Great River Organic Milling – Best Flour for Cooking
Every baker knows that the quality of baked food directly depends on the quality of flour, regardless of what you bake – cake, pizza, or cookies. Walking into a supermarket, you’ll find dozens of brands of flour on the shelves, but not all of them are trustworthy and really make good products. Bad flour often makes your food tasteless, and the buns or bread you bake are impossible to bite off because they stretch like rubber.
We decided to help users solve the problem of choosing good flour and made this article, in which we talked about a flour company that is worth your attention.
In this article, we’re talking about Great River Organic Milling. How is this company different from the rest? It’s simple: many manufacturers make flour based on old unchanging traditions. But after years, these traditions lose their strength, their flour loses to those who are constantly developing production technologies.
Great River Organic Milling is constantly improving its technology, each year learning how to grind flour even better and more efficiently. The company uses the finest grains and grinds them using granite stones that slowly rotate between the grains. Thus, it’s possible to create a delicate, nutritious, and high-quality flour that retains all the nutrients from the bran.
Of course, we also chose the most versatile flour model from this company, which you can use for both bread making and sweet crispy biscuits. This is Lily White Bread Flour. This is a model that’s mainly intended for bread but makes any food soft and nutritious.
Contents
- 1 Great River Organic Milling – Best Flour for Cooking
- 2 Here Our Top List 11 Best Great River Organic Milling Products – Editor’s Choice
- 2.1 1# Great River Organic Milling Lily While All-Purpose Flour – Our Best Pick
- 2.2 2# Great River Organic Milling Whole Grains Hard Red Flour – Our Red Spring Pick
- 2.3 3# Great River Organic Milling Whole Wheat Bread Flour – Our Budget Pick
- 2.4 4# Great River Organic Milling Bread Flour Blend – Our Best Blend
- 2.5 5# Great River Organic Milling Corn Flour – Our Best Corn Pick
- 2.6 6# Great River Organic Milling Steel Cut Oats
- 2.7 7# Great River Organic Milling Einkorn Wheat Grain
- 2.8 8# Great River Organic Milling Whole Grain Durum Wheat
- 2.9 9# Great River Organic Milling Brown Rice Flour
- 2.10 10# Great River Organic Milling Pancake Mix Flour
- 2.11 11# Great River Organic Milling
- 3 What to Look For in a Good Flour
- 4 How To Make Bread
- 5 Best Kitchen Apron 2023
- 6 Best Automatic Espresso Machine 2023
- 7 Best Wood for Cutting Board 2023
- 8 Best Kitchen Trash Can 2023
- 9 Best Stand Mixer For Bread 2023
- 10 Best Bottle Drying Rack 2023
- 11 Best Silicone Baking Mat 2023
- 12 Best Shop Stool 2023
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Here Our Top List 11 Best Great River Organic Milling Products – Editor’s Choice
In principle, the flours of this brand are about the same, but there are several important points that users do not pay attention to. We’ve compiled a list of the top 11 Great River flours for you, evaluating all their advantages and disadvantages.
1# Great River Organic Milling Lily While All-Purpose Flour – Our Best Pick
White Lily is great for those who like to bake bread in the traditional way. She also makes a great dough if you want to please the family with sweet buns or a French butte. Thanks to its flexibility and versatility, we have chosen this flour as the best.
The rest of the models do well with bread, but for something else they don’t work as well. Also, this product is QAI approved and is free of GMOs, gluten, and other harmful substances. A 25-pound bag is enough for even a month’s daily cooking, so it’s very practical.
2# Great River Organic Milling Whole Grains Hard Red Flour – Our Red Spring Pick
Red wheat flour has its own unique aroma and a rather hard coarse structure. Bread from this variety turns out to be very aromatic, tasty, but hard, when cut it almost doesn’t crumble. Therefore, for lovers of such bread, this particular model of flour will be the best choice. It’s rich in protein, doesn’t contain harmful substances, and rises quite quickly. The key feature of this flour is that the bread is quite hard, but not rubbery like in Italian brands.
3# Great River Organic Milling Whole Wheat Bread Flour – Our Budget Pick
If you’re looking for a small bag of flour to sample the Great River brand, you can try this option. Two or four bags are very cheap, but they are enough for several batches of bread. The flour is made from selected whole grain wheat, without the addition of various additives and GMOs. This flour is great for lovers of European bread, especially Dutch and German because they are rich in aromas and in the grains contained inside.
4# Great River Organic Milling Bread Flour Blend – Our Best Blend
Bled bread is well suited for sandwich bread and pizza dough. This bread turns out to be quite soft and dense. This flour model has won several awards for the best gluten-free and non-GMO flour. It also works well for traditional bread, but it has a rather specific taste. Overall, this is a great mix for quite a bit of money.
5# Great River Organic Milling Corn Flour – Our Best Corn Pick
Cornbread is one of our favorites, so we couldn’t resist adding this flour to the list. It also makes great corn pancakes. Due to the fact that flour does not contain a very large amount of protein, baked goods are very soft. This is one of the softest flours. Plus, the dough grows quickly enough when baking, so you can shape the bread very quickly and throw it into the oven. Like all the previous ones, this model is free of GMOs and other harmful additives.
6# Great River Organic Milling Steel Cut Oats
Thanks to the careful selection of cereals and running them through steel blades, this combined flour is obtained: with small and large pieces. Small pieces form the basis of your baked goods, while large pieces give them a nutty flavor and thickness. The cooking time for this flour is slightly longer, but your wait is definitely worth it. In addition, it is less high in calories than other types of flour, so bread made from this type of flour is perfect for people on a diet.
7# Great River Organic Milling Einkorn Wheat Grain
This flour has the highest protein content and the lowest gluten content. It is perfect for people with gluten allergies and children who love hearty classic bread. The wheat variety from which flour is made is the oldest. In the production of this model of flour, the manufacturer uses the classic technology of grinding with granite stones. This flour is often used by southern chefs and bakers. If you want to make protein-rich bread or diet cookies, this flour is for you.
8# Great River Organic Milling Whole Grain Durum Wheat
Like the previous model, this flour has a high protein content, but so does the gluten content. Great River whole grain flour has a rather heavy structure and turns out to be quite tough bread. But along with this, it acquires an exquisite smell and aroma. We usually mix this with other flours to soften the dough. Then it turns out just an explosive combo and the bread becomes very tasty. But you can use it however you like.
9# Great River Organic Milling Brown Rice Flour
Brown rice flour has more nutrients and fiber than any other flour or white rice flour. Bread and other baked goods made from such flour turn out to be very satisfying and nutritious, rarely has any specific smell. Unless you mix it with some other kind of flour. Only high-quality and nutrient-rich brown rice grains are selected for grinding. Throughout the entire process of making flour, the grains are not subjected to any chemical treatment or the addition of GMOs. This product is completely safe for your health.
10# Great River Organic Milling Pancake Mix Flour
An excellent mixture of different types of flour for making pastries, cakes, and filled cookies. Thanks to such flour, the dough turns out to be as melting and soft as possible and is easily soaked in cream or jam. For extra thickness, you can add some plain white flour to this variety to make the dough thicker. Nonetheless, it is a great dough for pastry bakers. Its only drawback is the price.
11# Great River Organic Milling
Quinoa grain has a very specific taste, but it still has a lot of fans, so bread made from this flour is also popular. Flour made from this grain is an excellent source of protein and protein, so pieces of bread and pastries made from this flour are often eaten by weight watchers and athletes. If you are one of them, this is your choice. All grains are thoroughly cleaned before grinding, after which they are crushed using granite stones. Thus, completely safe for health flour without GMOs appears on your table.
What to Look For in a Good Flour
Flour has several important qualities to look out for when buying. Let’s figure out how to choose good flour and what to look for when buying.
- Gluten & Protein. Flour initially has protein in its composition. And the higher the protein content, the higher the gluten content usually. What does this affect? Protein and gluten give baked goods their special flavor and texture, making them crisper and softer. For a good pizza crisp, you need flour that is high in protein and gluten. If you want to bake more versatile items like bread, rolls, or cakes, then you might want to go for flour that is low in gluten and protein. Plus, some people are severely allergic to gluten, so high protein flours just don’t work for them.
- Grain Type. Also, the taste and type of your baked goods depending on the grains from which the flour is made. For making traditional bread or rolls, finely ground winter or spring wheat flour is best. Need bread with chunks of grain or crusty and chewy bread? Then it is better to take flour with coarse grinding. You can also try corn flour, brown rice, or white rice.
- Price. The price is not as important a factor as the previous two, but it is still worth considering. You can find good flour for both $15 and $70. But beware, because if you want a premium flour, the price can skyrocket.
Different Types Of Flours
Beginner bakers are often confused between the types of flour and cannot figure out which variety they need to bake them. Now we will help you figure it out.
- Bread Flour. Bread flour is mainly used for baking bread. But it is also often used to bake buns, pretzels, etc. The protein level in such flour is average – 11-13%, which makes the bread quite chewy and soft. It is not necessary to use bread flour only for baking bread, but if you are looking for a simple and affordable option, then this type of flour is best for you.
- All-Purpose Flour. As the name suggests, this is the most versatile type of flour. It is used for baking almost everything: bread, pizza, buns, cakes, etc. In its structure, such flour always contains hard and soft wheat. When grinding it, the only endosperm is used, so the protein content is reduced here – only 9-11%. This type of flour comes in two varieties: bleached and unbleached. We recommend that you always take unbleached because it’s of higher quality and baked goods from this type are more fluffy and nutritious.
- Whole Wheat Flour. This flour is milled from whole grains and contains three main parts: endosperm, germ, and bran. This flour is much heavier than white or all-purpose flour, but it contains more nutrients, so bread from such flour is always very nutritious. This flour has the highest protein content of all types: 12-15%. Because of this, many bakers mix this flour with other varieties to make the texture lighter.
- White Whole Wheat Flour. White whole wheat flour is the same as whole wheat flour. The most important difference is that white whole wheat flour is made from lighter-colored grains. Also, this type of flour is sweeter than whole wheat.
Final Words
Well, it seems like the time has come to pick a winner among the flour models that we included on our list. Although objectively the best model cannot be here, since each flour has its own unique characteristics and different uses in baking. But first of all, we were guided by the versatility and tried to find the variety with which you can bake bread, and pretzels, and buns, and cookies or cakes. So we can say that we choose the most versatile flour, not the best.
So, the best flour is Lily While All-Purpose Flour. It is this model that you can use as you wish. We personally tested it by trying to bake bread, buns, and cookie dough. In all three cases, the dough always rose fairly quickly, and the finished meal came out the way we wanted it, nutritious and tasty. The bread chewed well and the biscuits were soft but crispy.
We hope our guide was helpful for you and now you know which type and model of flour you need. If we helped you, then share this article with your friends. Thanks for reading us.