Question about using a 40 mesh sifter

Baking Tools
21

Actually I started out with 50% going through the #40! So pretty coarse.

22

Wow yeah, thatā€™s coarse.

More on milling techniques ā€“ I think the strategy was put forth by @homebreadbaker who will hopefully correct me if I got it wrong. (I will admit to being a little less careful, but I think this how to optimally aggressively use the stones.)

  1. Turn on the mill and set the stones to backed off from the knocking sound.
  2. Pour in the grain.
  3. Adjust the stones to ā€œjust knockingā€ with berries passing through ā€“ to protect the stones.
  4. Reset the stones to no knocking as the last berries are passing through (or at least shut the machine off immediately as soon as the last berry is through).
2 Likes
23

Iā€™m not sure I ever ā€œput anything forthā€ about it per sĆ©, but I did describe how I use my Mockmill pretty much like you described Melissa. I donā€™t recommend this, but in fact I actually push the mill harder than what you described. I turn on the mill and adjust so the stones are just touching then quickly pour in the grain. Then I immediately adjust finer until the rate of flour coming out of the spout is kind of slow. I know that is impossible to understand, and I donā€™t know what to do about that, but Iā€™ve developed an understanding from trial and error that has included multiple episodes of pushing the stones too hard so they got clogged up and the mill needed to be taken apart and cleaned. So now that Iā€™ve made that mistake a few times, I kind of know how far I can push it without that happening, and thatā€™s exactly how far I push it so I get the finest possible flour I can get with one pass of milling and no sifting.

There is a great video on this page of the Mockmill site that shows how to do what I am describing. Look for the one thatā€™s called ā€œHow to mill extra fine flourā€.

2 Likes
24

Paul: With regards to milling: I understand that if someone wants to have first pass flour (medium with most of the bran removed) then it is necessary to sift to an 85% extraction rate. If the stones are set close enough (the way the manufacturer says to) so that the resultant milled flour after sifting is close to that extraction rate why push the mill further ? The stones are ceramic and the stones will wear down if too close and the ceramic dust will wind up in your bread flour. Donā€™t remember the exact composition but when I spoke to Germany about the stones I found they are made with some kind of epoxy to hold the ceramic particles together. Even with the Wondermix grinder the manufacturer specifies NOT to set the wheels to close (metal burrs) as they will wear down quickly and where does the metal go???

Eric from Breadtopia did a video on the different mills and the resultant flour from the Mockmill with stones set like the manufacturer says produced the finest flour. My question is why does it need to be even finer than that?

You make some phenomenal looking breads, do you attribute part of your success to this ultra ultra fine flour or is this just your preference?

I have made some ryes using whole coarse grain meal (my preference is the Wondermix burr grinder for those as makes less fine powdery flour) which of course is very coarse and the crumb came out soft and beautiful. Of course I am not trying to make Wonder Bread either.

Interesting subject and views!

25

Thatā€™s a great video. Iā€™m going to try pushing the setting even farther next time. Hard berries only :slight_smile:

26
  1. I like to use whole grain flour for both taste and nutritional reasons
  2. I think that fine flour makes a more manageable, better performing dough (more elastic and more extensible)
  3. Iā€™m too lazy to either sift or do multiple millings

Balancing all three of those, I want to get the finest flour I can from one pass through the mill.

As far as I understand it, the mill stones in the Mockmill are made of corundum, a mineral that is pretty hard. I think that the way I do what I do, the stones spend very little time in actual contact with each other because I only ā€œsqueezeā€ them together when there are berries in the mill which keeps the stones separated. Putting some pressure on the stones while the berries are being milled results in pretty fine flour. I always back the stones off right at the end, before the last berries are finished milling.

Again, I donā€™t recommend this. Itā€™s probably bad practice and Iā€™m probably going to hell for it. But in the mean time, I like the flour I get from my mill a lot.

1 Like