No bread flour

JIL

Oh @London_1, you reminded me of our trip to Ireland and the soda scones cooked for breakfast absolutely gorgeous. Cut and griddle as triangles. Much better than any hash brown.

My mother in law brought up 8 children and kept half the town fed with her soda bread.  Sadly she now has dementia and every other week I make her a soda scone/bread.  I know it's her illness, but she thinks when she has some, she has made it herself that morning. So it must be ok.

ariarnia

can we get the recipe for soda scones and bread please @London_1 @JIL ? 

maryb

I've noticed a big lack of strong bread flour in the discount supermarkets but they have it occasionally so I stock up when I see it.  But I have successfully made bread with half plain and half strong.  It ekes out the strong bread flour and the overall gluten level seems to be high enough to get the bread to rise - probably about the level of ordinary (ie not strong) bread flour.  Another thing that might help is to add some Vit C powder to the flour, it's often used as a dough enhancer

bouicca21

I’m always confused about bread flour.  Isn’t strong flour imported?  What was bread like before it was available?  And don’t the French use ordinary flour to make baguettes?

Or is all I think I know just a myth?

PS I’ve had no trouble getting bread flour from Aldi.

maryb

Strong flour always used to be imported (remember school geography lessons saying all our bread flour came from Canada?) but since the 1960s plant breeders have developed strains of wheat with higher gluten levels.  

JIL

ariarnia said:

can we get the recipe for soda scones and bread please @London_1 @JIL ? 

I use buttermilk, expensive but my mil is worth it. Otherwise use all milk.

In a bowl put 600mls of milk or half butter milk and milk. Add a couple of teaspoons of either lemon juice or apple vinegar. Leave it for a good half hour. Then add 750g self raising flour and a heaped teaspoon of bicarbonate of soda. Form it into a dough, bring it into a round and onto a baking sheet (I use greaseproof paper) make a cross in the top, apparently to let the fairies out)

Bake for 35 to 40 mins.

My mother in law used a cast iron pan to bake hers in, she also used to put dried fruit and sometimes treacle in other variations. 

Katiehound

cross on the top- to let the / keep the devil out! is my understanding

JIL

My mother in law is a religious woman so it surprised me about the fairies tale.
I was intrigued so found this on the web and enjoyed reading it so much I'm posting the link.

https://www.bbc.com/travel/article/20160920-secrets-of-the-soda-bread-masters

Katiehound

Liked the story

One of the restaurants I visit sometimes- in Kerry has soda bread with walnuts. Yummy- not sure if they bake it themselves but if not careful we are full before the main course arrives!!

QrizB

slm6002 said:

Recently I have struggled to get any bread flour to stock up my supplies, and I was wondering if I can substitute it with plain flour instead.  I only really make bread or pizza dough in my bread maker but have always followed the recipe from the book that came with the machine.

Why don't you try it and see?

I've been making my bread in a breadmaker with plain flour for years. Always turns out fine.