from a brand new 25lb bag of flour).The dough (which I bake using Ken Forkish recipes) has completely collapsed on me, three times in a row, which leads me to believe that I was sent a bag that was mis-marked, possibly soft winter white wheat for making pancakes and waffles, but definitely not bread flour. No gluten structure, no playful bounce back, just stickiness. Total failure. I have even increased the amount of both white and whole wheat flour in the mix, first by 10% and then by 20% to account for the heat or possibly the moisture content in the flour, but the dough is still tacky (though each time less so, but never not sticky). Going through the steps, when I remove the loaves from proofing, they just collapse, rendering the entire process useless.I've been careful not to over knead (I mix, I don't really knead). I've tried breads that are starter only based and starter and yeast based, I'm using the same salt and filtered water as ever, I took the rye flour out of the recipe so I am pretty sure it's the flour.Unfortunately, I don't have the bag the flour came in because I transfer it to an airtight container when I receive it. As for the possible mis-marking, it's just a hunch. I checked my order - bread flour - but I have my results, which are consistent with this order, which are complete failure, three baking cycles in a row.REVISION - I have been in contact with customer care at Great River, and they have been responsive and helpful. They have asked me to send them a sample of the flour (I no longer have the bag it came in) and will also replace the order. Upon further exploration, I see that I am not the only customer who has experienced a likely mismarking of their product, but I cannot fault them for their response. I will revise this when I get to the bottom of the story, but will raise my review from 1 Star to 4 Stars, based on previous shipments and thoughtful customer service.4Ok, but not the best.As an enthusiastic baker with nearly fifty years of experience, I was really eager to compare King Arthur Organic White Bread Flour, which has been my favorite (after beating out Guistos Organic years ago), with Great River Organic Lily Wite Bread Flour. I simultaneously made a baguette from each flour using the standard, simple recipe--2tsp.Red Star regular yeast, 2 cups water, 5 cups bread flour, 2tsp. salt. This made a very slack (moist) dough which looked and handled much the same with each brand of flour. The first photo is after the first rise of 1 1/2 hours (at 76 Fahrenheit), the second photo is after the second rise, the third photo is after shaping, the fourth photo is after the final rising and before slashing. The fifth and sixth photos are after baking. The dough handled much the same with both flours. After baking my family and I preferred the more complex flavor and more robust crumb of the King Arthur, which remains my gold standard. The King Arthur has a 12.7% protein content.The 5 lb bags of King Arthur are easier to manage and store, but they cost more per pound.P.s. Amazon printed only 2 of my photos, so I deleted those of the rising and shaped doughs because they were similar and reposted the final photos which show the different crust and crumb.4All great until the most recent order.Great River Organic Milling, Organic Whole Wheat Bread Flour, 25-Pound Package This is the third bag that I've ordered from Great River since last year. I've been baking bread using their organic whole wheat bread flour and my wild yeast since last year and it's always given me great-looking (nice rise and texture) and great-tasting breads. However, ever since we started using this bag, the result has been nothing but disappointing. At first, I suspected everything but the flour (I had a lot of faith). I kept on tweaking every detail until it dawned on me that something may be off with the flour because the dough would ferment well but it's lacking the rise as before. And my doubt was confirmed by a few recent comments as well.Now, I have to figure out what to do with a huge bag of flour that doesn't perform.Update January 2017 - This is an update from the previous three-star rating. I'm glad that I took a leap of faith and decided to give this brand one more try. I have to say that the recent bag that I purchased is of the best quality out of all 4 bags over the last 2.5 years. The difference is immediately noticed when the dough shows obvious life (I hope you know what I mean if you bake). I've made bread twice so far with 100% of this flour (and wild yeast) and have been extremely satisfied. Good flour gives confidence in knowing how the dough will react to different conditions. If the quality stays this way, I will recommend this product with no reservation.5The Best Flour Ever! Non GMO & ORGANIC!!!This is the absolute BEST flour ever! I use it to make all our loaves of bread. Very fine and white. I mix a little hard red wheat with it but I intent to try a loaf without the hard red wheat and see how it turns out. Amazon needs a like button!!! I would hit it 10 times! This is a definite 5 star product and we are lucky to have access to it considering how Monsanto has flooded this country with GMOs and poison grains! Thank you Amazon and Great River Company!5what's not to love?I can't say enough good things about this product. I've bought before and have had absolutely no problems. I can't find seven grain organic bread flour locally, and if I did I'm sure the price would be a lot higher than this on Amazon with free shipping. I just divide it up in gallon sized bags for the freezer and I have fresh, wholesome flour whenever I need it. The only difference when using this versus using regular bread flour is that you'll need a little extra moisture. Start out with one or two Tbs. of additional water and adjust as you go. Of course if you want the high and light white bread texture, some additional wheat gluten and yeast will do the trick. I've had a ball playing around with this stuff: just use it the first time as you would regular white bread flour [if that's all you've ever worked with] and then make some of the changes I mentioned. After the first time or two you'll know what to do to get it to behave exactly as you want.5Flour...and mothsWouldn't recommend buying this - both batches were infested with moths! We ordered this flour in July 2018. It sat in the pantry unopened for about 4 days then I opened it to make bread. It had been sat there for 5 mins when I noticed a moth on the outside of the bag. I didn't think much of it until I went to put it away and found a grub crawling down the side. On closer inspection there were cocoons, moths and grubs all around the inside of the bag. Needless to say it went straight outside. Having read that the flour is ground fresh for every order I figured it might be a one off and had the bag replaced (no issues with that - they were very quick and helpful). Two days later we had a new bag of flour on our doorstep. We pulled it inside and immediately decanted it into glass canning jars, sealed them and put them in the pantry. We went on vacation a week later and on our return all the jars had moths sat on the inside of the lids. There were also grub trails all through the flour and cocoons on the glass. We contacted Amazon and they've issued us a full refund. I'm assuming their mill is infested and would also question whether the flour is always ground to order as we had live moths and cocoons in the first batch - surely it takes longer than a few days for a moth to go through its whole lifecycle!?!1Best Flour EverYou could live on the bread made from this flour. I made a sponge first by warming two cups of water and putting it in a bowl with 4 1/2 tsp. yeast, 1 tablespoon olive oil and 2 tablespoons raw honey. I added enough of the seven grain flour and 2 tsp. organic apple cider vinegar to make a wet and sticky dough - called a sponge - that resembles a thick cake batter. I then let it sit covered in a warm place for one hour. When I took the cover off it was all fluffy and bubbly and alive. I put in enough flour to make a semi-sticky bread dough plus 1 1/2 tsp. salt and 2 tablespoons toasted sesame seeds (as per The Tao of Cooking - great tip for all whole wheat bread because it gives it a nutty flavor even if it's not 7 grain) - you don't need to add gluten - I believe if it's called bread flour it has gluten already added, but don't quote me on that. I kneaded it for 15 minutes adding enough flour to work with it, but not enough to make it dry. You don't want a heavy, immovable dough that's dry - it should stick to your hands a bit until the last minute or so of kneading. Cover and let rise an hour.I made one loaf and 6 large rolls from the above dough, put a deep slice in the middle of the rolls and two in the bread, smeared olive oil on top and used organic Earth Balance coconut spread to coat the pans which is what I use for all baking because nothing ever sticks with it and let them rise until the bread was an inch or more above the rim of the loaf pan. I put all of them into a 400 degree oven and cooked the rolls for 20 minutes and the bread for 35 minutes - but all ovens are different - they should be golden and hollow sounding when tapped with your finger. They were baked in the center of the oven not too close to any of the heat coils. Let the bread sit in the pan for at least 10 minutes or more after you remove it from the oven so it slides out easily.5DisappointedWhile the price on this flour is pretty good for organic, it doesn't perform as well as others. I go though almost 25# of flour per week and have used many different bread flours. I work with only sourdough. Also, keep in mind that the protein content of flour does not always equal gluten content. For example, spelt and einkorn are quite high in protein, but not much gluten. Gluten is protein, but protein is not necessarily gluten, when it comes to flour. Here are the pros and cons:Pros:1. Holds water very well so I can get a moist crumb without the stickiness while working with the dough2. The price is good for an organic bread flour3. The bread made with this flour has good flavorCons:1. The crust doesn't brown very well. I suspect there is no malted barley added to produce the sugars necessary for adequate browning. When I add diastatic malt to the mix I get a nice brown crust.2. The "skin" on the proofed loaves is not very strong. The loaf has cracks in unintended places when baked. It doesn't matter how I score the loaves, I get cracks where I don't want them.3. There is not as much oven spring as with King Arthur bread flours. This seems more of an artisan flour, similar to Bob's Red Mill Artisan Bread Flour, which I've used extensively.I will keep using this flour for a while and see if I can work with the cons. If I cannot get them straightened out, I'll have to go elsewhere for my bread flour. I've attached photos of a loaf made with this flour, and a loaf made with another brand of bread flour. Formulas were identical in both loaves.3

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Great River Organic Milling

Great River Organic Milling, Lily White Bread Flour, All-Purpose, Organic, 50-Pounds (Pack of 1)

Great River Organic Milling, Lily White Bread Flour, All-Purpose, Organic, 50-Pounds (Pack of 1)

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