This is the comment thread for the Breadtopia blog post originally published here:
If you do not see the “Reply” button, you will need to log in or register an account. Please click the blue “Log In” button in the upper right of the page. 
Looks great! Have you tried adding just a little rye as people often do with bread for even more flavor?
For pizza, I’m all about the low key wheat flavors, but topping options could change my mind there lol.
Maybe lower the hydration by a few points because you’re adding stickiness to a dough you want to be able to stretch and shift around.
The pizza looks great. How does this all purpose whole wheat flour compare to the whole wheat bread flour. Can I substitute?
Thanks
Dennis
I think you’ll get a good pizza dough from the whole grain bread flour too, but the flavor may be a little wheatier. Also because of the higher gluten level in the bread flour, the dough could probably take more water, and the final texture might be chewier.
I made this today! Had some interesting results.
First I would like to say that I used white whole wheat flour, King Arthur brand.
Second, this pizza was AMAZING as far as taste goes.
Third, I would consider myself a pretty experienced pizza baker and whole wheat bread baker, so I already had somewhat of an idea of what I was doing. I also split this into 3 pizzas.
My issue was that the dough wasn’t strong enough, at first. On my first attempt I started to stretch it like I would yeasted pizza dough and it got a hole pretty quickly. So I rolled it back up and started on the second one.
Both the second and third I managed to keep them whole, but transferring to the baking steel that I use was incredibly difficult and neither one held up as far as shape.
The third one, after sitting for 20 minutes, was totally different. It held up great, stretched evenly. It was easy to transfer loaded with toppings and it looked perfect! However, it didn’t puff up as nicely as the other ones and is a little denser.
I’m not sure what to do different next time, I’m thinking about reducing the hydration a little. I probably should anyway since white WW probably absorbs a little less water than red.
As you suggested, @Fermentada, I tried this with some Warthog flour, which I remilled to to get it finer (like a Tipo 00). The dough was super-slack and took a LOT of hand-mixing to get it to hold together well. At the end of bulk it seemed like the dough would have made fantastic whole wheat ciabatta! But when I made the pizzas I did them with the dough straight out of the fridge - if I’d let them come to room temp they would have been impossible to handle and even cold they needed a lot of flour for them to be usable.
The pizza turned out well, but I have to say I thought they dough itself was too wheaty- it unbalanced the flavors. But that may have been due to the Warthog itself. Something like a hard white spring wheat might be a better choice (for me, anyway).
Nice looking pizzas! I think reducing the hydration might help as you noted. With any pizza dough, there seems to be a window of how much stretching and handling works before things get wonky, and with whole grain pizza dough that window is pretty narrow. Like if I start to shape the dough, I’d better finish within a minute or so, and get it onto a flour-cornmeal laced peel asap.
That third dough you had to reshape must’ve had the gluten strengthened quite a bit when you had to ball it up again. That has happened to me before, though it was a white flour dough, and I probably only let it rest 5-10 minutes. I ended up with a tiny and tall pizza.
I couldn’t resist finding it for you in my photos. It’s practically a bialy lol.
I suspect Breadtopia’s hard red winter wheat has both stronger gluten and a less wheaty flavor than warthog, though they’re both red winter wheats. I’m sorry for the recommendation not quite working out! I feel the same way about too wheaty flavor unbalancing the pizza experience, and this new wheat doesn’t have that issue for me. Next time you’re ordering berries, you should give it a go. Similarly my teens devoured all the 100% whole wheat baguettes I made with this wheat, and I don’t think they would’ve done that with other red wheats.
@Fermentada do you know when the hard red winter wheat will be available? I have the White Spring Wheat - both hard and soft, and the hard red spring wheat berries too. But the only winter wheat I have is the Warthog.
The hard red winter berries should be available at the end of this week. And if you’re shopping… 
I finally got to try that bolted AP flour made from the same berries a couple of days ago. I just started with muffins but wow, I may be done with white AP. I’ll do challah, baguettes, pizza etc soon.
@Fermentada Melissa, how does the Hard Red Winter wheat differ from Turkey Red or are they interchangeable in use? I have both Turkey Red and Hard White Spring berries in my freezer. I basically use them both interchangeably or in a combination when I’m adding whole grain to my breads.
Bolted AP flour from those berries? Your comment about maybe being done with white AP is intriguing to me. Can you elaborate?
@Leah1 ‘Hard Red Winter Wheat’ is non specific. It could be any variety of Hard Red Winter Wheat. I would imagine when it’s non specific it would be referring to a common bread flour. Whereas Turkey Red is a specific variety grown for its unique flavour and wouldn’t be hybridised with any other common wheat grain. There will be shared properties but like any flour, especially with these unique varieties, there will be differences when it comes to hydration, taste and leavening abilities.
In the UK flour is not usually sold by the type of wheat unless it’s a special variety (today was the first time I saw in the description of a flour that a Hard Red Spring Wheat was added to the blend). So they are described as plain flour, bread flour or strong bread flour etc. Just which varieties of the common wheats i’m assuming it’s the choice of the company. Whether it is one variety or a mix i’m assuming it’s done with a flavour and/or flour strength in mind but they don’t usually identify the flour as Hard Red Spring Wheat, for example. However if it’s a special single variety it’ll be sold as khorasan or durum or Einkorn etc.
@Leah1 @Abe This hard red winter wheat has about 12% protein, which is lower than most hard red spring wheats, including turkey red I believe.
And even among winter wheats, there are differences. This wheat is higher in protein than
the red winter wheat in Breadtopia’s refined AP, which is 10-10.5%. And it’s lower than warthog, which is a little over 13%.
The flavor is less bran-y than most spring wheats in my opinion, which makes it well suited to baking where you want other flavors to dominate (e.g. pizza). I do, of course, also enjoy the flavor of all the different red spring wheats too, and Kamut and durum are welcome to dominate my pizzas lol, and white wheats and einkorn have similar benefits in sweets baking. So many choices are delicious in my opinion.
Re: The bolted AP flour specifically though, it made muffins that looked and felt (texture /mouth feel) so similar to refined AP baked goods that I thought, why would I ever forgo this extra nutrition in my baking again? Of course I’ll still make whole grain einkorn cookies and soft white wheat cakes, but I don’t think I need to stock a refined AP anymore for my occasional fluffier baking, and I’m really looking forward to seeing how it does in pizza, ciabatta, and baguettes.
@Fermentada Melissa and @Abe Abe, I haven’t ventured out to stock numerous varieties of grain due to storage. I store what I need in my freezer so I keep a limited variety of berries to mill that seem to cover what I typically bake: Hard White Spring, Turkey Red, Rye and Kamut. I’ve used all of these in a variety of combinations and bakes with tasty success. Cyril is fed white AP flour and I’ve got some cornmeal for cornbread. Almost forgot, I’ve got some whole wheat pastry flour too.
Now that I’ve gained 8 pounds comfort eating since COVID has dominated our lives I must stop the “occasional fluffier baking” since I have discovered I have absolutely no stopping mechanism and I eat it all! My hubby has lost over 20+ pounds designing and building a patio outside and I’ve gained 8 pounds baking and eating! Oy vey!
Many blessings,
Leah
There is no science to support the idea your body will derive any additional nutrition from spouted grains. I just read about this a few weeks ago, was surprised. I had always presumed additional nutrition would come from sprouted grains. I never considered maybe there isn’t any, and even if there is, will the nutrition be in a form that allows your body to take up that nutrition in any meaningful way? Apparently, no one has done the science on sprouted grains, no one has studied them, no one knows what, if any, nutritional value they add.
While the research is certainly in its infancy and ongoing there is strong evidence that sprouted grains do have an advantage. They are still carbs (which in itself is perfectly healthy to eat as part of a balanced diet) but do come with some additional health benefits.
Bolted flour is partly sifted flour aka high extraction from the milling process. It has some germ and bran. This Bolted AP flour is not sprouted.
That’s a long read. Can you share what the strong evidence is.
What I read a few weeks ago was along the line of the presumption that nutrients existing does not always equate to the nutrients being available, or if they are available, that they will be in a state the body can use them. And, even if there are addition nutrients, and those nutrients are just sitting there, ready to go, are there enough of them to justify the whole “sprouted” experience?
Thank you! My misread of your post. Sorry.
