Welcome To The Hungarian High Altitude Unbleached All Purpose Flour Test
Part of the Bug Flour Test
Please note - we are not connected with any flour vendor mentioned on this web site. We can't tell you where to find any of these flours outside our own home town, and we have no idea why the vendor discontinued your favorite flour, or why your favorite recipe is no longer on the back of the package. And now... here's the review of this flour..... |
Where we bought it: City Market, Gunnison, Colorado
What we paid for it: $5.00 for 25 pounds
Protein content: 10%
Interesting Vendor Story: The name confuses everyone. Many people here in Gunnison, Colorado, at an altitude of 7,703 feet (2,346 meters) above sea level, think this flour is good to use at high altitudes. Actually, it's no better than any other flour at high altitudes. And they are confused about the "Hungarian" part too.
The "Hungarian" part of the name comes from the process used to mill the flour, which was developed in Hungary in the 1800's. It was brought to Colorado by J.K. Mullen in 1875, and is still used on this flour. The flour is milled from hard wheat from Colorado, the Dakotas, and Montana, so the "high altitude" refers to where the grain is grown - some people feel that grain grown at high altitude is healthier than other grains.
Our first impressions: We've used this flour on many occasions, because it's one of the cheaper ones at our local market. We've always thought it made good bread, and was useful for all the other usual kitchen chores - making roux, thickening gravies, making biscuits, breading meat and so on. As we started this test, we were very eager to see how the flour did in a controlled test.
We tested this flour right after the Wheat Montana Natural White Flour, and we noticed that the doughs made with this flour had an ever so slight yellow cast compared to the Wheat Montana Natural White. The breads also had a touch more color. Whether this is good or bad is a matter of aesthetics. We liked it, but then again, we felt the Wheat Montana Natural White was a bit too white.
The Breads
(sorry about the missing "family portrait")
Bohemian Rye The Bohemian Rye was everything it should be. It sang with a flavor that all but made our toes curl, with a nice balance between rye, caraway, and sourdough tastes. The crumb was well formed and had great mouth feel. The crust was thick and firm without going into the realm of bullet-proof. The Hungarian High Altitude Unbleached All Purpose flour's taste didn't get in the way of the rye tastes, but instead seemed to accentuate the overall taste. A winner.
Ciabatta is one of our favorite breads. It's a very simple bread that relies on the quality and suitability of its ingredients. The ciabatta we made was a visual delight, with great crust color. However, inside things were less delightful. The crumb wasn't as open as it should have been, and it was a bit too soft as well. The ciabatta's taste was a bit too mild, although it was able to absorb the appropriate 43 times its weight in olive oil in our ciabatta dipping tests. In the end, it was a hit here, but not a big hit, and people began asking if there was any of the Wheat Montana Natural White and Rocky Mountain Milling Artisan Flour combination ciabatta left.
Simple Sourdough Pan Bread came out much better with Hungarian High Altitude Unbleached All Purpose flour than it did with our previous test with Wheat Montana's Natural White flour. The sour taste was more forward than in the Wheat Montana version of this bread, and it had more of a wheat taste as well. The crumb was nicely open and somewhat soft without being insipid, and the crust was delightfully crisp. The bread had a nice color, and, as with the Wheat Montana version of this bread, made a killer grilled cheese sandwich. While we like this bread for sandwiches, and just for nibbling, somehow the crumb of this bread just does wonderful things with butter and cheese.
Three stage French bread is another simple bread that absolutely depends on quality ingredients to work right. For us, it was a near miss, with the taste of the bread not being as complex as when we've made this bread in the past with Rocky Mountain Milling's Artisan flour. The crumb was a bit softer than we'd like for this bread, though the crust and color were just fine. However, we can can forgive many flaws if the taste is right. And this time it wasn't quite all there. If we had to make this bread with this flour, we'd add a cup or so of whole wheat flour to pump a bit more life into the loaf.
Hydration Pictures
As is our custom, we took pictures at 60, 80, and 100% hydration. This flour seemed somewhat more moist at every hydration. This in turn caused the crumb to be somewhat softer than with some flours. We'd probably add a bit more flour to these recipes if we were to remake the breads.
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I love the hydration pictures. How did hydration correlate to the loaves though?
I’ve been doing 100% hydration, and it’s a bit of a challenge to work with the dough…
Hi Mark,
Thanks for the nice words and the question.
The correlation between hydration and the condition of the loaves is not as clear cut as many people want you to believe. Trevor J. Wilson has some great videos on open crumb, including getting an open crumb from stiff dough.
More to the point, there is no sainthood awarded for working with super high hydration doughs. I have friend who work with dough at over 120% hydration. My comment is, “OK dude, if that’s what you want to do.” A trick to get there – use basinage. That is, add enough water to get the dough to 65 or 70% hydration. When it is developed, add more water to get it 85 or 90%. WHen the dough is well developed and the water incorporated, add the rest of the water. This makes the dough easier to handle.
Good luck,
-Mike
thx. I’m gonna try switching to 90%
Hi Mark,
LOL! Most people start at lower hydrations and work their way up. For a white flour sandwich loaf 65 to 70 works well. For whole grain, 75 top 85 works well.
Please let us know how 90% works out for you.
-Mike
Started at 100% per recipe plus info (I forget the source) that high hydration is needed at altitude. not meant as a flex: whatever works is what I’m after. My early (yeast) loaves had too much structure and no oven spring.
Hi again Mark,
The Hungarian High Altitude flours got their names not because they were well suited to baking at a high altitude, but because they were grown at a high altitude. They were move flours and I enjoyed working with them.
I used to live and bake in Gunnison Colorado which is at 7,703 feet (2,347 meters) above sea level. As a result, I have a pretty good idea of how to bake at higher altitudes. We also taught classes in Crested Butte which is is about 1,100 feet higher in altitude.
We wrote up our hints for baking at an altitude in the page, “Baking With an Altitude“. Our doughs tended to be somewhat dryer than doughs made at sea level, and we used about 1/3 less riser than called for in the recipe. I think going to 90 or 100% hydration is just asking for trouble. Exoperienced bakers have trouble with doughs that are that slack.
Good luck,
-Mike
Thanks, that was good advice. I’m down to 75%-80% and having success now. …or 85% with a flour mix of 25% whole wheat.
Hi Mark,
Thanks for the feedback – sometimes I get things right! I have friends who try to outdo each other in hydration, I think they are missing the point. The point of baking is to make a bread you, and hopefully others, enjoy, not to make a bread with a higher hydration dough than anyone else can even imagine.
Best wishes,
Mike