Serious question, when did bread flour stop being bread flour?

I've been baking bread for over 30 years now, and I keep noticing the younger bakers at the shop grabbing all-purpose flour for their sourdough loaves. They tell me it's fine, that protein content doesn't matter that much anymore. But I've tested it side by side three times now with the same recipe. The all-purpose batch came out flat every time, while the bread flour batch had that nice tall rise and chewy crust. The protein difference is usually around 3 percent between the two, which is nothing to ignore if you want structure. Has anyone else seen this trend at their local bakeries or is it just the folks here in Portland?

2 comments

2 Comments

uma_taylor471mo ago

Protein percentages have been getting bumped up across the board for years now so the gap between all-purpose and bread flour is way smaller than it used to be. Master a good autolyse and a strong fold schedule and you can get the same oven spring with all-purpose that you used to only get with bread flour.

josephmartin1mo ago

Oh man, have you checked the harvest year on that all-purpose flour? I've noticed a lot of mills are blending in more spring wheat to hit higher protein numbers for the home baker market, but the quality of that protein - the gluten strength - isn't the same as what you get from a dedicated bread flour blend. So your younger bakers might be right about the number on the bag, but wrong about what that number actually means for your dough.